A short briefing at the Pentagon just occurred, with Gen. McKenzie, U.S. Central Command, confirming that 12 U.S. service members were killed by today’s suicide attacks in Kabul, Afghanistan.

In prepared remarks that seemed almost dismissive of the loss of life at times, the administration attempted to paint the attacks as baked-in while touting the supposed overall success of the mission.

“We thought this would happen sooner or later,” says Gen. Genneth McKenzie.

Also says "we share a common purpose" with the Taliban and they are "useful to work with"

— Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) August 26, 2021

McKenzie also seemed to dance around the fact that we are trusting the Taliban. While he admitted there was a failure, he seemingly still placed his trust in the terrorist organization to provide security. Several times, the mantra that the mission will continue was repeated with the assertion that more attacks are likely coming. When pressed on what measures were being taken to prevent future loss of life, the general actually said they would be reaching out to the Taliban.

McKenzie also assigned blame for the attacks, saying they were carried out by ISIS. While there are some questions about how a car bomb made it through Taliban checkpoints without coordination, ISIS itself has now taken credit, confirming the Pentagon’s assertion.

ISIS: "The attacker was able to reach a distance of no less than five meters from the American forces, who were supervising the procedures for collecting documents from hundreds of translators and contractors in preparation for their evacuation from the country."

— Evan Kohlmann (@IntelTweet) August 26, 2021

The ISIS statement accused the Taliban of being "in a partnership" with the U.S. military to evacuate "spies" and boasted that its bomber "managed to penetrate all the security measures imposed by the American forces and the Taliban militia in the capital Kabul."

— Evan Kohlmann (@IntelTweet) August 26, 2021

Lastly, McKenzie indicated that future military action is not imminent in order to respond to the attacks and loss of American lives. Instead, he spoke of asking the Taliban to close down roads, confirming they will continue to run the security operation outside the airport.

It appears the White House is going to double down here on their current, failing plan. The president is now scheduled to speak at 5:00 PM Eastern today. We’ll keep you updated on what Biden says.