Consider This from NPR - A U.S. Marine's View From Kabul's Airport As the City Fell to the Taliban

Episode Date: August 15, 2022

One year ago, on August 15, 2021, the Taliban swept into power in Kabul. It's a day that many remember, as videos and images showed a chaotic scene at the Kabul airport, with thousands of Afghans desperately trying to flee the country. Lt. Col. Chris Richardella was one of the officers leading the U.S. Marine Corps at the airport when the Taliban took over. In a conversation with NPR's Mary Louise Kelly, he recounts what followed.In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Support for NPR and the following message come from the Kauffman Foundation, providing access to opportunities that help people achieve financial stability, upward mobility, and economic prosperity, regardless of race, gender, or geography. Kauffman.org. fell to the Taliban, Lieutenant Colonel Chris Richardella was in Kuwait. Richardella is a Marine. He was the commanding officer for a battalion landing team, a kind of on-call crisis response force for the region. We had been preparing for about a month at this point in Kuwait. We'd been talking about it, analyzing it every single day, rehearsing what we thought might happen and what we were going to do in training. This was early August 2021. The Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan was looking more and more imminent. Then, as Richard Ella puts it, the bell rang. Orders came. He and his battalion got on a military transport plane, flew to Kabul, and got to work. What we really need to figure out was if we were directed to start evacuating people, what gates we were going to choose, what entry points onto the base, and really kind of setting up the logistics that would make the most sense for the flow of a large amount of people.

That was August 13th, 2021. Two days later, Kabul fell. Richard Ella was one of the officers in charge of security for Kabul airport. Consider this. One year ago, U.S. troops withdrew from Afghanistan, marking a chaotic end to America's longest war. We'll hear from one of the officers in charge of security at the Kabul airport on the day Kabul fell as thousands of Afghans desperately tried to get on the last planes out. From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly. It's Monday, August 15th. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally, and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees.

Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply. It's Consider This from NPR. Lieutenant Colonel Chris Richardella told me about the precise moment when it became very clear things were not going to plan. I'll never forget this moment for as long as I live. And that was the night of the 15th. During the day, at different gates, more and more people started coming up. We were not formally ready for evacuation operations. I was in command of 1,000 Marines, and all 1,000 were supposed to be there to set conditions to establish security and be prepared.

I only had 150 at that point. And things started to become pretty tough. People were coming to the gate. They were panicked. And we started to receive plenty of sniper fire at some of these gates. People were getting injured. We dealt with that as we're trained to do. Meaning they started firing back, trying to get people to safety. That evening, I walk into the Joint Operations Center,

and right away, I see people talking about how the ambassador or the chief of mission has closed down the mission there. At the embassy, yeah. Yes, ma'am. That the government has fallen, the president has left. I was unaware as I was out on the line the entire day. And at that moment, I look up at the myriad of screens and one camera was picking up on the southern portion of the base. What we didn't know is that all the Afghan security forces left.

So there was a huge hole in security for the southern portion of the base. What we didn't know is that all the Afghan security forces left. So there was a huge hole in security for the southern portion of the base where the civilian terminal was. And all you saw were thousands of people running through the gates and onto the base. Our job is going to be to keep the airfield open. If there were people on that airfield, we would have to close and we would not have support nor would we have an exit. So in that moment, I looked at a few of my people and we just locked and loaded, put our kits on and just ran out. Of course, it was at night. It was pitch black and we had no idea what we were going to face. And as we ran onto that airfield, there they were,

about 3,000 to 5,000 panicked civilians right there on our doorstep surrounding the one to two C-17s that were actually there. What they saw is their beacon of freedom. So let me just pause you for a second. You're describing a situation. You have 150 people under your command. You should have more, but you have to keep the airport open so they can arrive. And with those 150 people, you're trying to figure out what do we do with these thousands of people who are frantically pouring into the airport? And we don't know who these people are. Afghans, Americans, whoever, good guys, bad guys, any of it. We're just trying to hold a line. That was it, ma'am. There's no textbook on that right there. So we just figured it out as we went.

And so what we did was just get shoulder to shoulder. I would say we made up about 300 people total and just start pushing the people back to the other side of the airstrip, corral them there, then start spreading our message that we will get them out. That turned into two and a half days of a constant bitter struggle back and forth. As 5,000 grew to 10,000, panic increased. Taliban continued to shoot at us and start hurting people. From the outside, for those of us trying to follow what's going on,

this is when we're seeing the picture starting to stream in of people who are desperate, running after planes, holding on to planes as they're trying to take off. They're that desperate. What are the orders you're giving? You're in charge. Hold the line. Keep the airfield open. Protect these people. Those are the orders I'm giving.

The people saw what we were doing. They saw that we were trying to stop the guys that were firing at us, that were firing through them, the crowd, that is. People had nowhere else to go. And it just created riots and absolute panic and chaos. I want to bring in one other voice and let you respond to it just to enlarge on quite how quickly the situation was changing. I interviewed General Frank McKenzie, the then commander of CENTCOM, and asked him about August 15th and the day that

Kabul fell. He told me on that day he had flown to Doha, which is where the Taliban leadership was, he had warned them not to interfere with the U.S. withdrawal. When I was going out to Doha, the plan was to try to get the Taliban to stop at a perimeter of maybe 15 or 20 kilometers outside the city, a ring around it. We wanted them to not come any closer until we pulled our forces out. Well, by the time I got there, they were already in downtown Kabul. So that plan was no longer operative. So a sense there of how quickly things were changing. Colonel Richard Della, from where you sat, did it feel like things flipped suddenly over those days from the Taliban is the enemy, we're fighting them to, hang on, we're gonna have to coordinate with the Taliban if we're going to secure this airport and try to get whoever we can get out, out. Yeah, that really came as a shock to me.

You know, I questioned that at initially when I received that guy and said, you know, we've had multiple engagements and killed a bunch of them at this point, they're still shooting at us. And I was told yes, but we're partnering with them now. They're kind of going to do security from outside the base and we're going to do the inner security portion of the base. The people are still very scared of the Taliban, and it certainly didn't make our jobs very easy once we formally opened for processing operations to begin the evacuation at the various gates that we had, the press of humanity of 5,000 plus people pushing against a single gate.

And they see us take one, two, three people in, and they just want to bum rush, claw, punch, kick any way they can to try and get onto the base. Were you getting calls asking you to help get people out? I started receiving a lot of emails. I started receiving a lot of text messages. Many of these people, some top former officials, some with a lot more rank on their collar or retired at this point, reaching out to me.

How they got my name and number, I don't know. Many peers of mine reaching out, hey, you need to look for this guy. This is his name. This is how many people he has. These are his family members. And it just became constant. All day, every day, people reaching out to you, asking for help. You know, about 3,000 to 5,000 people in a gate trying to get just a small family through was very tough. I did do some of those missions.

I would call them to help out in the middle of the night where we would open a side door to a gate, bring family in after we had coordinated with that family and the people back here on how to signal, where to link up, when to come in. We bring them in and we take them to the bird immediately to evacuate. Do you remember anybody in particular, an individual or a family who you were able to help? Not by name, but I can picture them right now as we speak. Describe them to me. Yeah, there was a family, a gentleman who was an interpreter. My friends reached out to me, told me this was a good guy. He had all the necessary paperwork. He just couldn't get to the gate, and he had his family with him.

So middle of the night, many of these people had been outside the gate just trying to get to the gate and he had his family with him. So middle of the night, many of these people had been outside the gate just trying to get in for five days or so with no food, no water, very tough situation. Brought the family in, took a picture with them to send back to my friends just to verify that everything was good. And I drove them with, I don't know, 10 people in a five passenger SUV there, all sitting on top of each other, some sobbing, some elated, and drove them straight to where they were going to be processed into the system, and then put them directly on the bird. That was very gratifying. It was very tough, very unrealistic to do for absolutely everyone. They just happened to be able to get to that point in the gate that I needed them to get to

so that we could grab them and bring them in. Anyone who haunts you, who you couldn't get out? That's a good question because I think this is what Marines struggle with. The combat aspect of this mission was not hard. This is what Marines train for. I think what people struggled with the most, both while we were there for the evacuation and even when we returned, because we are all sons and daughters. We're all brothers and sisters. We all have families. And this is what you were dealing with, was this just absolute crisis of humanity and looking in these people's eyes and them looking at you as their only way out because they truly believed they were going to die. And as we watched women having babies in front of us or handing

their babies over the gate because they knew they couldn't get in, some people dying right in front of us from just absolute heat exhaustion and whatever medical condition they may have had. And then bringing families who more often than not, because they were usually large, 10, 20, 30 people, families would be separated quite often as you're coming through a very narrow portion in a gate and all the families coming through these crowds that were very violent were breaking people apart. And you bring kids in and they're crying for their parents who aren't there. Or you bring a mother in who's losing it because her son couldn't get through. Looking at these people, hearing the screams, the cries being clawed at and looking at these people in their

eyes. And I think what was even tougher is that not all of these people were qualified to get onto our aircraft to be evacuated. So some of those people that we brought onto the base, we then had to escort off the base. And after you tell someone, once they're finally in the base, in your bubble of security, and then they don't clear because they don't have the right paperwork or whatever it may be. And then you have to then take them off the base. That was very tough. Marines really struggled with that. Yeah.

You told me how you train and prepare for every possible scenario going into a situation like this, and you're describing a situation that one couldn't possibly prepare for as a military officer, as a human being. No. There's no way you could ever think through that scenario. In fact, when we were training, we trained every single day to do evacuation operations. We had other Marines in our unit play the evacuees. But once you get on the ground and you induce that panic and that chaos and that friction,

it's quite a different story. And there's no organization, there's no discipline, and it's quite a different story. And there's no organization, there's no discipline, and it's quite chaotic. You left Kabul on August 30th, is that right? Yes. What was that like, flying out and knowing this was how 20 years of war was going to end? Mixed bag of emotions, to be honest with you. We had received a rocket attack on the base that morning. So we were on high alert. But to know that this is how it was going to end, you know, the previous deployment I had done there, the many friends that I'd seen, many different units deploy over there over the years really kind of defines the my generation my career

in a lot of ways for a guy like me sure it's it's very tough to see it come to a close as it did i wonder if on that day you got a little closer to understanding what an older generation of american service members and veterans might have felt um And I'm thinking of my dad's generation who fought in Vietnam. And then many of them had the rest of their lives to wonder if they had fought a war that some would see that could be seen as a waste. I share that sentiment. I felt closer to that generation in that moment than I ever have in my entire life. But as I would tell any one of those Vietnam veterans who I'd thank for their service,

more strenuously now, having a shared experience with them, as I would tell my Marines who look back on their experience a year ago, that they did well given the circumstances. They saved lives. They helped good people. They hurt bad people. And they executed in an outstanding manner and kept their honor clean. That was Lieutenant Colonel Chris Richardella, who was leading a battalion of Marines handling security at Kabul airport when the Taliban took over Afghanistan last year. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Mary Louise Kelly.