America’s Miscalculations, Afghanistan’s Collapse

The last few days in Afghanistan have been chaotic as the Taliban retake control of the country.

The debacle can be traced to a number of assumptions that guided the U.S. decision to withdraw from the country this year after two decades of war.

How could those assumptions have proved so wrong, so quickly?

Guest: David E. Sanger, a White House and national security correspondent for The New York Times.

Sign up here to get The Daily in your inbox each morning. And for an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. 

Background reading: 

• An Afghan military that did not believe in itself and a U.S. effort that President Biden, and most Americans, no longer believed in brought an ignoble end to the United States’ longest war.
• A takeover of the whole of Afghanistan was all but absolute as the government collapsed and the U.S. rushed through a frenzied evacuation.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.