House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, has issued a subpoena to the State Department in an effort to obtain a July 2021 cable from US diplomats warning of the possible fall of Kabul.
The subpoena, which McCaul sent Tuesday to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, demands Blinken’s response, along with dissent cables written by about two dozen State Department officials working at the Kabul embassy at the time.
The committee spokesperson said the subpoena requests the documents by April 4.
McCall cited a 2021 Wall Street Journal report that said the cable warned that the Biden administration was not properly prepared for a full US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was completed by the end of that August. Was.
“Providing the cables to Congress could have a chilling effect on the willingness of others to come forward in the future,” Blinken said in testimony last week and instead offered a classified briefing on the cable’s substance.
The Foreign Affairs Committee said Monday that the cables, and Blinken’s response to them, “are important documents because they reveal exactly the same information that the State Department’s own staff provided to Secretary Blinken about a month before the withdrawal.” “
Before McCaul finally decided on the subpoena, he offered to review the document in a secure location rather than physically deliver it to the committee. The Foreign Affairs Committee said they also offered to redact the names of the signatories to protect their privacy.
The State Department, however, refused to provide the confidential cables, which McCaul said in a statement on Monday, compelled him to issue the subpoenas.
“The American people deserve answers as to how this tragedy unfolded and why 13 American service members lost their lives. We expect the State Department to follow the law and honor this subpoena in good faith,” he said.
McCall was referring to the 13 US service members who were killed in an August 2021 attack by the Islamic State terrorist group outside Kabul’s airport, where Americans and allies were being evacuated from Afghanistan.
State Department Principal Deputy Spokesman Vedant Patel told NBC News that the department followed up with the committee to reiterate its willingness to provide information about concerns raised by diplomats in Afghanistan.
“The department remains committed to providing the committee with the information it needs to conduct its oversight work, and has already provided thousands of pages of documents in response to the committee’s request,” Patel said.
The committee originally requested the classified cables in August 2021 under then-Democratic chairman Gregory Meeks of New York.