Inside the administration, top aides are just trying to keep up with the rapidly changing battlefield. U.S. officials now believe Kabul could be surrounded or fall under Taliban control within weeks, and even the future of the fortress-like U.S. Embassy is increasingly in doubt…

Biden administration officials say the U.S. has better intelligence and other enhanced capabilities to thwart any future terrorist plots against America that might emerge from Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden once planned the 9/11 attacks. They also stress that the U.S. will continue to offer humanitarian aid for Afghans and financial support for the Afghan military, including, for now at least, air support.

But those promises are not entirely reassuring to many on Capitol Hill and beyond. Some critics fear a reprisal of what happened in Iraq after the U.S. withdrew troops in 2011: the rise of the Islamic State, which forced Washington to send troops back in to fend off the terrorist group.

“No one should pretend they’re surprised the Taliban is winning now that we abandoned our Afghan partners,” Republican Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska said in a statement. “No one should pretend to be surprised when girls and women are brutalized. And no one should pretend to be surprised when the Taliban yet again provides safe harbor to terrorists plotting international attacks.”