Former US Vice President Mike Pence accused President Biden of showing “weakness” toward the Taliban and insisted the crisis in Afghanistan wouldn’t have happened if US troops left the country sooner.

Pence, who served as vice president under former President Donald Trump, penned an op-ed, published on Tuesday, for The Wall Street Journal in which he strongly criticized the situation in Afghanistan.

In his op-ed, Pence referenced comments Biden made in July, when the president said it was unlikely that the Taliban would overrun Afghanistan or that people would have to be lifted off the roof of the U.S. embassy in Kabul.

“One month later, the scenario Mr. Biden deemed impossible has become a horrifying reality,” Pence wrote.

“In recent days, the world has watched panicked civilians cling to US military aircraft in a desperate attempt to escape the chaos unleashed by Mr. Biden’s reckless retreat. American diplomats had to beg our enemies not to storm our embassy in Kabul. Taliban fighters have seized scores of American military vehicles, rifles, artillery, aircraft, helicopters and drones,” he said.

“The Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan is a foreign-policy humiliation unlike anything our country has endured since the Iran hostage crisis,” Pence went on, referring to the time Americans were held hostage in Iran following the 1979 revolution in that country. US personnel were seized from the American embassy in Tehran and some were held for over a year.

“It has embarrassed America on the world stage, caused allies to doubt our dependability, and emboldened enemies to test our resolve,” Pence wrote.

“Worst of all, it has dishonored the memory of the heroic Americans who helped bring terrorists to justice after 9/11, and all who served in Afghanistan over the past 20 years.”

Source: Agencies