It's "laughable" that the Biden administration would suspend the evacuation flights out of Afghanistan over fears that the Taliban could be using the flights to raise cash abroad when the U.S. government won't support humanitarian efforts to help people escape the country, Blaine Holt, a retired Air Force brigadier general and deputy military representative to NATO, told Newsmax Wednesday.
"We have our own veterans, our own humanitarians going in and trying to effect escapes, and all they need is some funding and a little money and support from the government," Holt said on Newsmax's "Wake Up America."
His comments came after Fred Fleitz, the president of the Center for Security Policy, told the program earlier Wednesday that he believes it's a "matter of time" before the Biden administration and the rest of the world normalizes their relationship with the Taliban-led Afghan government.
"The Taliban right now are going right back to who we know them to be," Holt said. "They are slaughtering people in Afghanistan, the very people we want to get out … the Taliban are not meant to join the world community and shouldn't be treated as such."
Further, if the Taliban can get hold of money that's been frozen, they won't use it to feed the Afghans, he said.
"They're already starting to create more violent episodes on the Pakistani border, and I believe the Pakistanis are learning about the Taliban that they helped support all these years," said Holt.
The general also on Wednesday commented about the $768.2 billion defense spending bill President Joe Biden signed earlier this week and pointed out that there is not much that's being discussed about how the money will be spent.
"Instead we're getting into the sociology of the bill, which is, you know, they're very slim pickings," said Holt.
There are definite readiness needs the bill must address, but also there must be care taken to spend the money efficiently.
"Just a small case in point would be when China recently launched a satellite that cost them $200 million that largely competes with the satellite that we launched a year ago that cost $800 million," said Holt. "At those rates, we're not competitive in how we spend."
Meanwhile, Washington's operations are built around the defense budget because it's predictable, said Holt.
"Congress actually authorized $25 billion more than the president's request was for the bill," he said. "I would love the viewers to understand that way far back as far as 1976, the entitlement spending in the national budget far outstripped where we're at with defense spending. These dollars need to be accountable dollars for what we get for them."
At the same time, it's important to remember that "we live in a very dangerous world," the retired general said. "We're just coming off the heels of the disaster in Afghanistan and we've got to put our forces into a position to succeed wherever they go in this world."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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