WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered another review of the U.S. military's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, and of the suicide bombing at the Kabul airport that killed American troops and Afghans.
President Donald Trump and Hegseth have repeatedly blasted the Biden administration for the withdrawal, which Hegseth said Tuesday was “disastrous and embarrassing.” He said the new review will interview witnesses, analyze the decision-making and “get the truth.”
There have already been multiple reviews[1] of the withdrawal by the Pentagon, U.S. Central Command, the State Department and Congress, which have involved hundreds of interviews and studies of videos, photographs and other footage and data. It's unclear what specific new information the new review is seeking.
The Abbey Gate bombing during the final days of the Afghanistan withdrawal[2] killed 13 U.S. service members and 170 Afghans, and wounded scores more. It triggered widespread debate and congressional criticism, fueled by searing photographs of desperate Afghans trying to crowd into the airport to get out of Kabul, with some clinging to U.S. military aircraft as they were taking off.
A detailed U.S. military review[3] was ordered in 2023 to expand the number of people interviewed, after a Marine injured in the blast said snipers believed they saw the possible bomber but couldn’t get approval to take him out.
The findings, released in 2024, refuted[4] those assertions and concluded that the bombing was not preventable. A congressional review was highly critical of the withdrawal, saying the Biden administration did not adequately prepare for it or for all the contingencies and put personnel in danger.
Others, however, have faulted the State Department for not moving quickly enough to decide on an evacuation, resulting in a rush to get out as the Taliban took control of the country. Critics have also blamed Trump for making a deal with the Taliban in 2020 when he was president to remove U.S. troops from Afghanistan, which decreased the number of forces on the ground as the pullout went on.
Both Trump and then-President Joe Biden wanted an end to the war and U.S. troops out of Afghanistan.
The new review will be led by Sean Parnell, the assistant to the secretary of defense for public affairs. He will convene a panel that will provide updates “at appropriate times,” but there is no time frame or deadline for any report, which is very unusual.
President Donald Trump has named a four-star Space Force[1] general to oversee the development of Golden Dome -- the massively expensive space-based missile defense system promised during the first days of his second term.
During a press conference in the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump named Gen. Michael Guetlein, the vice chief of space operations, as the "direct reporting program manager" for the effort to build a missile shield over the U.S.
"He has an unmatched background in missile warning technology and defense procurement," Trump said during the announcement. "Gen. Guetlein also knows that we need to move fast. No one is more qualified for this job."
Trump's announcement did not provide many specific details regarding the companies and technologies that would be used to create the proposed space-based defense system, which the administration says would be capable of stopping all types of attacks on American soil including from ballistic, hypersonic and even nuclear missiles.
Inspired by Israel's Iron Dome defense system, which protects against short-range missile threats for a country roughly the size New Jersey, Trump made a bold promise to create America's own system. He issued an executive order in the first month of his second term making it a top priority, and he claims it should be complete by the end of his time in office.
"This design for the Golden Dome will integrate with our existing defense capabilities and should be fully operational before the end of my term," Trump said. "So we'll have it done in about three years."
Trump claimed that a design had been selected and that it will cost roughly $175 billion to complete. That is less than the potential $542 billion to $831 billion high-end cost for Golden Dome over next 20 years projected by the Congressional Budget Office earlier this month[3].
In the Oval Office, Trump touted the $25 billion proposed for Golden Dome in a massive funding bill being pushed through Congress as a down payment of sorts for the project. Notably, that bill as a whole is facing opposition from Republicans and Democrats alike.
Guetlein, a four-star general who has served as the Space Force's second top officer since late 2023, thanked Trump for the new role and doubled down on support for the project.
"Golden Dome is a bold and aggressive approach to hurry up and protect the homeland from our adversaries," Guetlein said. "We owe it to our children and our children's children to protect them and afford them a quality of life that we have all grown up enjoying. Golden Dome will afford that."
Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force's top uniformed leader, praised Guetlein's appointment in a statement on social media.
"No one is more uniquely qualified to make Golden Dome a reality than my teammate and brother-in-arms, Gen. Michael Guetlein," Saltzman said. "Congrats, Mike!"
Spokespeople for the Department of the Air Force[4] did not immediately return a request for comment asking how Guetlein will balance the new role with his existing duties.
Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank who focuses on defense and space policy, said Guetlein was "an excellent choice and the ideal person to be leading an effort this complex."
Guetlein previously served as the head of Space Systems Command, deputy director and Air Force element commander of the National Reconnaissance Office, and was a program executive at the Missile Defense Agency, according to his biography.
Harrison added that besides naming the well-qualified general, there were many more details about the Golden Dome project that needed to be made public.
"Other than naming Guetlein, the whole event was disappointingly short on specifics," Harrison said.
As the years go by, each military service adds new slang and terms as others fall out of use as practices change. Here's a look at some of those terms no longer in use.
Another judge in a border state is dismissing charges against people accused of trespassing into the Trump administration's newly created military zones between the U.S. and Mexico, marking the latest legal setback for the immigration crackdown strategy.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Miguel Torres last week began throwing out some charges in the cases before the U.S. District Court of West Texas related to violating defense property security and unlawful entry onto a Department of Defense installation. The judge deemed there was not probable cause to continue with those charges, according to federal court dockets reviewed by Military.com.
The dropping of charges in El Paso mirrors similar court decisions on charges related to the military zones in New Mexico. A federal judge there dismissed charges[1] related to trespassing on defense property in nearly 100 cases last week.
President Donald Trump ordered that narrow areas of federal land along the border in multiple states be transferred to the military in an effort to snare migrants crossing illegally into the U.S. The military designation has elevated the role of troops in his nationwide immigration crackdown and also enabled harsher penalties against migrants, who can now be charged with crimes related to trespassing on a military installation and face higher fines and more jail time.
The recent court decisions have delivered an early legal setback to the Trump administration's immigration strategy. But there have been some successful charges alleging individuals trespassed onto the new national defense area in Texas, where federal land was turned into a 63-mile, noncontigious extension of Fort Bliss[4].
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Texas said in a news release Tuesday[5] that 60 defendants had pleaded guilty and were convicted of charges related to trespassing onto the military-controlled land.
"These convictions are a positive step in the judicial process of deterring illegal immigration, and I am very grateful to our El Paso Division staff and to our federal law enforcement and military partners for their diligent work in securing our borders," Margaret Leachman, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, said in the news release.
Texas immigration advocates told Military.com that the creation of the new zone in the Lone Star State marks the latest crafted effort to hit migrants with more legal troubles.
Danny Woodward, an attorney with the Texas Civil Rights Project, said Operation Lone Star -- the Texas National Guard[6]'s long-standing mission at the border -- saw a massive push in pursuing private property trespassing charges against migrants in recent years. He sees the latest creation of the military zone as a similar effort.
"I think that they're grasping at straws a little bit, trying to figure out ways to add charges to people," Woodward said. "It's something that we've seen here in Texas, and it's been a real struggle."
Maj. Geoffrey Carmichael, a spokesman for Joint Task Force-Southern Border, said a total of 190 individuals had been detected in the New Mexico and Texas National Defense areas as of Tuesday. Under the current arrangement, the military is spotting border crossers, who are then typically detained by other federal authorities.
Carmichael declined to specifically comment on the charges being dropped, but added that the military is still staying dedicated to its border enforcement mission.
"Joint Task Force-Southern Border continues to stay laser-focused on its mission, whether it's warning sign installation in the most rugged and challenging areas along the border, joint patrols alongside U.S. Border Patrol to detect trespassers, or bringing to bear any of the other unique military capabilities we offer in order to achieve 100% operation control of the southern border," Carmichael said.
The signs posted along the military border zone in Texas were, in part, at the heart of some of those charge dismissals last week, El Paso Matters reported. The judge questioned their placement as well as if they could be read before entering the defense land.
"Conspicuous matters. Where signs are matters. What they look like matters," Torres said in court, El Paso Matters reported[7], adding, "If you have to be right up on the sign to see it, you've already committed the offense."
El Paso Matters reported during last week's hearing that some Border Patrol agents said they had not actually seen the signs themselves but claimed they had been placed every hundred feet or so.
At one point, a defense attorney reportedly lifted up a copy of the 12-by-18-inch sign and asked a Border Patrol agent whether he could read it from less than 20 feet away. The officer couldn't read it from that distance, El Paso Matters reported.
"Given our experience here in Texas, I would be surprised if they're able to make it stick for a long period of time in courts," Woodward said. "But I don't think that's going to stop them from trying new and novel things like this."
