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Blinken: "This is manifestly not Saigon" all over again in Afghanistan

15 August 2021
Dan Ackermann

As video emerged on Sunday of military helicopters landing near the U.S. embassy in Kabul to rapidly evacuate U.S. personnel, Secretary of State Antony Blinken assured: "This is manifestly not Saigon."

Driving the news: Blinken made the rounds on the Sunday shows to defend President Biden's resolute withdrawal of the U.S. military as Kabul nears complete surrender to the Taliban.

  • Jonathan Karl, the host of ABC's "This Week" asked Blinken whether the U.S. evacuation was comparable to Americans being airlifted from the U.S. embassy in Saigon in 1975.
  • "Let's take a step back. This is manifestly not Saigon," said Blinken, who argued: “In terms of what we set out to do in Afghanistan, we’ve done it.”

What he's saying: When asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" why Biden didn't delay the deal struck by President Trump on a 2021 withdrawal, Blinken said: "Because we inherited a deadline. ... Come May 2nd, if the president had decided to stay, all gloves would have been off. We would have been back at war."

  • Biden blamed Trump, for empowering the Taliban and leaving them "in the strongest position militarily since 2001" but said in a statement that he had to make a choice and that he would not pass on the war to a "fifth" U.S. president.
  • Blinken also said on "Meet" that the United States would have a "core diplomatic presence" in Kabul, adding: "In effect, an embassy at a location at the airport."

What else is happening: Blinken spoke Saturday with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

  • Ghani gave a speech earlier on Saturday in which he gave no indication he would be resigning.
  • Biden announced Saturday that approximately 5,000 additional U.S. troops will be deployed to assist with drawdown of U.S. personnel and other allies as they evacuate the region. Of those, 3,000 were already announced, 1,000 were already in Kabul and 1,000 additional troops will arrive from the 82nd Airborne Division directly in Kabul.

Go deeper: Behind the scenes of the Biden administration as the U.S. ditches Kabul

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

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Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.

Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.

The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.

  • The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.

What the transcripts say:

  • Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
  • The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
  • Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.