Source: World Wide Web
The ugly face of the US State Department and the Pentagon is afraid of being revealed? According to Reuters, a monitoring agency of the US government accused the US State Department and the Pentagon of concealing information on the 29th local time, and lawmakers and the public need to use this information to understand the collapse of the former Afghan government and army, as well as the chaotic situation of the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.
Screenshot of the Reuters report
John Sopko, special inspector general of the U.S. Reconstruction Operations in Afghanistan (SIGAR), said on the same day: "Only if the Defense Department and the State Department have banned the disclosure of information, the full picture of what happened in August, and all the warning signs that may have predicted the outcome at that time, will be disclosed."
A State Department spokesman said that based on security concerns about the evacuation operation, the State Department has requested "the temporary deletion of some reports in order to edit identity information from public records and protect the identities of Afghans and Afghan cooperation organizations associated with the United States."
The spokesman said: "Identity information is the only detail that is hidden. The spokesperson also added that SIGAR has the authority to reinstate these reports.
Sopko told reporters that after the Taliban occupied Kabul, the U.S. State Department asked him to temporarily ban online access to certain reports he posted in order to guarantee the safety of Afghans linked to the United States.
Sopko said the State Department "failed to describe any specific threats against individuals that may have been included in our report." He added that he "reluctantly" banned people from accessing the documents.
Sopko said the U.S. State Department recently requested edits on about 2,400 items remaining on THE SUGAR website. Some of the demands were "bizarre," such as removing the name of former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani from the report. After reviewing, his agency found that only four items should be edited, and the rest were available for consultation.
Referring to the U.S. Congress sending itself to investigate the downfall of the former U.S.-backed Afghan government and military, Sopko said the Pentagon has allegedly banned the publication of a series of data since 2015 at the request of the Ghani administration.
He also said much of the information, including casualty data and force strength, was "all the information one needs to know to determine whether the Afghan (former government)s) security forces are a real fighting force or a house of cards."
The Afghan Taliban stepped up its offensive in early August, seizing the provincial capital and entering and taking control of Kabul on August 15. On August 30, Eastern Time, the United States announced the completion of the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, and the military operation in Afghanistan lasted for about 20 years ended. On September 7, local time, the Afghan Taliban announced the formation of a new government and announced the list of some government officials to the outside world. The Ghani government collapsed.