According to one of the soldiers injured in the incident, the CIA alerted Marines stationed at Kabul airport’s Abbey Gate last year of a suicide bomber two days before an explosion tore through the disorganised evacuation.
When the Islamic State bomber set up his explosives on August 26, 2021, 13 American military members and at least 170 Afghans perished.
American Marine Tristan Hirsch was assigned at the gate in the middle of the mayhem.
He is now allowed to talk about what happened before the assault since he survived the explosion and has subsequently left the service.
He stated that Marines had observed the first bomber in the vicinity for two days but were forbidden from killing him.
He also detailed Taliban killings in the midst of the stampede of civilians attempting to flee.
Hirsch, 24, told his local Chico Enterprise-Record newspaper in California, “We knew about him two days before the assault.”
“We were aware of his appearance.” He seemed just as they had described him, the CIA informed us.
They had been warned that a guy preparing for paradise and on a suicide mission would seem differently to the hungry and exhausted throngs storming the airport in need of assistance to leave.
They were searching for a person who seemed to have just washed and had a clean beard.
When asked what intelligence had been given to the military and if the bomber had been identified, the CIA remained silent.
Hirsch claimed to have missed the suspect. However, people at the gate observed him for two days. He continued, “He’d come up and go.”
Hirsch said that a buddy of his who was a sniper had drawn back his weapon and was prepared to shoot the man.
The response to our request for approval was, “Let me get a military judge to determine whether it’s lawful.”
Permission, according to Hirsch, was delayed because the battalion commander at the time was worried about losing his position.
The bomber set up his explosives at 5:36 p.m.
He probably got by Taliban security near the airport before detonating a 20-pound bomb, carried in a backpack or vest, according to a Pentagon study.
Around a US position at the gate, it shot 5-millimeter ball bearings into a crowded area.
Abdul Rahman Al-Logari, a prisoner who had been released from a maximum-security facility after the Taliban took control of Kabul, was subsequently named by the Islamic State as the assailant.
According to reports, American intelligence was aware of him and had informed Indian officials four years before that he was preparing to carry out a suicide assault in New Delhi.
The New York Times reported that he was detained and sent to the CIA.
Hirsch’s testimony is different from what was found by the Pentagon. He said that a second bomber had been found by Marines, “but he didn’t have a chance to explode,” therefore the attack wasn’t carried out by a lone bomber. I believe that the first one to go off killed him.
Hirsch was injured as well.
I remember sitting there and marvelling at it when I was struck by the explosion, he said.
“I was a military engineer by trade.” I had often used explosives to blast up doors, dig ditches, and use very large quantities of explosives. When I first saw it, I reportedly thought, “That’s not it horrible, that’s not large.”
But I didn’t understand there were thousands of ball bearings in the 25–30 pound vest he was wearing until after 30 seconds had passed.
At the time, I was somewhat perplexed. I was screamed at by a buddy to take cover. Everyone shouted for a corpsman, and I was just kind of standing there.
His realisation of the scope of the assault came gradually. One of Hirsch’s pals died as a result of it, and Hirsch had a traumatic brain injury.
He is now sporting a bracelet with Staff Sergeant Taylor Hoover’s name on it as his platoon commander.
He remarked, “He was a very lovely man.”
Hirsch enlisted in the Marines in 2018 at the age of 20. He served six months in Saudi Arabia as a member of the emergency fast response squad before being dispatched to Afghanistan.
Hirsch and his battalion were the first to die as the Taliban advanced quickly throughout the nation.
When they arrived, the Taliban had just taken over the capital, the airport was in a state of chaos.
“While we waited, our squadron commander would enter the command centre and explain to us why (the first jet) couldn’t land. On the tarmac, there were just too many people, said Hirsch. “Almost out of petrol,” they said.
It was their responsibility to oversee Abbey Gate within the airport, maintain order, and assist travellers in leaving.
In some way, he said, “our duty was to locate certain passports, what’s valid, and what’s a green card.”
We received no visual assistance, and instructions were likely relayed by 40 different persons. We sometimes had to play the villain by shooing folks away. And you were aware of what was about to occur.
“The hardest part was the desperation.” seeing blatant acts of evil committed by Afghan citizens who were attempting to flee, not even by the Taliban.
“I’ve never heard of or seen such desperation,” I said. Men would approach you and only urge you to murder them so they wouldn’t be taken prisoner by the Taliban. They would prefer to be murdered by an American.
One kid, who seemed to be in need, dumped a newborn infant into a canal when he was 15 or 16 years old.
The Marines could even observe Afghans being shot dead from their vantage point.
He said that turning people away was the worst decision they could have made.
If you ignore them, you will only hear the execution gunshots ten minutes later.
You might sometimes see what was happening, but there was nothing you could do; you would just have to sit there and observe.