Why it matters: Moulton was lambasted for his secret trip to Kabul, but he brought along a former Marine infantry officer’s perspective. What would he have done differently? “There’s one very simple order, which would have been to start this evacuation months ago.”

“It’s hard to see a disaster unfold of our own making, a disaster that we could have prevented by just starting this earlier.”…

“We talked to people who have literally been negotiating with the Taliban about the consequences of staying beyond the president’s deadline, and we learned that, even if we stayed until Sept. 11th, we were going to leave thousands and thousands of people behind — because we started this so late.

“And, so, another cruel irony is that when we leave, we’re still going to have a productive diplomatic relationship with the Taliban if we have any hope of getting more people out in the future.”