BRITISH paratroopers today desperately tried to control chaos at Kabul airport as women and children were crushed in a stampede to escape the Taliban.
Shocking photos show the troops attempting to manage thousands of refugees and foreign nationals at the only route out of the war-torn country.
Paratroopers were forced to link arms and push back the angry crowd, some of whom waved British passports in the air, reports Mail Online
In the chaos one solider was forced to wave a Special Forces-issue Glock handgun above his head to try regain control.
It came as President Biden today admitted that the US may not be able to rescue everyone it needs from the Taliban territory by the August 31 deadline.
He branded the evacuation as the “most difficult and dangerous airlift in history.
He added: “Make no mistake, this evacuation is dangerous.”
“I cannot promise what the final outcome will be or that it will be without risk of loss.”
Meanwhile Uk Defence Minister James Heappey warned that the airbridge could close in the coming days.
He said: “The air bridge has two more days, five more days, ten days.
“It keeps absolutely everyone here at the Ministry of Defence awake at night – that reality that we won’t get absolutely everyone out.
“At the moment the large majority are getting to us. Now of course, some will not be able to get to us.”
Speaking in the No 10 study this evening, Mr Johnson said the situation was “getting slightly better”, with “stabilisation” at Kabul airport.
He said 2,000 people had been repatriated to the UK in the past days, with most of them UK nationals or those who had assisted British efforts in the central Asian country.
The Prime Minister stressed it would be a “mistake” to think of the end of August or the beginning of September as a “cut-off point for our involvement and our willingness to help” and that there would be time to sort accommodation and logistics for the 20,000 Afghan refugees the UK aims to take.
“The UK’s commitment to Afghanistan is lasting and our plan to help people with the resettlement programme will run for a good while to come,” he said.
Speaking to reporters after he had chaired an emergency Government Cobra meeting on Afghanistan he said: “It’s worth repeating that at the end of a 20-year cycle of engagement there is a huge record to be proud of in Afghanistan.
“It bears repeating that the UK armed forces, UK diplomats, aid workers, did help to change the lives of literally millions of people in Afghanistan, to help educate millions of women and young girls who would otherwise not have been educated, and to stop terrorism from coming to this country.
“And what I want to assure people is that our political and diplomatic efforts to find a solution for Afghanistan – working with the Taliban, of course, if necessary – will go on.
“And our commitment to Afghanistan is lasting.”
