I have been impressed by the people that President Donald Trump has appointed.
One of the really impressive traits of this administration is that, unlike what we saw in his first term, everyone now seems to be on the same page, working together to get Trump’s agenda done. That’s a great thing because it promises much better results for the American people than what we saw in his first term and definitely during the Biden years.
There are a lot of issues that the Trump team is having to clean up after the disaster that was Joe Biden’s presidency. One of those issues is accountability for the horrible withdrawal from Afghanistan—a withdrawal that resulted in the deaths of 13 American service members and left Americans and allies behind.
We’ve seen that the White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was clearly a great choice with how she’s been handling her job.
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Now, Pentagon Spokesperson Sean Parnell has just delivered what should be a primer about “Why We Fight,” detailing some of his own experience and explaining the importance of accountability.
He was asked if the Department of Defense would commit to firing or otherwise disciplining anyone who was directly involved in leadership in the Afghanistan withdrawal.
Parnell said he was “horrified” by what happened in the withdrawal, as someone who had served in Afghanistan.
When asked about the Afghanistan withdrawal this response from @SeanParnellATSD is everything! ACCOUNTABILITY IS COMING!
— DOD Rapid Response (@DODResponse) Mar 16, 2025
“You think about how much time, and blood and treasure and American life that was lost in Afghanistan over 20 years, you think about that for a second — I’m 43 years old, and this country was at war in Afghanistan for 20 years.”
“Almost half of my life, this country was at war in Afghanistan,” he emphasized, adding how he witnessed the war firsthand.
“We bled the ground red in Afghanistan,” he said. “I watched my men do extraordinary things in support of a grateful nation and in support of a mission there, and to watch Afghanistan be surrendered in the way that it was, [it] was extremely difficult.”
Then he said something that I think would resonate with anyone who thinks about the Afghanistan War, the Vietnam War, or even the billions given out to Ukraine for their war.
Something that President Trump and Secretary Hegseth really understand is when we make a decision to get involved in any conflict, we have a moral obligation to have a clear cut end state to what that operation looks like, a clear exit strategy to what that operation looks like, and to make sure that victory is clearly defined.
Parnell observed that the U.S. had struggled with the finer points of that over the last 20 years. But he said both Trump and Hegseth understood that when American gets involved in a fight.
“It’s our job to end that fight as fast as is humanly possible. Because we have a moral obligation to win, and win decisively.”
Oh, my gosh, a thousand times “yes” to all that. This has been a huge problem in wars in which we have been involved, and that failure has cost us greatly in money and lives.
“Otherwise you’re going to have an entire generation of American warriors wondering what the hell it was all for,” Parnell continued. He explained how he’d lost 30 friends in Afghanistan.
So he said as to the question of whether people would be held accountable for the failures in the withdrawal, they had an “obligation to the American people and to the American warfighters who fought in Afghanistan, to hold the leadership accountable”
“Because if look, If you have a private that loses a sensitive item, that loses night-vision goggles, and loses a weapon, you can bet that private’s going to be held accountable. The same and equal standards must apply to senior military leaders.”
Exactly. It’s been almost four years now, with no one held accountable. It’s past time to fix that.
