Afghanistan Withdrawal

July 2: The U.S. evacuates Bagram Airfield in the middle of the night The manner of the US departure from Bagram Airfield, the main hub of America's 20-year war in Afghanistan, offered a clue to the nature of the disaster to come. U.S. forces slipped away in the dead of night, shutting off the electricity and failing to notify the base's new Afghan commander. 'We (heard) some rumor that the Americans had left Bagram ... and finally by seven o’clock in the morning, we understood that it was confirmed that they had already left Bagram,' Gen. Mir Asadullah Kohistani, Bagram’s new commander, told the Associated Press. Leaving Bagram effectively signaled that America's war was over. The nature of the departure was a bitter blow for the Afghan forces pondering how they would fare without their mightiest ally. 'In one night, they lost all the goodwill of 20 years by leaving the way they did, in the night, without telling the Afghan soldiers who were outside patrolling the area,' said Afghan soldier Naematullah. Already there were signs that the 350,000 troops of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces were struggling A U.S. intelligence assessment, reported by the Wall Street Journal, said Kabul could collapse as quickly as six months after American forces left. It replaced a previous estimate that the government could survive for as long as two years. And yet, it only took approximately a week.