When Fox News reporter Pete Hegseth asked whether Pompeo was willing to let Kabul fall—“We’re not going to intervene ultimately two, three years from now, if the Afghan government can’t defend itself?”—Pompeo replied, “That’s right.” Three weeks after his deal with the Taliban, he threatened to pull all U.S. forces from Afghanistan and to choke off U.S. aid—which would have brought the country to its knees—if to the government didn’t move faster in talks with the Taliban. He also repeatedly pressed for the release of jailed Taliban fighters.

The troop reductions continued, even as the Taliban carried out dozens of attacks per day. On July 1, 2020, the Department of Defense reported that al-Qaida “routinely supports and works with low-level Taliban members” and “assists local Taliban in some attacks.” This matched a separate report from United Nations Security Council investigators. Some of the evidence, later published by the Washington Post, indicated that throughout this period, Taliban leaders had collaborated militarily with al-Qaida partners and had pledged not to betray them. When Pompeo was asked about the DOD report, he claimed to have secret evidence that the Taliban was working against al-Qaida. “I can’t talk about the things that I have seen,” he said…

A year ago, in Pompeo’s words, the Taliban was represented by a “gentleman,” was “working diligently to reduce violence,” and was “sincere in wanting what’s good for the Afghan people.” Now he calls the Taliban “butchers.” “We never trusted them,” he insists. “We always knew that what they were telling us was almost certainly a lie.” He claims, preposterously, that when the insurgents didn’t fulfill their promises, “We didn’t withdraw. We crushed them.”