WASHINGTON \u2014 More than 70,700 people had been evacuated from Afghanistan as of Tuesday evening. Nearly 6,000 American troops are protecting the international airport in Kabul, the capital. And additional U.S. flights are leaving every 45 minutes.<\/p>\n
The Biden administration has provided a stream of updates about its airlift of Americans, Afghans and others since Aug. 14, when the Taliban closed in on Kabul. Yet U.S. officials are reluctant to offer an estimate of the one number that matters most: How many people ultimately need to be rescued.<\/p>\n
That tally has never been more critical, with the American government preparing to wind down evacuations as the U.S. military begins its final withdrawal from Afghanistan. On Tuesday, President Biden reaffirmed his plan to remove all American troops by Aug. 31, although he left room \u201cto adjust the timeline should that become necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n
But U.S. officials believe that thousands of Americans remain in Afghanistan, including some far beyond Kabul, without a safe or fast way to get to the airport. Tens of thousands of Afghans who worked for the U.S. government over the last 20 years, and are eligible for special visas, are desperate to leave.<\/p>\n
And refugee and resettlement experts estimate that at least 300,000 Afghans are in imminent danger of being targeted by the Taliban for associating with Americans and U.S. efforts to stabilize Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Recounting his conversations with other world leaders, Mr. Biden said Tuesday evening at the White House that they had agreed to \u201ccontinue our close cooperation to get people out as efficiently and safely as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re currently on a pace to finish by August the 31st,\u201d Mr. Biden said. \u201cThe sooner we can finish the better.\u201d<\/p>\n
But other senior U.S. officials doubt the evacuations will be complete by then.<\/p>\n
\u201cAmericans want us to stay until we get our people out, and so do our allies,\u201d Senator Ben Sasse, Republican of Nebraska, said Tuesday. Mr. Biden, he added, should \u201ctell the Taliban we\u2019re getting our people out however long it takes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Administration officials say the numbers are changing on an hourly basis, if not minute-to-minute, especially since other countries have their own evacuation operations.<\/p>\n
But the American effort is unquestionably the largest. Given the resources and risk the United States is putting into the evacuation, how can the government not know how many people it is planning to fly out?<\/p>\n
\u201cVery good question! We are wondering the same,\u201d said James Miervaldis, the chairman of No One Left Behind, a nonprofit that advocates the relocation of Afghan interpreters to the United States.<\/p>\n
Here is what we know.<\/p>\n
Sort of.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Embassy in Kabul is contacting Americans who are believed to be in Afghanistan \u2014 officials say there may be thousands \u2014 and offering them safe passage to the airport in Kabul to fly out. But the alerts are going only to Americans who provided the government their location before Kabul fell or in the week since.<\/p>\n
The situation has led to U.S. officials combing through databases that may be vastly outdated or undercount the number of U.S. citizens in the country. One Biden administration official said most Americans in Afghanistan are dual citizens, and may have never registered with the embassy or otherwise advised the U.S. government of their whereabouts.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s our responsibility to find them, which we are now doing hour by hour,\u201d Jake Sullivan, Mr. Biden\u2019s national security adviser, said on Monday. \u201cIn the days remaining, we believe we have the wherewithal to get out the American citizens who want to leave Kabul.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than 4,000 American citizens, plus their family members, have been evacuated so far, a senior State Department official said on Tuesday. Thousands more remain: A day earlier, a congressional official put the total number of U.S. citizens still in Afghanistan at 10,000. It was not clear how many of the 4,000 who have been evacuated were included in that tally.<\/p>\n
First, some history on the so-called S.I.V. program.<\/p>\n
In 2009, Congress approved special refuge for Afghans who had worked for the American military and U.S. Embassy as interpreters, translators, advisers and other jobs during the war, and who could be targeted by the Taliban or other extremists for assisting the United States.<\/p>\n
The International Rescue Committee estimates there are tens of thousands of Afghans who are eligible for the special visas. But only about 16,000 Afghans have received the special visas since 2014, and the State Department faced a backlog of more than 17,000 applications when Mr. Biden took office in January.<\/p>\n
Between mid-July and Aug. 14, the State Department evacuated about 2,000 Afghans who qualified for the visas. After a several-day pause last week while the Biden administration focused on evacuating American citizens and embassy staff, flights have resumed for the former Afghan employees; the first plane load of special immigration visa holders since Kabul fell departed Ramstein Air Base in Germany early Monday and headed to the United States.<\/p>\n
One congressional aide said the Biden administration had identified about 50,000 special visa applicants, and their families, to be evacuated. But the aide said far more were eligible.<\/p>\n
Sunil Varghese, the policy director for the International Refugee Assistance Project, said it was not clear how many Afghans qualified for the program \u2014 largely because the Pentagon and State Department had done a poor job of coordinating and communicating with each other about who had worked for each agency.<\/p>\n
And without a centralized U.S. government database to track former employees in Afghanistan, it fell to the Afghans to prove they had worked for the United States, Mr. Varghese said.<\/p>\n
Who are the Taliban? <\/strong>The Taliban arose in 1994 amid the turmoil that came after the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan in 1989. They used brutal public punishments, including floggings, amputations and mass executions, to enforce their rules. Here\u2019s more on their origin story and their record as rulers.<\/span><\/p>\n Who are the Taliban leaders? <\/strong>These are\u00a0the top leaders of the Taliban, men who have spent years on the run, in hiding, in jail and dodging American drones. Little is known about them or how they plan to govern, including whether they will be as tolerant as they claim to be.<\/span><\/p>\n How did the Taliban gain control? <\/strong>See how the Taliban retook power\u00a0in Afghanistan in a few months, and read about how their strategy\u00a0enabled them to do so.<\/span><\/p>\n What happens to the women of Afghanistan? <\/strong>The last time the Taliban were in power, they barred women and girls from taking most jobs or going to school. Afghan women have made many gains\u00a0since the Taliban were toppled, but now they fear that ground may be lost. Taliban officials are trying to reassure women that things will be different, but there are signs that, at least in some areas, they have begun to reimpose the old order.<\/span><\/p>\n What does their victory mean for terrorist groups? <\/strong>The United States invaded Afghanistan 20 years ago in response to terrorism, and many worry that Al Qaeda and other radical groups will again find safe haven\u00a0there.<\/span><\/p>\n Far from it. The administration acknowledges that there are hundreds of thousands of Afghans who are considered at high risk of being targeted by the Taliban \u2014 former Afghan security forces, government officials, journalists, judges and prosecutors, and women rights advocates among them.<\/p>\n The State Department said it had accelerated its referrals of Afghans at high risk to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program. That program, however, would generally require Afghans to apply through the United Nations\u2019 refugee agency and await approval \u2014 a process that can take years.<\/p>\n As of Friday, the State Department was planning to accept up to 50,000 Afghans into the United States under a humanitarian parole \u2014 meaning they would be temporarily settled at military bases until their visas were processed, according to a memo provided by a resettlement worker.<\/p>\n \u201cThis caseload would be separate from \u2014 and additional to \u2014 the Afghan refugee or S.I.V. cases who will also continue to be admitted,\u201d according to the memo, which was confirmed by a person familiar with it who said even 50,000 was a vast undercounting of those in need. The State Department declined to comment.<\/p>\n One administration official said the number of people who needed to be evacuated could be more than 100,000. The International Rescue Committee has a much higher estimate: 300,000 Afghan civilians alone.<\/p>\n Not likely. The evacuation mission is widely expected to slow to a trickle once the U.S. military exits. Without the protection of the 6,000 American troops in Kabul, the military airlift will end, and State Department charter flights will slow, and could altogether cease. Additionally, some other foreign governments have said they would have little choice but to also depart.<\/p>\n The Biden administration is warning the Taliban, which wants international aid to Afghanistan to continue, to allow Afghans to leave the country \u2014 a commitment that Ned Price, the State Department\u2019s chief spokesman, said did not \u201chave an expiration date.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo it certainly stands to reason \u2014 and we will hold the Taliban to this; the rest of the world will as well \u2014 that individuals who seek to leave after the U.S. military is gone will have an opportunity to do so,\u201d Mr. Price said on Monday.<\/p>\n But on Tuesday, the Taliban said they would block Afghans trying to leave the country from traveling to Kabul\u2019s airport.<\/p>\n \u201cI am pleading for the United States to help my family \u2014 the family that has been teaching English, working on military posts and are now in imminent danger for having helped America,\u201d said Fatima Jaghoori, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Afghanistan and served in Iraq with the U.S. Army. Her husband, who also served in the American military, was killed in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n \u201cPlease let my service and sacrifice act as a token to bring my family to safety,\u201d she wrote in a letter to U.S. officials. \u201cMy family does not have a chance at life if they are left to the Taliban rule.\u201d<\/p>\n David Zucchino and Alexandra E. Petri contributed reporting.<\/p>\nSo once Americans and S.I.V. holders are evacuated, is that it?<\/h2>\n
Is it even possible to get that many people out in time?<\/h2>\n