Taliban advance as international troops withdraw from Afghanistan |

President Joe Biden said Thursday that the US will end its military mission in Afghanistan on August 31 during a White House address.
Biden had previously vowed to withdraw all US soldiers from the country by September 11. "We did not go to Afghanistan to nation build," Biden said in the speech. "Afghan leaders have to come together and drive forward a future." He added that he did not trust the Taliban, but said the US-backed government in Kabul had many more troops to counter their advance. Biden told reporters that its not "inevitable" that the Taliban will take over the country following the US pullout. The US president also noted that no nation in history has ever united Afghanistan. "How many more, how many more thousands of American daughters and sons are you willing to risk?" Biden said in remarks aimed at opponents of the pullout. "I will not send another generation of Americans to war in Afghanistan, with no reasonable expectation of achieving a different outcome," the president added.