Kabul terror bombings kill at least 100, including 13 US marines

Joe Biden is ready to authorise more military force in Afghanistan after twin bombings left 100 dead, including 13 US marines.

The bomb explodes next to Kabul airport on Thursday.

US President Joe Biden said he stood ready to authorise further military force in Afghanistan and the US would “hunt down” the terrorist attackers that have left more than 100 dead, including 13 US marines, near Kabul airport.

The twin blasts ripped through nearby security checkpoints outside Kabul airport international airport’s entrance gate and another at a nearby hotel, about 5pm local time on Thursday (12.30am Friday AEST).

Islamist extremists ISIS-K have claimed responisbility for the attacks, which have put intense pressure on Mr Biden.

In a televised address, he said the US would not be deterred by terrorism and the attacks would not shift the US from its timetable to complete the evacuation of US citizens by August 31.

“To those who carried out this attack, know this, we will not forgive, we will not forget, we will hunt you down and make you pay,” he said. “We have some reason to believe we know who they are, although we aren’t certain,” he added at a press conference at the White House.

Scott Morrison condemned the “evil, calculated and inhuman” attacks against “the innocent and the brave”.

“We join with our American and Afghan friends in mourning their terrible loss. Like so many other losses that have gone before them,” he said.

“Like Australians who have been at the same airport and at the same game and many others like it, over the course of these operations, these brave young Americans stood at the gate to protect life, to save life but lost their own in providing a pathway to freedom for others,” he said.

Deeply saddened by the deaths of US military personnel and Afghans in the horrific terrorist attacks in Kabul. We mourn your tragic loss.

Australia condemns these heinous and barbaric attacks.

All our brave ADF and Australian personnel are safe.

— Scott Morrison (@ScottMorrisonMP) August 26, 2021

Defence Minister Peter Dutton and the ADF confirmed all Australian military personnel and other government officials had already left Kabul and are “safe” in the UAE but Mr Dutton said the Australian military evacuation mission had now concluded.

Mr Dutton said it was too early to tell if any Australians were killed or injured in the attacks and that it would take “some time” to determine how many Australians and locally engaged Afghan staff were unable to be evacuated.

President Biden praised the 13 dead marines as “heroes engaged in a dangerous selfless mission to save the lives of others”.

“And our hearts ache for all those Afghan families who lost loved once, including small children in this vicious attack,” he said.

The President spoke movingly of his own family’s tragedy, the loss of his son Beau, caused by overseas military operations, but argued the evacuation was always bound to be messy and costly whenever it occurred. “Lives we lost were lives given in service of liberty, service of security and service of others, in service of America,” he said.

Mr Biden, who said he had been in continual contact with his generals all day, backed his general Kenneth McKenzie who earlier had praised Taliban forces who have helped secure access to the airport for stranded Americans and Afghans as “helpful”.

“No-one trusts [Taliban]; we’re just counting on their self-interest … It’s in their self-interest that we leave when we said we would, and we get as many people out as we can,” the president said.

He dismissed the idea the attacks were co-ordinated between the Taliban and ISIS terror group ISIS-K.

No Australian defence personnel have been killed or wounded in a tragedy that, for the US armed forces, was the largest death toll in at least a decade and the first death of personnel in Afghanistan since February 2020.

Explosions have continued throughout the night in Kabul, with Taliban military vehicles seemingly under attack from magnetic or sticky bombs. Kabul residents reported hearing at least three such explosions after the double airport blasts.

A gunfight was also underway near the parliament at Darulaman, about 12km from the airport.

General Kenneth McKenzie, who commands US forces in Afghanistan, said ISIS suicide bombers had evaded earlier Taliban checkpoints to reach US marines and he expected such attacks to continue.

“Americans ultimately have got to be in danger to do these [bomb] searches, there’s no other way to do it,” he said.

The General said he had “seen nothing” to suggest the Taliban, which was helping US forces secure the airport, had facilitated the attacks.

“We share a common purpose [to get out by August 31]. They have cut some of our security concerns down, they have been useful to work with,” he said.

The White House revealed late on Thursday that the US had evacuated more than 100,000 people from Afghanistan since August 14.

A man injured in terrorist attacks in Kabul is taken to hospital on a stretcher. Picture: AFP

Repeated warnings of a heightened and growing terrorist threat materialised on Thursday as the US and allied forces raced the clock to evacuate all remaining western and eligible Afghans from Kabul, the capital city in the hands of the Taliban which retook Afghanistan almost two weeks ago.

President Joe Biden, briefed on the unfolding disaster by the chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff and his secretaries of defence and state Thursday morning EDT, cancelled his scheduled meeting with the visiting Israeli prime minister to monitor the situation from the White House.

As the world waited for President Biden to speak in Washington, British prime minister Boris Johnson said from London that British troops would “keep going until the last moment” extracting people from Afghanistan despite the “barbaric” bombings.

Mr Johnson said officials and the military had been working “flat out” and would continue to do so, acknowledging that the overwhelming majority of British evacuees had already been extracted.

The Taliban – enemies of ISIS-K, an even more extreme terrorist group – said it “strongly condemned the bombing of civilians at Kabul airport, which took place in an area where US forces are responsible for security”.

“The Islamic Emirate is paying close attention to the security and protection of its people, and evil circles will be strictly stopped,” spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.

Wounded women arrive at a Kabul hospital for treatment. Picture: AFP

The Pentagon said “a number” of US service members had been killed in what it described as a “complex attack”. Multiple reports listed US casualties at 12, including one medic, but the toll was expected to rise.

“We also know that a number of Afghans fell victim to this heinous attack. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones and teammates of all those killed and injured,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a statement.

Pictures from the scene showed injured people being ferried away from the scene in wheelbarrows. Others were walking wounded and covered in blood, helped by relatives.

“A lot of people got hurt, and I got a baby girl, she was five years old and she died right in my hands,” an Afghan translator, on his way to the airport to be evacuated, told Fox News.

Kabul Emergency Hospital said more than 30 patients had arrived at the Kabul Surgical Centre with an additional six who were dead on arrival. Graphic and gruesome footage circulated on social media showing people dying instantly near the canal surrounding the airport.

Injured Afghans flee the site of a suicide bombing next to Kabul airport on Thursday. Picture: Twitter

The second explosion, believed to be a car bomb, occurred near the Baron hotel in Kabul, located about 1km from the airport, where it was believed some US forces had been located. Turkish defence officials said the target for the attacks was the US.

The attacks came a day after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said up to 1,500 Americans remained in Afghanistan.

US and allied forces evacuated 13,400 people over the 24 hours to early Thursday morning, bringing the total since August 14 to 95,700, including at least 4000 Australian nationals and vulnerable Afghans granted Australian visas.

Hundreds of people have been camped for days at Hamid Karzai International Airport in the hope of joining the western evacuation from Afghanistan, which the US – and the Taliban – have insisted must be completed by August 31.

Medical and hospital staff carry an injured man out of a car for treatment after two blasts detonated outside Kabul airport. Picture: AFP

Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said the US would “not be dissuaded from the task at hand”. “To do anything less – especially now – would dishonour the purpose and sacrifice these men and women have rendered our country and the people of Afghanistan,” he said in a statement.

The disaster prompted calls for a change in US strategy, either an immediate withdrawal, or a definitive decision to extend the evacuation mission which would require a greater number of troops than the 5,200 American servicemen still in Kabul

“It’s been an extremely difficult day [but] several classified meetings over last few days suggested it was not something we were unaware of coming,” said the Chairman of the House of Representative Foreign Affairs committee Gregory Meeks, a Democrat.

Republican minority leader of the House of Representatives Kevin McCartney insisted Speaker Nancy Pelosi reconvene Congress, which is in its summer recess, before August 31 “so we can be briefed thoroughly by the Administration and prohibit the withdrawal of our troops until every American is safely out”.

“Our enemies have taken advantage of the chaotic nature of Biden’s withdrawal,” he said.

Volunteers and medical staff unload bodies from a truck outside a hospital after two powerful explosions rocked Kabul. Picture: AFP

Mr Johnson said British Royal Air Force personnel had airlifted the equivalent of a largish UK town, describing it as a “phenomenal achievement’’.

Meanwhile, Germany removed its troops from Kabul in its final evacuation flight on Thursday. German defence minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said: “All soldiers, members of the foreign ministry and federal police who have led this mission to a safe end for us on the ground have been flown out of Kabul.”

Denmark, New Zealand and Belgium suspended their evacuation efforts, citing heightened security concerns.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison yesterday warned the situation at Kabul airport had become “highly dangerous” as the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade later issued new warnings on the deteriorating situation in the Afghan capital.