President Joe Biden announced that 5,000 additional US troops would be deployed to Afghanistan.
Recent weeks and days have seen a series of rapid Taliban takeovers in which cities fell to them.
Biden stated in a statement that the troops would ensure "an orderly, safe drawdown" of US personnel.
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In the face of a rapid Taliban takeover in major Afghan cities, President Joe Biden announced Saturday that he would send approximately 5,000 US troops to Afghanistan.
Biden stated that he authorized the deployment of about 5,000 US troops in order to ensure that there is an orderly, safe drawdown of US personnel as well as an orderly, safe evacuation of Afghans who assisted our troops during the mission and those who are at risk from the Taliban advance.
Biden stated that the White House had informed Taliban representatives in Doha (Qatar) that any action they take on the ground there in Afghanistan would be met with a strong and swift US military response.
Mazar-i-Sharif in Afghanistan, the fourth-largest, was lost to the Taliban on Saturday. This left only two major cities, Kabul and Jalalabad, under government control. The insurgents also took Kandahar and Herat, which were the country's second and third largest cities.
After capturing the province of Herat from the Afghan government, Taliban fighters pose in front of a vehicle in Herat, Afghanistan. Saturday, August 14, 2021. Associated Press/Hamed Sarfarazi
The Taliban's rapid advance has led to the takeover of half the country's 34 provincial capitals and more than two thirds of the country as a whole.
According to the US military, the Taliban could seize Kabul in 30 days and the rest of the country in several months.
Biden made Saturday's statement in which he justified his decision to withdraw US troops Afghanistan. He said that he was the fourth president to have presided over American troop presence there and that he would not allow the war to be passed to the fifth.
He also blamed President Donald Trump for a deal that left the Taliban in the most powerful position since 2001, and set a May 1st 2021 deadline for US forces.
Trump demanded "DO YOU MISS US YET?" in a Friday statement. Trump was referring in part to the "tragic mess" in Afghanistan.
