ウィスパリング同時通訳研究会コミュのPentagon Holds Briefing After Announcement US Will Leave Afghanistan On August 31st, 11 Days Early

John Kirby: (00:01)
I think as you saw yesterday, we announced that the Pentagon reservation will now go to force health protection level ALPHA tomorrow morning. This change is not a return to pre COVID 19 normal. And we’re going to continue force health protection measures to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 within our workforce. One change is that the occupancy goal will be to no more than 90% of personnel and workspaces. However, this is a maximum goal and not a target to achieve immediately. HPCON ALPHA is not re-entry or return to the Pentagon workplace. It provides the department more flexibility to meet our national security mission while allowing more occupants to be in the workspace to support classified missions. The department will continue to work with the Office of Management and Budget and the White House Safe Federal Workplace Task Force to finalize the department’s re-entry plan. (00:58)
We will continue to use maximum tele-work opportunities and flexible scheduling, and we’ll only get to bring in employees as needed to support their mission and to implement the secretary’s priorities while keeping a focus, of course, on defeating COVID. Other changes under HPCON ALPHA are outlined in the director of administration and management memo, which is available on defense.gov if you haven’t seen it. Lastly, Secretary Austin, looking forward to welcoming the French minister of the armed forces, Florence Parley, to the Pentagon tomorrow. Of course, we’ll post a readout following that meeting. And with that, we’ll go some questions. We’ll start with Lita.

Lita: (01:40)Thanks, John. A couple of things on the president’s speech on Afghanistan. Can you say what if any progress the Defense Department is making on the… I’m sorry, on the over the horizon negotiations? And can you talk a little bit about the Taliban and what progress they’ve made on district takeovers? How far do you think they’ve gotten? I’ve heard over 100 at this point. Can you talk a little bit about what the situation is on the ground with the Taliban? Thank you.

John Kirby: (02:25)
So on over the horizon capabilities, we continue to explore additional over the horizon capabilities with neighboring nations. I don’t have any agreements that are inked to read out to you today. But General McKenzie, our State Department colleagues and of course the secretary himself is exploring this daily. We’re still working, working through this. I would hasten to add, as you’ve heard me do in the past, that we already have over horizon counter-terrorism capabilities at our disposal, and it’s fairly robustly. I mean, we’ve got a sizeable footprint in the Middle East and facilities ashore that we can utilize with fixed wing air assets, both manned and unmanned in the region, as well as a carrier strike group in waters not far from Afghanistan that continues to provide additional capability. So we are making progress. We are working this very, very hard. And as we get solutions that we can talk to, we certainly will do that.(03:37)
But I do want to make sure that it’s very clear to the American people that we already have in place robust, capable over the horizon capability to continue to get at the terrorist threats that are affecting the homeland. I would also add, and we’ve talked about this before, but the terrorist threat, certainly the more significant terrorist threats to our interests and the interests of our friends and partners has metastasized outside Afghanistan. We aren’t seeing the same level of terrorism threat emanating from Afghanistan that we once did. And that’s a big reason why, in fact, the president ordered the draw down. I mean, we had accomplished the mission of not getting attacked from Afghanistan here on the homeland over the last 20 years. It doesn’t mean we’re taking our eye off the ball. It doesn’t mean we’re not going to try to maintain a focus on this or continue to have the authorities and the capabilities to go after terrorist that threatened the Homeland from Afghanistan. But there are other places that, that threat has metastasized to; Africa, other places in the Middle East that we need to be focused on to.(04:53)
Your second question on the Taliban, I don’t have an up-to-date operational assessment of Taliban advances. As you know, we don’t talk about intelligence assessments and I don’t want to get into the habit of reading out the Taliban’s military strategy. They have taken dozens of district centers. That is true. And we believe that they mean to threaten provincial centers as well. But I just don’t think it would be useful for me to get into a tick-tock of everything they’ve been doing on the ground. We are mindful of the security situation. We are mindful of the Taliban’s advances and that’s why it is so important for us to continue to press for a negotiated political settlement to this war. That’s why it is so important, as you heard the president just say, for the Afghan government and the Afghan military to use the capacity and the capability that they have, and that we have helped them engender over the last 20 years to defend themselves, their government and their territory and their people. Tara.

Tara: (06:09)Thanks, John. The president said that the interpreters might be moved to facilities outside the continental United States. That is fairly limiting in the number of [inaudible 00:06:21] facilities, potentially bases at Guam. Or could you talk a little bit about what these potential facilities could be that the interpreters could be sent to?

John Kirby: (06:30)So a couple of thoughts here, you heard the president say that US installations overseas as well as third countries. And we are looking at a range of options in that regard. You said it was limiting, I think I would challenge that presumption. You also heard the president say that of the 2,500 or so that have worked their way through the SIV process to that point, that less than half of them have indicated a willingness to move at this point. So the numbers wouldn’t necessarily connote to a level that was so high, that we couldn’t manage it with either a range, well, with a range of US installations overseas, US military installations, or third countries. Again, we’re still working at this very hard with countries in and out of the region. And as I said before, the department is looking very hard at overseas installations that we possess or that we’re using that might prove valuable.

Tara: (07:36)Two follow ups to that. Has DOD been requested by state to look at specific installations to potentially house the interpreters?

John Kirby: (07:45)It’s less about state asking us to look at specific installations, Tara, as it is about our task in this inter-agency process is to look at our installations overseas and to recommend to state and to DHS what installations we think might fill the need. And I think, again, depending on the numbers here, we don’t have a perfect sense of what the demand signal is going to be. But what we’re assuming is that we’ve got to have some flexible options here. That it’s not just going to be one and done. One installation and that’s it and they’ll all have to go there. We want to preserve some flexibility in the process to, again, to be able to absorb numbers as they flex up or down. So I would anticipate that we will want to be ready, as a government, for a range of different places that they can go to as they continue to process their way through the system.

Tara: (08:42)Okay. Last one, just to follow up to Lita’s question on the over horizon. When we’ve asked us in the past, you’ve often said, we do already have a robust over the horizon response and ability. So I guess my question is why is there a need for additional sites?

John Kirby: (09:00)Same reason I just gave you with SIVs, flexibility, options. One of the things that we prize highly here at the Pentagon is options and being agile and being nimble in case you need to do something differently. Plus, look, I mean, geography is geography, Tara. And so the options that we have available to us, though they are robust and we are using them, there’s a geography component here. I mean, it, there’s great distances to cover. So obviously we would also like to pursue the possibility of capabilities that are closer to Afghanistan. And that’s where the head space is right now. Tony.

Tony: (09:46)One follow up on the ISR thing and then I had a broader question. The president said our eyes will be firmly fixed on Afghanistan. That implies in the military technical world, possibly persistent intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance drones, river joints, all your electronic combat type of planes and drones, is that what he’s referring to? That persistence air presence outside looking in to Afghanistan?

John Kirby: (10:12)Without getting into too much specifics on intel assets and resources, Tony, I think you can expect that we plan to use a range of ISR capabilities at our disposal. And we also intend to leverage the strong relationship we have with the Afghan forces who will still be on the ground and who will still have information and context that they can help provide us. I mean, we’re not walking away from that relationship. We’re certainly not going to walk away from the knowledge, the context, the cultural understanding that our Afghan partners will be able to provide as well.

Tony: (10:49)I need to ask you a broader question. Pulling together some of the threads that came out of the White House, the press conference today, the president disclosed there’s about 75,000 Taliban, that’s a new figure, arrayed against over 300,000 Afghan security forces, well-equipped. We’ve spent like $74 billion on them over the last 20 years according to SIGAR. The Taliban is [inaudible 00:11:13] Vietnamese army, Afghans are well-equipped, but as we leave, the Taliban controls more territory now than they did in 2001. From a broad military perspective, can you tell us why the Taliban has been so resilient given the forces arrayed against them and the dollars we’ve spent over there?

John Kirby: (11:34)I don’t want to be in a position where I’m defending the tactics and the strategy of the Taliban. They have never not wanted to have governance capability in Afghanistan. I mean, this has been a persistent goal of theirs and they are able to operate inside the population in ways that official uniformed personnel are not able to do necessarily as easily or as adeptly. And they also, unlike the Afghan national security and defense forces, I mean, they use intimidation and torture and cruel methods to achieve their ends through fear and intimidation. And I can’t speak for why that’s necessarily more effective than other strategies in Afghanistan, but I think don’t miss the larger point here that I think the president was trying to make, that over the last 20 years, whether you are one who is in favor of the mission or not, over the last 20 years through great blood and treasure, we and our allies, and hasn’t just been the United States, have helped build a capacity inside the Afghan national security and defense forces, which is impressive. (13:11)
They have an air force, a competent air force. The Taliban has none. They do have more forces in the field than what we estimate the Taliban to have, and they have modern weaponry and they have had the training to use that weaponry. The question, and this is what the president was getting at was are they going to use that capacity? Do they have that will to use that capacity? We know they’re fighters and they have been in the fight. They have taken a lot of casualties over the last year alone. You guys have all covered that. There’s not an issue about bravery or courage here. So the question is now for them, are they willing and able to come together as a government and use that capacity that they have? And they will do it, again as the president said just a little bit ago, they’ll do it with our help. It’s not like we’re clapping hands and walking away. They’re still going to get financial support.(14:07)
The president just pledged I think another $300 million. We’re going to continue to work on improving their air force in their air force capabilities. The secretary just recently agreed to deliver another two this month, two refurbished UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters with another 35 to come. We’re going to help manage an overhaul process for some of their Mi-17 helicopters and we’re going to purchase another three Super Tucano H-29 aircraft for them.

Tony: (14:45)A-29.
John Kirby: (14:46)A-29, sorry. A-29 aircraft. I mean, we’re committed in very tangible ways to improving their air force capabilities and we’re also going to be working to provide logistical and maintenance support for their forces going forward.
Tony: (15:02)You were a spokesman for General Allen there in Afghanistan nine years ago or so. To what extent is the Taliban’s resilience a product of the fact that Pakistan has allowed the Haqqani network and other organizations of the Taliban to use their safe haven, use their territory to refurbish and go back into Afghanistan? Is that one of the historic reasons for their resilience?
John Kirby: (15:25)
The safe havens along that border have historically been a problem, there’s no question about that. And we know that the Taliban has been able to use safe havens along that spine to refurbish, to retrain, to replenish themselves, to plan and that’s something that we are in constant communication with Pakistan about. I would also remind, and I think it’s too easy to forget that Pakistan itself has become victim to terrorist networks operating out of some of those same safe havens. So it’s a problem that they share too. And we’re going to continue to work with them about how to better close down those safe havens.
Tony: (16:14)Thank you.

John Kirby: (16:14)Yeah. Let me go to the phone. If I don’t, then I get in trouble. So we’ll keep moving around. Oh, here it is here. Sorry. Jennifer Steinhauer, New York Times.
Jennifer S.: (16:26)Hi. Thanks. If I could switch to COVID for a second, I wonder if you had anything more to update us on the status of possible mandated vaccines. And also, do you have any visibility into why there are such pretty broad notable differences in vaccine acceptance rates between the service branches?

John Kirby: (16:47)I can’t answer the second question for you, Jennifer. I think that’s really a question better asked of the services themselves, I would say. And you heard us talk about this a few days ago. I mean, we’re at almost 70% of DOD personnel with one dose. So I think we’re glad to see that. We obviously want to see that number keep going up, but as for the differences between the services, I don’t have an analysis here for you and I’d refer you to the services. On the mandatory versus voluntary, again, the vaccines are under emergency use authorization right now and so they are voluntary. And with the acceptance rates across the force that we’re seeing, we’re glad to see that with a voluntary vaccine, we’re doing that well. If these vaccines are approved by the FDA, then the secretary will certainly talk to the services and healthcare professionals here at the department to determine what the best options are going forward, which could include making them mandatory. (17:48)
But I don’t want to get ahead of that process. We’re going to wait and see what the FDA does and what they decide, and then we’ll move forward. It is not uncommon. In fact, it is quite common that FDA approved vaccines are mandatory in the service. Having been in the Navy myself for nearly 30 years, I can tell you I’ve been stuck quite a bit and it wasn’t like I was asking for every one of those. It’s common here, but I don’t want to get ahead of the process and we’re going to do this the right way and we’re going to do it in concert with service leadership and healthcare professionals. Pierre.

Pierre: (18:22)How concerned are you with the attacks on the last few days on US soldiers at facilities in Iraq and Syria?
John Kirby: (18:30)
Obviously, deeply concerned. We take the security and safety of our people overseas extremely seriously. And you’ve seen us retaliate appropriately when that safety and security has been threatened. So we’re obviously watching this with great concern. As you saw just a couple of days ago, we had a couple of minor injuries. So it’s not something that we ever lose sight of. Well, you didn’t ask so I’m not going to go there. [inaudible 00:18:58].
Pierre: (18:59)Since you gave me a chance…
John Kirby: (19:02)All right, go ahead. I did, I walked into it.
Pierre: (19:06)I understand what you said, obviously, but I want to ask more about how threatening, how dangerous what’s happening, or is it just a low level, what’s happening in there?
John Kirby: (19:20)These attacks, they’re using lethal weaponry. I don’t know how you can say anything other than that it’s a serious threat. We were lucky the other day. Two people had minor injuries. Who knows how else that could have turned out. We take each one of these deadly serious.

Speaker 1: (19:49)A couple of questions on Afghanistan, first on Pakistan. What kind of commitment [inaudible 00:19:55] have received from Pakistan that they will not let their territories to be used as safe havens for terrorists?
John Kirby: (20:01)I won’t talk for the Pakistani-
Speaker 1: (20:03)[inaudible 00:20:01].
John Kirby: (20:03)I won’t talk for the Pakistani government. I’m certainly not going to divulge conversations that we’re having with Pakistani leaders. I think my answer to Tony was appropriate. This is something that we routinely talk to Pakistan about. It is a concern that Pakistani’s share, and they too have suffered at the hands of these groups operating out of those safe havens. It’s a difficult problem to solve. We know there’s more work that needs to be done, and we’re going to continue to have those conversations with our Pakistani counterparts.

Speaker 1: (20:35)And one of the stated goals of the Obama Biden and institution for being in Afghanistan was to destroy, dismantle and defeat the terrorist infrastructure and Taliban in particular. And now since they have gaining so much ground in Afghanistan, do you think that goal has been achieved there?
John Kirby: (20:50)I think you’re understanding the goal incorrectly. The goal was to deter dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda, and that has been accomplished. Now that doesn’t mean that there aren’t still Al Qaeda operatives or selves in Afghanistan. I’m not saying that there aren’t. But they are nothing like the organization they were on 9/11 20 years ago. And that’s a real testament to the hard work that our men and women in uniform accomplished, our Afghan partners accomplished and our NATO and coalition allies accomplished in Afghanistan over the last 20 years. They are a greatly reduced threat. They’re still there, but they’re a greatly reduced threat.

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