US Defense Secretary pledges accountability over Afghan war failures

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Friday promised that there would be accountability for war in Afghanistan, which ended dramatically in 2021 with a chaotic withdrawal after a faster-than-expected collapse of the US-backed government in Kabul.

“We are going to look back at what happened in Afghanistan and hold people accountable — not to be retrospective, not for retribution, but to understand what went wrong and why there was no accountability for it,” Hegseth said addressing an audience at the Pentagon.

He pointed the failed war in Afghanistan, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 as events that have eroded the global view of American strength. That, he said, increases risks to global stability.

“Unfortunately, over the last couple of years, we’ve seen events that have occurred that created the perception, reality or perception, but I would argue more perception, of American weakness,” Hegseth said.

“Chaos happens when the perception of American strength is not complete. And so we aim to reestablish that deterrence.”

Hegseth said he would travel next week to a NATO gathering of defense ministers in Brussels to deliver a message for them to “step up in their industrial base, in spending.”