BREAKING: Top ISIS Leader Taken Out By U.S. Special Forces

Breaking news today on Sekulow, his top ISIS leader taken out by U.S. Special Forces. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow.

We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow.

Hey, welcome to Sekulow. We are taking your phone calls. 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. And a positive news in the War on Terror. A group which, again, we have spoken about a lot, they have not posed as much of a threat to the U.S. or our forces since their leader was taken out. But they have tried to reconstitute in Syria and North Africa. That's the Islamic State, ISIS.

So they have not given up that banner. Their leader was in Northwest Syria and was located by our Special Forces and intelligence. They knew exactly where he was. He was cornered in a building and he decided to blow himself up rather than be taken by the U.S. Special Forces. But an incredible job listening to reports this morning coming out of this just to kind of explain to you how in-depth the intel was on this specific individual. When they utilized Special Forces, no U.S. casualties, is that they knew that the building he was in, he might not have known. He might have thought he was going to cause a lot more destruction with his suicide vest. But instead, they knew enough about the building to know that he likely did not have enough explosives strapped to him to take out the whole building.

And they were able to evacuate most of the area. But this, again, shows you that even when things with the administration seem dicey every day, especially with foreign policy, our Special Forces and our military, when they're able to do their job and be unleashed, are able to take out systematically these terrorist leaders, which then causes a lot of disruption to these terrorist groups. So the leader was the actual replacement for al-Baghdadi. So this was the number one ISIS terrorist, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi. He was killed by our Special Operations.

What is interesting, John, we talked about this before we went on air. We had in Syria, where this took place, you had U.S. Special Operating Forces, Special Ops Forces, and you also had Russian Special Operation Forces there, Wes, at the same time. Not in the same exact spot, but both U.S. troops and Russian troops were on the ground in Syria. Yeah, on opposite sides, as far as that goes, they support the President of Syria, and we do not. And interestingly enough, this guy was killed in Idib, which is the area, the province that's held by our allies, by the Syrian Democratic Forces, is their area. So he was hiding in an area that really is under the control of Syrian Democratic Forces and where we have U.S. forces stationed. And this operation, kudos to the administration for keeping it quiet until it was done, and kudos to our soldiers who did an excellent job. They went in with a loudspeaker and an Arabic translator telling women and children to evacuate. They did all they could to minimize civilian casualties. It appears the 10 civilians that were killed, it was six women and four children, were actually killed by the terrorist himself as he blew himself up. Yeah, so this was a great operation by the United States military, our special forces, and we want to thank them and all the men and women that are serving our country anywhere that they're deployed. This was a major operation and a major operational success. There's also, we're going to get in this next segment, there's some information coming out of Afghanistan, that information about what took place there.

Not so encouraging, I would say. Than, this is something that you would think Congress would be looking at. We are looking at it, we filed a FOIA request and are now in federal court on it, but we'll get into more with your thoughts. Well, we'll do an answer for that in just a few days, but from the very beginning with that Afghanistan withdrawal, we wanted to know why things like evacuating Americans, evacuating allies, evacuating our equipment, why those things weren't handled before the actual withdrawal took place. Jay, this information you're going to get into, it gives us a peek into that why. You know what, folks, we're going to continue too, if you've got phone calls about ISIS, phone calls about this new information on the Afghan withdrawal, you know that they were going up the day before Kabul fell, they were still planning meetings at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul for the next day.

Of course, that day, instead of having meetings, they were evacuating the embassy. Give us a call, 1-800-684-3110 to see how the military can do its job, but our diplomats, and we talked about this with Rick Grenell yesterday, it's like they're not doing their job, they're not doing their work. We'll be right back on Secular. The challenges facing Americans are substantial at a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights, in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena.

And we have an exceptional track record of success, but here's the bottom line, we could not do our work without your support. We remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms, that remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side, if you're already a member, thank you, and if you're not, well this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org, where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today, ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive, and that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn, it's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support, and the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, a play on parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. Welcome back to Sekula. We are taking your phone calls too as well.

If you want to give us a call in the air, 1-800-684-3110. We have these dueling stories. We have a very positive story. See when our military is able to act unrestrained, they're able to make the decisions, they're able to put the intelligence together, we can take out these terrorist leaders and again praise to our military for an excellent special forces mission taking out the number one ISIS leader. This was the person who replaced Baghdadi, and again ISIS was trying to reconstitute. While the Trump administration effectively destroyed the caliphate, there were still actors trying to reconstitute under the ISIS banner in both Syria and North Africa. Their leader is now dead. So what it's showing to these terrorist groups is that we are still watching you and we can take you out before you have a chance to become a Baghdadi.

Before you have a chance to create a mini caliphate and start taking actual property. Because that's what ISIS is about. ISIS is not Al Qaeda hiding in the caves. ISIS, their whole thing is we want to caliphate, we want to take land, we want to take cities, we want to run them, we want to be in charge. And again, because of our special forces in northwest Syria, no US casualties and an ISIS leader is surrounded by our special forces and the reporting is he had a suicide vest on and he decided rather than be taken by special forces, likely killed by special forces, he would detonate that vest, thought he was going to do a lot more damage, they were able to clear the area and knew that he did not have, I mean that just tells you when intelligence is good, knew that he didn't have enough explosives.

Right. To take down the building. So I was going to ask you this Wes, so when we're talking about a special operations unit like this that was operating, what goes in, I mean obviously don't disclose anything, but what goes into this?

What are they doing? I mean it's a combination of intelligence, on ground, off in the central command center, how does it all work? Yeah, they coordinate heavily, special forces always do with our intelligence people and we have intelligence operatives on the ground in Syria that are both planted by the US and also Syrian assets as well there. So there's a lot of coordination and planning and then anytime you have an operation like this, your special forces guy, they do what we used to call in the military rock drills. They actually go through and they will set up a mock building or mock encampment and they will practice, this is how we will go in, this will be our points of entry, if we need to escape, this is our points of exit.

They go in and they actually physically rehearse this before they do it and again, kudos to the military. So do you think they knew that there was a good possibility that he was going to detonate himself at some point? I think so because some reports are saying that people thought he had enough explosives to bring down the whole building.

He did not and apparently we knew that. That's impressive intelligence. Here's what President Biden had to say, this is number eight. As our troops approach to capture the terrorists, in a final act of desperate cowardness, with no regard to the lives of his own family or others in the building, he chose to blow himself up, not just to the vest, but to blow up that third floor rather than face justice for the crimes he has committed, taking several members of his family with him just as his predecessor did. So what's interesting to me, and I appreciate that our military did such a great job on this, and I think the important thing and the important message, and this would be the message to the entire world. We may have political discourse here that is aggressive and people are on all sides of the issues, but when it comes to protecting the interests, and by the way, you take out ISIS because not only is it destabilizing to the Middle East, it is destabilizing to the world. I mean ISIS terrorists have done acts in the United States. We took out the number one guy under the last President, and then we took out the number one guy under the current President.

Republican, Democrat, in that sense it didn't matter because we had the intelligence, we had the capability. So I want to say a thank you to everyone serving that was able to see this. Now, I say that because you wish every operation would move in that kind of way, but there is information coming out on the Afghanistan withdrawal that has Senator Richard Blumenthal.

You want to set this up, Jordan? Upset. Yes, you've got a very liberal US Senator, Democrat from Connecticut, but is on the Senate Armed Forces Committee, and this new information came out through Axios, unclassified, but it was about the National Security Council staff. On August 14th, dates are very important here, so I want to explain the dates. On August 14th, there's a deputy small group. They met for one hour to talk about the relocations out of Afghanistan, so getting the Americans out, getting the special visa holders out of Afghanistan. And they were still meeting about this on August 14th, to the point where they said let's have another meeting tomorrow. And they were still working with the embassy in Kabul on August 15th, except for Kabul fell to the Taliban on August 15th. So people are saying they were rushing their plans together, or this was a situation where their intelligence was very bad, or they were ignoring the reality on the ground. Because I can't imagine how you couldn't figure out that the Taliban was on your doorstep on August 14th if they were literally going to take the city August 15th. And basically what was, they walked in. I mean it was not like super violent.

They walked in and took over the city. And what did this lead to though? Ultimately this poor planning. Not the fault of our troops, but remember 13 U.S. troops killed by supposedly ISIS-K, which was another ISIS group reconstituting in Afghanistan. And we were trusting the Taliban to protect our troops from ISIS-K, and of course 13 U.S. troops were killed. But it shows some serious, serious mismanagement at the diplomatic level.

Well, I mean, to the point of negligence. I mean, you know, they're having meetings on August 14th talking about the priority. Now this is August 14th. The next day, Kabul's gone. And the Taliban are in control. The day before they're trying to figure out this.

What level of person should we evacuate and in what order? And they're discussing it. They haven't come to final conclusions.

An example, there's a lot of documents here. In the meeting on the 14th, they had just decided that they needed to notify local Afghan staff. On the 14th, the day before, on the 15th, our embassy was evacuated. I mean Kabul was gone. Taken by the Taliban.

So this shows you. Now, we filed a, so when they say they had a plan and it just didn't work, no they didn't. They did not have a plan. Well, they were doing the planning, unfortunately, the day before the whole country fell and fell into the hands of the Taliban. So we filed on August 30th a demand letter with the State Department, with the Director of Information Office Management, the Department of Defense, the Office of the Secretary and Joint Staff, and also the U.S. Central Command. I want to, before we get into the details, people say, why would you file with the U.S. Central Command? You want to explain CENTCOM? Yeah, CENTCOM is the combatant command that is in charge of all of that region of the world.

The combatant commands control different regions of the world and CENTCOM is commanded by a four-star general and they have, they're in charge of all military operations and much of the intelligence gathering for that part of the world. So our request sought records pertaining to communications, knowledge, and efforts surrounding the failure unfolding in Afghanistan and the communications between agencies in the months leading up to the national security and humanitarian catastrophe that took place and we give specific examples. Then documents are being released which are showing what was going on and here's the problem. The course then, the government did what they always do, no response, and we do what we always do and put it up on the screen for those watching on our social media platforms, we filed in federal court. United States District Court for the District of Columbia, American Center for Law and Justice versus the United States Department of the State, United States Office of Director of National Intelligence, that's Rick Rinnell's old office, and the United States Department of Defense, and of course CENTCOM as we said. And the answer to this complaint is due in just a few days by the federal government.

Dan? Yeah, we had no response so we filed a lawsuit. We'd have to do this in most of these cases, Jay, and look, in a nutshell, I actually think if you boil all the questions that we've demanded answers to, I think we're looking for the answer to the question that Jordan posed just a minute ago. I mean, clearly there was intelligence that showed that the takeover of Kabul was going to happen. So did they A, not know, or B, did they ignore it? And Jay, look, I mean, I just can't believe that 24 hours, they were only 24 hours away and they didn't know?

I think they chose to ignore it. You know, the other thing here, Jay, and I think this is what Senator Blumenthal is so upset about. Let's say you're the Commander in Chief. Let's say you've done the deliberative process and you have decided that you are going to withdraw.

Whether you agree or disagree with that, let's say that that is the conclusion that you have arrived at. Well, if you don't have the things nailed down, that these leaked notes show were nailed down, Jay, you have to adjust. You can't leave yet. You can still leave later, but you have to do it in an orderly fashion.

And if you don't, what happens? It costs lives. And in this case, it costs American lives and it costs the lives of allies on the ground. We hear from military men and women that are listening to this broadcast right now and get the reaction of both of these stories.

Yeah, especially because I know there's a lot of you listening right now who served Afghanistan or had a husband or wife who served Afghanistan or a child who served Afghanistan. And while this information is still coming to light about why the withdrawal was such a botched disaster, we've got Democrats upset about it. We come back to the brink.

We didn't get to it yet. I mean, liberal Democrats. We don't usually agree with Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut. But again, they are outraged as well because it put our military in a horrendous situation. The diplomatic blunders and not believing the intel or bad intel led to our military being in a dangerous situation where they were relying on the Taliban in those final days to protect them from outside terrorist groups. And guess what? That didn't work.

13 U.S. troops were killed. We'll be right back on Secular. Take your phone calls. 1-800-684-3110. Yeah, we've got a lot more on this.

This is some interesting information, folks. Give us a call. If you served in the military, we want to hear from you.

800-684-3110. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, the Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life.

Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights, in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena. And we have an exceptional track record of success.

But here's the bottom line. We could not do our work without your support. We remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms.

That remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side. If you're already a member, thank you. And if you're not, well, this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org, where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today.

ACLJ.org. We talked about the fact that, and welcome back to Sekulow, and we are taking your phone calls. We really want to hear from people who are in the military or did serve, because there's generations of people who served in Afghanistan.

And maybe it's your husband, maybe it's your wife, it's you. Because there's new information coming to light about how the diplomats on the ground were botching this up until the last moment. They were planning on the day before Kabul fell to the Taliban. They were planning on having more meetings with our embassy in Kabul, and they weren't talking about the embassy at the airport at that point. They were talking about the actual embassy. The next day, the embassy was evacuated. They had just decided on the day before Kabul fell that they should start letting our Afghan allies, those special visa holders, who could immigrate to the US, to start letting them know to prepare to leave. That meeting was the day before it fell. They didn't say, this is the plan, we've now executed the plan.

I think we need to do this, so let's get this ready to do. It was not where it was put into action, correct? Let me play Senator Blumenthal, because this is not just Republican opposition and outrage over this. This is bipartisan.

Take a listen to Bite25. I am deeply dissatisfied, in fact downright upset, with the lagging, laggard efforts in evacuating at-risk Afghan allies from that country. These men and women and their families put their lives on the line to protect our troops and diplomats, and we are failing to rescue them. Listen, now that's Richard Blumenthal, liberal Democrat, recognizing what we recognized back in August, that this was a debacle. Yeah, Jay, let me just give a little insight into why the outrage from both Republicans and Democrats was pretty universal. When this happened, Jay, all of their offices were literally flooded with constituents who had either friends or family still in harm's way, and who were just aghast that the United States government was leaving them behind.

Look, a lot of those constituents thought that leaving Afghanistan was an okay idea, but they just could not wrap their minds around, like we couldn't, the idea that we would leave without getting the people who had fought, whether they were Americans or our allies, behind. That's why the outpouring was so universal, and I'll just say this, Jay, even here at the ACLJ, today, as we speak, we continue to monitor some very specific cases on the ground. Some of them are resolving, yes, others are not. And even now, at this late date, people like Senator Blumenthal have dozens of open cases inside their office.

I'd almost be willing to guarantee it. I've been through this process before. They were flooded with real situations. This was not some hypothetical, theoretical policy decision.

This impacted people's lives on the ground, and these senators felt it in a very personal way. Yeah, I mean, we got some calls coming in, 1-800-684-3110, Mary Ellen from Illinois, on Line 1. Hey, Mary Ellen, welcome to Sekulow, you're on the air.

Oh, hello, everyone. Yes, I hear Senator Blumenthal's name first surfacing now, how many months after August 15th. It's like, how come we didn't hear his name back August 15th going forward? Not just now. Yeah, I mean, so everybody could see on the ground that it was horrendous.

But I do think we have to go back to August. We probably have to look, because there was a lot of bipartisan discussion about how bad the withdrawal was. There was, Jordan. I think after the fact, I think when people were actually left behind, I actually thought the level of bipartisan outrage was pretty significant, especially in this divided town, I thought it was good.

Now, here's where I do think some criticism is warranted here, and I think maybe Mary Ellen is alluding to this. In the lead up, Jordan, the President's party needed to insist he do better. I mean, look, I think most of these people, I don't remember for sure about Senator Blumenthal, but my guess is he probably thought that the withdraw decision was a good one. But look, you can't set a date certain, and then if the rubrics that are required to actually implement that withdraw are not met, Jordan, you've got to adjust.

You've got to push it back. You can't turn security over to the Taliban and just throw up your arms and lose American lives, and that's essentially what happened. And I want to be fair and honest about that, what Thea is talking about, because this goes back, again, a Democrat, Jean Shaheen, New Hampshire, U.S.

Senator. She got asked today as well on MSNBC about this information. Take a listen. She said she didn't agree with any of it from the get-go. What is your reaction to this latest reporting, and are you satisfied with what we have seen in the wake of the withdraw? Has there been enough attention on women and children?

Well, I think no. I think we need to do more to think about how we can support women and girls in Afghanistan, and it's no secret that I was not supportive of the President's decision to withdraw and was uncomfortable with the way that was carried out. And we now know also, and Wes is going to address this, that it wasn't just members of the Republicans and Democrats in the Senate that were concerned about this, but the generals that were in charge.

Oh, yeah. This was not a military debacle. This was a White House State Department debacle. And if you recall back in the fall, after all this transpired, we had some of our top generals from CENTCOM, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Vice Chairman, the Secretary of Defense, who testified before Congress that they did not recommend this operation to unfold the way it did.

They were against this. The President tried to say early on all of his generals concurred, and they disputed that because they told him that they were not ready, they wanted to hold Bagram Airfield for a while longer and not use the airport in Kabul as an exit point, all kinds of things like that. But the military, their hands were tied in this case. And what we're witnessing here, what we witnessed back in August, is an absence of planning, not letting the military do what they do best. And also, as Stan alluded to, a commitment to a certain date to leave, even though they weren't prepared to leave on that date and the mission was not ready to be executed. The President and the administration, they overestimated the ability of the Afghan National Army to defend their own country. They underestimated the strength of the Taliban.

And keep this in mind, Jay, this came out last fall, too. The Taliban, they were talking with our representatives at the State Department, and they offered to stay out of Kabul to let us control it until we got everyone out, and the administration refused to take control of the city, and they voluntarily let the Taliban come in because they thought we could all escape from the Kabul airport. Yet on the day before, what are they doing? They're still discussing transit points to get people out of the country. Folks, that's why we filed this. That's why you're in federal court. That's why your American Center for Law and Justice and our Office of Government Oversight takes a very aggressive view on this.

And we go to court to get the answers, because when you get the answers, you know what, you don't let it happen? Again, where you lose 13 men and women serving in our military and had a disastrous execution and removal of our troops, and now we know that the White House in the Situation Room, I know that room, been in that room, the Situation Room, they're meeting the day before Kabul fell to decide, Jordan, who do we get out and what priority and when do we start notifying them? That was the day before.

12 hours later, it was gone. That night, if you look at the time change. And when that happened, you have to then understand the shift there. Instead of focusing it on our Afghan allies who were under serious threat, making sure they got out safely, like the Afghan girls soccer team, which eventually did get out. All those different groups that we said we would protect, we had set up in the U.S. ready to go. And also, it looks like military bases that were being set up ready to go, they should have already been set up. But think about it, by the next day, guess what?

You're watching your own back. So it switched to where, if you're that embassy staff that was the remaining staff, you were getting out. And then we had to move our embassy to the airport, whatever that meant, which was a mess. And then the troops that we sent there, remember we sent additional troops to Afghanistan? And 13 ended up being killed trying to help people get to the airport because we were relying on the Taliban, for goodness sakes, to provide security for U.S. troops from Islamic terrorist groups that wanted to kill U.S. troops like the Taliban. So the whole effort, we talked about it with Rick yesterday, our military is great at what they do.

Our diplomats are failing us, and that makes it tough on the U.S. military, that much tougher. Where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today. Keeping you informed and engaged. Now more than ever, this is Sekulow.

And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. So serious questions. I want to hear from those of you who have served in Afghanistan or had family who served Afghanistan, because I know people were very upset when they saw the withdrawal. And we're starting to get more and more information, and we filed a FOIA, now a federal lawsuit, to get that information about why this was done in such a poor manner by the Biden administration, why they didn't listen to the intelligence almost a year out, not a full year out, but almost, I mean, nine months out, saying you need to start doing this now when it comes to getting, if you want to leave Afghanistan, which there was a whole discussion about whether that was right or wrong, but if you want to leave, then you need to start doing this now. And so there's leaked documents out.

Axios has posted them. And what they show is that the deputies of the National Security Council were meeting along with the people in the Kabul embassy, the diplomats there, on August 14th about a plan for the Afghans who had the special immigrant visas, the SIVs, to come to the U.S. On the 14th they said, well, you know, we need a plan to notify them to leave. On the 15th, Kabul fell, our embassy was evacuated to the airport, and all of the chaos ensued. I mean, we know about the chaos. But what we're now finding out is how early these warnings came, Wes.

Starting in, I mean, we're talking about, remember, here we're talking about August. Warnings came almost the beginning of the year, in February. Right after the President took office, Matt Zeller, who was a CIA officer, he's since retired from the CIA, he said, when all this broke over the last few days, he said, they were talking with the administration about protecting Afghans who worked with Americans.

This is a quote from him. They treated us like we were chicken little. They did not believe the sky was falling. He goes on to say, on the 13th of July, we offered to work with them to help evacuate people from Afghanistan. We all saw this disaster coming before the inevitable occurred.

This is 13 July. He says, they did not get back to us on that request until August 15th, the day Kabul fell. I mean, think about the timing of this and what it says about what was going on.

Not about our military. Because as we said at the first half hour, our military did a surgical strike against the number, the replacement for al-Baghdadi. He's dead.

He's done. So the military, as Jordan said, can execute. The problem is, is the political side of this, or the White House side of this, and the State Department side of this, our diplomats continue then to fail on this. I mean, information, as Wes just said, is available in February. And then you turn around and they say again in July, hey, we may want to do something about this. And then August 14th, they're meeting to decide what to do, and the country falls the next day. Yeah, and Jay, the ramifications are just horrific.

I mean, they really are. Jordan talked about the 13 Americans whose lives were lost as a direct consequence of these decisions. Jay, I think beyond that as well, I mean, I think probably if we went around the panel, we might have various views on when the best time to leave was. I personally think 20 years was probably way too long, but think about this. For 20 years, the reason that young girls were protected, could go to school, weren't given away as child brides, was because we were there providing them some protection. Jay, if we were going to pull back from that, those 20 years put a duty in place for us to protect those young girls. We failed on that front, Jay.

We just did. No, I mean, the consequences of it were not just 13 American soldiers killed, which was horrific, but also the Afghan assistance of ours that we'd left, as Thant said, or the younger teenagers that were helping out and translating or that went to school to be educated, and now they're subject to the Taliban and that rule. But it's just a catastrophic failure of the White House and the State Department, Jordan, on all of this. Not the military. We want to be clear on that.

No, I mean, that's the problem. They put the military in a horrible situation. They added forces at the end in Afghanistan, and the 13 were killed, the 11 were killed. They were trying to take care of children.

And again, we talked about that with Rick Renaud yesterday. That is not really the military's job. We've turned them into going into villages and towns to help build these relationships. That's what diplomats are supposed to do. We're supposed to have diplomats in places that are dangerous around the world.

But there's this lack of engagement there on the diplomatic corps that puts our military in a horrendous and very difficult situation. Not that they won't go. They go. They put themselves in harm's way and try to do the best that they can for the people. They take their orders.

They follow them. But remember, this debacle didn't just lead to Afghans being killed, but it led to American forces being killed in Afghanistan. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights, in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena. And we have an exceptional track record of success.

But here's the bottom line. We could not do our work without your support. We remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms.

That remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side. If you're already a member, thank you. And if you're not, well, this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org, where you can learn more about our life-changing work.

Become a member today. ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, a play on parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift.

Alright, welcome back to Sekulow 2. If you want to talk to us on air, 1-800-684-3110. And I want to just reiterate too, the ACLJ is taking action on this.

Let me go to Thanh Binh at Washington DC. Thanh, we're not just sitting back waiting for documents to be leaked by the news. We were really proactive going back to August. So just a couple weeks after, they were meeting still on August 14th about how to evacuate Afghanistan, and it fell to the Taliban on August 15th. On August 30th, we had already sent the FOIA to the State Department, people within the State Department, Department of Defense, other agencies as well, including CENTCOM. And now we're in federal court, but we filed within less than two weeks of those meetings, we had already filed those FOIAs. And Jordan, we're entitled to those documents. That's why we're insisting on them. And look, we basically want to know why the things that we've talked about today weren't considered and a plan readjusted. If you couldn't get the Americans out, if you couldn't get your allies out, if you couldn't get the people who served alongside of us out, if you couldn't evacuate the very important and sophisticated equipment so that it didn't fall into the hands of the enemy, then you just can't leave on that date certain. Those are the documents that we want, Jordan, and we want to know who involved, who had the sacred obligation to do this job and had that information and pushed forward with the decision anyway. I mean, look, ultimately this is on the Commander-in-Chief's desk, but Jordan, there are a ton of people inside these agencies who also would have had access to this information. I want to hear from, and we have already some military men and women that either served in Afghanistan or Iraq or had family members that did, and get your reaction to all this.

1-800-684-3110. But there's an interesting situation, because I'm going to pivot right now to the situation that we're dealing with, the United States is having to deal with, with Russia and Ukraine. So Russia, and this is, the word has been imminent. The word has been, coming from the White House, it's an imminent attack of the Russians to the Ukrainians. There was that quasi-invitation in, if they only take a little bit, maybe we won't react, and then there was an inconsistent statement made at the United Nations. So this was in a press conference yesterday. Jen Psaki was asked a question by a reporter.

Take a listen. Last week, I believe in here, you said that you, the assessment still was that a Russian invasion is imminent. That's the word that you used before that other officials have used and used it last week. But yesterday, the ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said she would not use the word imminent. She said she does not think of Russian invasion of Ukraine as imminent. So I guess we just need some clarification on where that assessment stands right now. I used that once, I think others have used that once, and then we stopped using it, because I think it sent in a message that we weren't intending to send, which was that we knew that President Putin had made a decision.

Wes? The imminent predictions are not, they're not just coming from President Biden or Jen Psaki. These predictions have come from our military. They're looking at situation on the ground, they're looking at satellite photos, they're looking at the fact that the troops continue to, you know, go and surround Ukraine on three different sides, that Putin is now moving field hospitals and blood and plasma supplies to the border of Ukraine, which you don't need in a training exercise in large quantities. It's the military who really believe, and his intelligence, that this is imminent. More than likely, when Jen Psaki used that term, it's because the military had briefed her on it. So then the question is, why are they now, they're being challenged on it, because they put the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. They put her out there to make that statement, to de-escalate things.

So there's a reason. Well, I think that, listen, the world has said to the U.S., stop. I mean, you had the Ukrainian presidency. Stop calling this imminent.

Don't use SAC. Don't start acting like Kiev's going to be overrun. Now, whether or not that world is right on it, that is where the world's position has been. And the people who live in the backyard of Ukraine, their position has been, you are, you're basically, remember, I mean, President Biden was going to say it's a given. It's a done deal that they're going to invade.

The question is just how far they go. And now they're starting to walk back and start, and I think that's, and I don't know if it's right or wrong, but I think that there is also, how do you want to play Putin? So if you keep forcing his hand, saying like he must invade, or maybe you're trying to play down, then whatever he does is not what you talked about, so it's not as bad.

Like you said, it's a smaller invasion. But the world clearly did not like this U.S. drumbeat of war. And that's how it felt. Right or wrong, it felt like our government was beating the drum of war, you know, yesterday, it was just yesterday we were talking about the troops.

Just yesterday. The drum beats the war. We're spending it, you know, sitting in forces from Fort Bragg. We've got 8,000 more we can send. And the Iranians have said- We were reinforcing NATO.

I mean, that was a big thing. We're going to reinforce NATO. We were going to do it bilaterally because NATO was not being stood up.

Right. And would not come together in agreement, and by the way, so no indication that they have. And there are some political considerations involved here, I know as well, because the President of Ukraine, he has asked the administrations to stop saying imminent because he says it will create panic, it will affect their economy, and so I think that's part of the reason they're probably trying to soft pedal it. I don't think the intelligence has changed. Actually, the intelligence still indicates that an invasion is likely, but there are political considerations. It probably was the wrong thing, in hindsight.

Yes. Was addressing it the way that the United States addressed it? Yeah, if you know your enemy's about to do something, it's probably best you don't tell the enemy that you know that. Yeah, I mean, that doesn't- That's in tactics 101. And we did not have unity within NATO, and still don't. Well, again, this is a skeptic's perspective, but as I'm watching John Kirby right now on TV talking about the ISIS leader being killed, I'm starting to think it's a bit of like, okay, but that's great, this one guy who I'm not sure of what kind of influence he had. I need to go back and look.

It is good. But yesterday you were drum-beating troops that are not going inside Ukraine, but they're going to Poland, they're going to Romania, they're going to our NATO allies. And I feel like this could be being utilized right now as a way to take attention off that. Now, the media's not going to allow that.

All the media is in Ukraine. I think that whatever they'd like to shift on it, like Jen Psaki said, we're not going to use imminent anymore. They're not going to be able to backtrack too much. And their actions speak louder than their words. But I do think they're going to probably try to play up this ISIS.

Not that that's a bad thing, because a good message to send a terrorist, but try to shift some discussion from the Department of Defense. Yeah, you know, it's interesting because Admiral Kirby's speaking, and he's not been a confidence builder, let's be honest on this. I have no idea how he got this job back again. Well, because he did it before.

Yeah, it's weird. Usually people don't go back for the same job. He did. So there he is.

And no disrespect to him, except that, you know, when you're listening to these guys, it doesn't build confidence. So my question, I guess, is, and I'll throw this up to Than, or my thought is, we have a situation right now where we had a successful operation yesterday in Syria. Great.

That is very good. We have a difficult situation in Ukraine. I'll say it that way.

Maybe not. Nobody should use the word imminent. That's the word that's coming out.

Whatever it might be. China and Taiwan, the Russians and the Chinese and the Japanese are worried about North Korea, and of course the South Koreans are too. And I'm just wondering, is the White House, is the White House focusing on these issues the way they should be focusing on them?

Because when you get that memo that is now out about the fall of Afghanistan, and they're figuring out hours before when to start notifying people, that is not exactly what I would call a confidence building measure. Well, Jay, unfortunately, I think actually you invoking China is right on point here, because I think that the White House's ability to impact deterrence here is waning. I mean, look, there was a moment during this process where economic sanctions, including the ones that the Senate was putting forward, would have had a very big impact on Vladimir Putin. I mean, economic sanctions from the United States are significant when it comes to Russia. But if you publicly have the backing of President Xi of China, as it now appears that Vladimir Putin does, the impact of those sanctions, while still significant, Jay, they wane quite a bit. So, you know, even if the White House were to circle back now and get really focused and take some punitive actions, they just don't have the stinging effect that they would have had a month ago when, in my view, they should have been done. So even if they circle back to him now, if President Xi comes out and says, we'll fill that void, eh, Vladimir Putin might not care as much if the United States put those in place. Yeah, I think that that is, again, the main issue here is that all of this ties back together to the, it's not the military, it's the non-military spokespeople, it's the White House spokespeople who, you know, build in drum beats war.

To me, it's the same as what they're doing in Ukraine. And what the problem has been throughout this administration, I think, Wes, is that they don't explain to the American people the mission. In Afghanistan, it was unclear. I mean, we knew withdrawal, and there was widespread support for that. So instead of saying, hey, we got widespread support for it, let's make sure we do a great withdrawal, it was all muddled. And it got, and they weren't trusting each other's intel.

Same with Ukraine. It's not that the American people don't want to do the right thing. But if you don't explain to us why we got troops going there, why are we beating this drum beat war, why was it imminent last week, but it's not imminent this week. And words, these words need to be carefully utilized when they speak for the White House, when they speak for the Department of Defense. And that makes the American people rightfully skeptical because you don't exactly know what to believe and when they're telling the truth, when they're hedging the truth a little bit. And the other thing about the administration, too, is that when they are questioned, it seems like their go-to position is to become defensive.

And that does not, you know, make people trust you either. When you're asked a simple question, answer the question if you can. And for security reasons, intelligence, security, you can't answer it, you say that, but be honest about it.

Don't spin it and don't become defensive and don't lie. In our final segment, I'd love to hear from people who served in Afghanistan. You don't have to currently be served, but if you served there in this and all this news that's coming out now, 1-800-684-3110. You can see our FOIA, you can see the federal lawsuit that we filed less than two weeks after they were still trying to figure out that Kabul was falling at ACLJ.org. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn. It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, playing parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life.

Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights, in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena. And we have an exceptional track record of success.

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That remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side. If you're already a member, thank you. And if you're not, well, this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org, where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today. ACLJ.org. And we're starting to get more and more congressional reaction.

And I want to play, this is from a Republican from Wisconsin, Congressman Mike Gallagher. He's on the House Armed Services Committee. Yeah, he was just asking again about, they're just being asked about this because these reports are now out. You don't have to speculate about their failure or overthrow.

Now you know... This is on Afghanistan, so people understand what we're talking about here. There's information not coming out about the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. And in the Situation Room, the day before Kabul fell, they were still trying to figure out in what order they should notify and prioritize things while the country was literally falling. Well, the Taliban was marching through the entire country, and the next place was Kabul. They were being warned as early as February. They were talking about August. And people kept warning them, kept coming back saying, you've got to start moving and moving.

They weren't. But listen to Congressman Mike Gallagher, his reaction. Again, these are members of committees that play an important role. This is the House Armed Services Committee member by Ford. We now know they had one meeting preparing for the withdrawal.

That's completely unsatisfactory. They were asleep at the wheel. Our Secretary of State was on vacation in the Hamptons. This is embarrassing. And the buck ultimately stops with Biden. The President is still unrepentant about his actions in Afghanistan.

A few weeks ago he said, I don't apologize for anything in Afghanistan. And that's really what worries me, OK? Shocks happen to every administration. Mistakes are made.

You have to learn from those mistakes. But this administration seems intent on pushing full steam with this approach. And I think it's fair to say our weakness in Afghanistan, the collapse of our position, is undermining our posture in other areas of the world, right now in Ukraine, and I fear over the long term with China. And I think that the last part of what the congressman said I think is really critical. And that is this notion, this idea that you have by the failure in Afghanistan, you have emboldened our enemies. And that's something you always have to be very cautious of.

Absolutely. And this is exactly what's happening. I mean, under the previous administration, you know, China and Russia, they sort of kept their heads down a little bit. We have Putin watching us. We have Xi and China watching us. They're becoming more and more belligerent, both in their actions and their rhetoric. North Korea is firing missiles and threatening to do another nuclear test. Iran is still in the picture.

And China, Russia, and Iran started last week doing joint military exercises in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. I mean, weakness or even perceived weakness, it invites bad actions from your adversaries. You know, Brandon on Facebook asked a very interesting question. He said, I don't understand why these people, he's talking about the terrorists, chose to blow themselves up. Why is that their choice? And there's a theological reason for this, unfortunately, within Islam. You know, in Christianity, God so loved mankind that he sent his own son to die for us. In Islam, there's this reverse idea of, so they look at this as their way to heaven. Martyrdom. Martyrdom, you know, that is the highest human achievement to be a martyr for Islam.

And so they see that and they see a great reward for doing that. And quite frankly, also in the Middle East, it's just a much more violent culture. They've seen a lot of violence. Some of them commit a lot of violence. And so blowing yourself up and blowing up your children and your wife or your wives is not seen as a bad thing by some of these radical Islamic terrorists.

Yeah, I mean, unfortunately not. Then the question becomes, you look at it and you say, hey, wait a minute, you got Republicans and Democrats agreeing on something here. What can be done? Now, the truth is the executive branch is in charge of foreign policy. That's the way the Constitution is structured. So they could talk, but can they take any action?

We're going to find out what happened through our litigation, but can they do anything? Well, the administration may get to make this decision, Jay, but the rest of us, Congress has a lot of authority, but the rest of us, even on the outside, we have an ability to see who and why made those decisions with some limited exceptions. Jay, and this goes back to what we talked about a second ago. We don't have to speculate anymore about the ramifications, about the consequences. But there are some things we don't know. We don't know necessarily who reviewed the information, who saw that this was going to happen and chose to push it aside.

That's what we want to know. That's what we demanded in the litigation. We're due a response from the government, Jay, on February 11th.

Now, we all know how these things work. This is going to be a long process, but we're going to stick at it, and we're going to stick at it for the reason that you mentioned earlier in the broadcast. This is a travesty, and you can't put some of that toothpaste back in the tube, but, Jay, we got to make sure this doesn't happen again. It just can't happen again, and the people responsible need to be held accountable. Debra on Facebook wrote in, my son served in Afghanistan. He felt safe under Trump, but not under Biden and Obama. Thank God he's back now, but he's sick knowing how much of our equipment was left there. I mean, those who served there, who had friends and their, you know, the brothers and sisters in arms killed there, losing their life while defeating groups like Al Qaeda, while taking out these terror groups and pushing back the Taliban into the hills and into the caves. Now, no, the Taliban is armed like we were. Not only are they armed like we were, but we left significant ammunition, significant aircraft that have modern technology, and here's one of the problems. The Chinese government came into Afghanistan immediately, and guess what they want to know, Wes, right? They want to know what's in that U.S. military. Yeah, our equipment, our technology is being compromised, and that is a fact that you just mentioned. China and Russia both have sent representatives to examine our ammunition and equipment there. We have some breaking news on Ukraine and Russia.

This is interesting. Maybe this is why the U.S. has changed some of their tone. This just came out of the New York Times, though. The United States has acquired intelligence about a Russian plan to fabricate a pretext for an invasion of Ukraine using a faked video that would build on recent disinformation campaigns. The plan, which the United States hopes to spoil by making public now, involves staging the Russians, staging and filming a fabricated attack by the Ukrainian military either on Russian territory or against the Russian-speaking people in eastern Ukraine.

Russia, the U.S. officials said, intended to use the video to accuse Ukraine of genocide against Russian-speaking people, then use the outrage over the video to justify an attack or have the separatist Russian leaders in that Donbas eastern Ukraine region to invite Russian intervention. So what's interesting about that is, assuming the New York Times has this correct, is that's where your intelligence makes a big difference. You could have thwarted a – that doesn't mean that they won't try to do something else. But at least one of their plans. But if that was one of their plans, that was pretty good intelligence.

Yeah, absolutely. And some intelligence analysts have been predicting this kind of thing for several weeks now. I'm going to say this at the beginning of the broadcast, I'm going to say it at the end. Even with all the political strife, and there is a lot of political strife, we live in the greatest country in the world. The United States and America is the greatest country and one of the best military in the world. And great intelligence-gathering capabilities. When deployed correctly, if this report in the New York Times proves to be correct, this was a major thing, a major issue, a major engagement. And maybe the thwarting of what the Russians – it doesn't mean they won't come up with something else. They're going to deny it immediately, I'm sure. But the fact that that came up, Jordan, that was a big deal. Yeah, people have been talking about these false flag events by Russia to justify an invasion.

This is very specific. Video to look like Russians speakers inside Ukraine were being systematically killed by Ukrainians. And then it would encourage even those Russian separatist groups to say there needs to be an invasion by the Russian forces, not just the pro-Russian Ukraine forces. So, I mean, again, when intel is utilized correctly – I think Sam put in our chat right – when it's utilized correctly, it could prevent or at least cause trouble for those trying to plan bad actions and war. But when you don't take it to light, like in Kabul and that intel, it could also lead to chaos.

So you've got to trust your intel and utilize it. We'll talk to you tomorrow on Sekulow. As always, check out ACLJ.org. Where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today. ACLJ.org.