The State Department and Department of Defense have begun reviews into the United States’ withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The State Department’s 90-day review into the withdrawal will “seek to assess the lessons learned from our engagement in Afghanistan and provide recommendations going forward,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a memo to employees obtained by The Hill.
The review will cover the period between January 2020 and August 2021 and is being led by Daniel Smith, who briefly served as acting secretary of State in January, Blinken wrote.
Smith and a team of current and former State Department officials will have access to documents and records and will be authorized to conduct voluntary interviews. Separately, the Pentagon’s after-action review of the withdrawal will cover the period between February 2020 and the end of August, Pentagon spokesperson Army Maj. Robert Lodewick told the paper in a statement. The independent team conducting the review just began its work last week, Lodewick said. —Agencies
