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Over to Afghanistan, where the Taliban swept into Afghanistan's capital yesterday after the embattled government officially collapsed.
The Afghan President joined an exodus of his fellow citizens and foreigners as the Taliban entered the abandoned presidential palace.
And a Taliban spokesman said today that the militants would hold talks in the coming days to form an "open and inclusive Islamic government."
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Following weeks of turmoil and the political maelstrom in Afghanistan was Taliban fighters entering Kabul's abandoned presidential palace.
The megalomaniac Taliban's meteoric offensive has had the entire country taken over by its military in just a week's time. As such, it turns out that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's last resort - asking the country's military to prepare to defend the capital - didn't work.
The President last night joined the mass exodus of his fellow Afghans and foreigners and fled the country alongside a small coterie of confidants. But, his current location remains shrouded in secrecy.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. That's what the Afghan president said in a social media post after fleeing the country. He said countless Afghans would have been martyred and Kabul would have faced catastrophic destruction, had he stayed.
But his decision to abandon the capital had Abdullah Abdullah, his long-time nemesis who had twice buried his animosity to be on friendly terms with Ghani in his government, accused him of shrugging off his responsibility for his entire country and citizens, saying "God will hold him accountable" for abandoning the capital.
And a bit of panic ensued when Afghans were fearful the Taliban would reimpose brutal rules which all but eliminated women's rights decades ago. So, Afghans not only flocked to the airport to escape, they also withdrew their life savings from banks.
The Taliban today finally got their wish of ruling Afghanistan. The Taliban, as it stands, are full steam ahead to form what they claim an "open, inclusive Islamic government."
Earlier, a Taliban official said the group would announce from the presidential palace the restoration of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the formal name of the country under Taliban rule.
As tens of thousands of Afghans and foreigners flocked to the Kabul International Airport to get out of the country, commercial flights were suspended after sporadic gunfire erupted at the airport. Truth be known, the halt to commercial traffic resulted in the closing of one of a handful routes out of the country.
Meantime, U.S. President Joe Biden and other top U.S. officials were lost for words because of the Taliban's meteoric offensive. That had Republicans making a tag team attack on his administration for failing to control the Taliban.
But today, reacting to those who likened the U.S. pullout from Afghanistan to that from Saigon in the Vietnam War, U.S. Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, said it is "manifestly not Saigon," and that sending U.S. troops to Afghanistan was purposeful. Blinken: "This is manifestly not Saigon. The fact that matters is this: We went to Afghanistan 20 years ago with one mission in mind, and that was to deal with the people who attacked us on 9/11. And that mission has been successful."
For the most part, Afghans who are still in the country watched their country being taken over by the Taliban in disbelief and wouldn't budge.
Some 60 nations last night made more of stability in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan by releasing a joint statement distributed by the U.S. State Department, saying those in power and authority across Afghanistan "bear responsibility and accountability for the protection of human life and property, and for the immediate restoration of security and civil order."
Also, that statement says it behooves the Taliban to keep roads, airports and border crossings open, and maintain normality.
But already, there have been reports of revenge killings in parts of the country.
For now, it is unclear when the official transfer of power will take place.
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