Subject: Re: Inheriting a far more dangerous world
"Retaining Bagram would have required putting as many as 5,000 U.S. troops in harm's way just to operate and defend it," [ME: vs 2,500 troops per memory] Austin told the House Armed Services Committee during a hearing today on Capitol Hill. "It would have contributed little to the mission that we had been assigned, and that was to protect and defend the embassy which was some 30 miles away."

Additionally, when the noncombatant evacuation operation, or NEO, began, Bagram's distance from Kabul would have offered little help. SNIP - Lapsody

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Bagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.