When an Obama cabinet secretary feels the need to criticize President Biden, you know things are bad.
Here’s what Leon Panetta, who served as secretary of defense from 2011 to 2013, has to say to the Washington Post about Biden’s Afghanistan withdrawal:
“He didn’t really spend much time on the issue that I think really concerns the American people, which is the execution of that decision. What went wrong and how it is going to be fixed?” said Leon Panetta, a longtime adviser to Democratic presidents who served as defense secretary under President Barack Obama. “It just struck me that they were crossing their fingers and hoping chaos would not result. And it doesn’t work that way.”
Panetta, who said he has been unsure what to tell the numerous contacts in Afghanistan calling him seeking a way out of the country, said, “right now it just does not look like we have our act together” and expressed surprise at the seeming lack of preparation.
“It’s not the Joe Biden that I often saw in the National Security Council raising questions about the planning involved in any decision that the president had to face,” he said. “He would be among those that would say, ‘Have we looked at all the consequences? Have we looked at all the possible land mines that we might have to face in implementing that decision?’ He was good at that. I assume he must have asked those questions. But it’s clear that, for whatever reason, those plans or strategies or precautions were not put in place.”
In a separate interview with CNN, Panetta said of Biden: “He’s just got to ensure that the United States of America remains a strong world leader that can work with our allies to try to protect peace and prosperity. That is the message he’s got to give the American people and the world, because our credibility right now is in question.”