US has just two weeks to rescue 30,000 people from Afghanistan before Biden's date for withdrawal of forces on August 31

The Pentagon has two weeks to rescue tens of thousands of people from war-torn Afghanistan as the Taliban inch toward the capital city of Kabul and demand a 'peaceful transfer of power.'

President Joe Biden has ordered about 5,000 troops, up from 3,000, to help evacuate US staff 'and other allied personnel,' along with 'Afghans who helped our troops during our mission and those at special risk from the Taliban advance,' the president said Saturday.

That's 1,000 extra troops, not counting the 1,000 already at the embassy and at Kabul's airport, according to the Department of Defense.

The Pentagon estimates the US withdrawal to total 30,000 people, according to Yahoo News.

On Sunday, it was reported that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani will quit after making plans to hand over his country's government to the Taliban within weeks.

The announcement came as the Taliban made it to Kabul after regaining control over multiple other Afghan cities and provinces.

US government officials are said to have been stunned by how quickly the hardline Islamic group have swept back to power, with intelligence officials claiming they believed US-trained Afghan soldiers would have put up more of a fight.

The frantic push to evacuate comes amid bloodcurdling reports of the Taliban ransacking homes and taking girls as young as twelve up to women aged 45 to become their 'wives' as the spoils of war.

Taliban leader Mullah Baradar, who is based in Qatar, is heading to Afghanistan where he is expected to head the new interim government after a transfer which will see President Ghani relinquishing power.

The terror group said: 'We don't want a single, innocent Afghan civilian to be injured or killed as we take charge of Kabul but we have not declared a ceasefire.'

Various reports claim that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani is set to step down and hand power to a transitional government

The Fall of Saigon - 1975

Pictures showing US embassy officials being evacuated from Kabul are almost the mirror image of those taken during the 'Fall of Saigon' in 1975.

Also known as the 'Liberation of Saigon' by the North Vietnamese, the event saw the People's Army of Vietnam and the Viet Kong capture the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon - now called Ho Chi Min city.

During the offensive, US officials were told to evacuate the city.

But because of continuing rocket fire on the nearby runways, US officials urged that any evacuation must take place by helicopter.

So began Operation Frequent Wind, officially declared by the US radio stations putting Irving Berlin's White Christmas on repeat - the signal for US staff to begin evacuation.

The embassy evacuation managed to fly out 978 Americans and about 1,100 Vietnamese citizens.

Ambassador Graham Martin was flown out to the USS Blue Ridge, where he pleaded for helicopters to return to the embassy.

His pleas were overruled, though many locals were still rescued by sea and boats after.

Saigon was later turned over to the Communist Party of Vietnam.

As the Taliban advance continues, following the decision by the US to pull its troops out, gunfire was today heard near the presidential palace in Kabul.

The militants were seen in the districts of Kalakan, Qarabagh and Paghman hours after taking control of Jalalabad, the last major Afghan city to fall to the insurgents.

The terror group said in a statement they do not intend to take the capital 'by force' after entering the outskirts of the city.

An Afghan official earlier confirmed Jalalabad fell under Taliban control without a fight early Sunday morning when the governor surrendered, saying it was 'the only way to save civilian lives.'

Its fall has also given the Taliban control of a road leading to the Pakistan city of Peshawar, one of the main highways into landlocked Afghanistan.

Jalalabad is close to the Pakistani border and just 80 miles from Kabul - the Afghanistan capital home to more than four million people and currently the only remaining major city still under government control.

Besides Kabul, just seven other provincial capitals out of the country's 34 are yet to fall to the Taliban.

Concerns are mounting over how long Kabul can stave off the Taliban insurgents as they have captured the northern stronghold of Mazar-i-Sharif, the second-largest city Kandahar and third-largest city Herat all within the last 48 hours.

The Taliban are now closing in on the capital from all sides, controlling territories to the North, South, East and West and advancing to just seven miles south of the city.

Hoda Ahmadi, a lawmaker from Logar province, told The Associated Press that the Taliban have reached the Char Asyab district on the outskirts of the capital, which was gripped by blackouts, communications outages and street fighting overnight Saturday as the country descends into chaos.

A US defense official has warned it could be only a matter of days before the insurgent fighters take control of Kabul.

A Taliban fighter sits inside an Afghan National Army vehicle along the roadside in Laghman province on Sunday

Taliban fighters drive the vehicle through the streets of Laghman province Sunday - the same day Jalalabad fell

Residents and fighters swarm an Afghan National Army vehicle on a roadside in Laghman province as the insurgents take control of major cities

Last days of the US Embassy in Kabul: Nerve center of the war on terror is being gutted of all sensitive material as staff and CIA assets

The US Embassy in Kabul - the nerve center of the war on terror - is being gutted of all its sensitive material and evacuated in 72 hours, as the Taliban coils around Afghanistan's capital.

The Embassy's demise will create an intelligence void that could plunge the US into pre-9/11 blindness, unless it can find another nearby country that will allow it rebuild its spy center.

For the past 20 years, the US Embassy in Kabul has gathered vast amounts of information that shaped counterterrorism military actions - such as precision drone strikes - and prevented another 9/11-type attack.

The location allowed CIA agents to meet with sources and monitor the Taliban, Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations in the region.

'When the time comes for the US military to withdraw, the US government's ability to collect and act on threats will diminish. That's simply a fact,' CIA Director Bill Burns told Senators in April.

Everyone in the Embassy - except Bureau of Diplomatic Security Service agents and top decisionmakers, including the ambassador - will be out of the country before the end of Tuesday.

Security Engineers will also stay behind as they continue to burn, shred and pulverize 20 years worth of intelligence stored on electronics and in documents.

Embassy or agency logos, American flags 'or items which could be misused in propaganda efforts' are also considered to be sensitive materials and will be destroyed.

The military is prepared to lower the American flag flying above the Embassy - at the State Department's order - signaling the Embassy's official closure.

Today, the Taliban said they aim to take the city, but say they have no plans to take Kabul 'by force'.

Leaders of the extremist group say they don't want a 'single Afghan to be injured or killed' during the hostile takeover - but warned 'we've not signed a ceasefire yet'.

Just last week, US intelligence estimates expected the city to be able to hold out for at least three months.

A senior US official told the New York Times the Taliban have warned the US it must cease airstrikes or else its extremist fighters will move in on US buildings.

Joe Biden has vowed that any action that puts Americans at risk 'will be met with a swift and strong US military response.'

Meanwhile, in the UK, Boris Johnson is facing calls for a last-ditch intervention to prevent the complete collapse of Afghanistan.

The lead elements of the British force sent to evacuate the remaining UK nationals were understood to be in the capital amid fears it could fall within days or even hours.

But amid a hurried scramble for safety, helicopters were seen landing at the US embassy to ferry away remaining personnel.

In the UK, there was deep anger among many MPs at the way - 20 years after the first international forces entered Afghanistan - the country was being abandoned to its fate.

The chairman of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee Tom Tugendhat said it was 'the biggest single foreign policy disaster' since Suez, while Defence Committee chairman Tobias Ellwood said it was a humiliation for the West.

Despite the decision of the Biden administration to withdraw the remaining US troops which triggered the collapse, Mr Ellwood said it was still not too late to turn the situation around.

He called for the despatch of the Royal Navy carrier strike group to the region and urged the Prime Minister to convene an emergency conference of 'like-minded nations' to see what could be done.

'I plead with the Prime Minister to think again. We have an ever-shrinking window of opportunity to recognise where this country is going as a failed state,' he told Times Radio.

'We can turn this around but it requires political will and courage. This is our moment to step forward.

'We could prevent this, otherwise history will judge us very, very harshly in not stepping in when we could do and allowing the state to fail.'

SAS ordered to save Our Man in Kabul: Special Forces will get UK ambassador out by Sunday night amid fears Taliban will take Kabul airport in days

ByGlen Owenand Mark Hookhamand Abul Taher for The Mail on Sunday

Dominic Raab last night ordered the dramatic rescue of the British ambassador in Kabul as Taliban forces closed in on the Afghan capital.

The Foreign Secretary sanctioned the SAS-led operation to airlift ambassador Sir Laurie Bristow and his embassy staff out by tomorrow night after he was warned that Kabul airport could be seized by the militants within days.

Sir Laurie took up his posting in June, and since the start of the Taliban offensive last month, he and most of his staff have been operating from the fortress-like Hamid Karzai international airport – three miles from the centre of the capital.

The Foreign Office has been shocked by the speed the Taliban has been able to move across Afghanistan

The British Embassy, pictured, is under imminent threat from the Taliban who are only a few miles from Kabul

The British government wants to stop a scene similar to that of the Fall of Saigon where Vietnamese evacuees were flown out on CIA funded Air America flights

The Foreign Office has been surprised by the speed of the Taliban advance; until this weekend, diplomats were predicting the fighters would take two weeks to reach Kabul.

But by early yesterday, after a lightning offensive, the Taliban captured the city of Pul-e-Alam, capital of Logar province and just 43 miles from Kabul. The insurgents then continued their relentless advance, reaching the Char Asyab district just seven miles from the capital.

It means Kabul is well within range of the artillery guns seized by Taliban units after they were abandoned by the routed Afghan forces.

In a complex undertaking being directed from Britain's Permanent Joint Headquarters at Northwood, Special Forces units are joining 600 British troops from the 16 Air Assault Brigade, including 150 Paratroopers, to begin airlifting more than 500 British Government employees out of Kabul.

A further 7,000 interpreters, security staff, aid workers, intelligence agents and other personnel with links to Britain could also apply for safe passage out of the increasingly unstable country in an echo of the humiliating US exit from Saigon in Vietnam in 1975.

The Taliban have been rapidly advancing across Afghanistan and are within days of reaching the capital Kabul

Officials have been surprised by the speed the Taliban have been able to cross the country

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has ordered the SAS to rescue the ambassador and his team

A total collapse of the Afghan government could lead to hundreds of thousands of refugees leaving the country and seeking asylum in nations including Britain.

A 'ring of steel' of fortified checkpoints surround the airport in a bid to prevent car bombs, while The Mail on Sunday also understands that an air defence system called C-RAM (counter rocket, artillery and mortar) has been deployed to protect the runway from being shelled. The airport's huge perimeter is defended by a force of about 500 Turkish troops. They are being reinforced by 3,000 American soldiers, including 500 Marines, who began arriving yesterday.

Meanwhile, US Reaper drones and heavily armed AC-130 Spectre gunships – a fearsome ground attack version of a transport aircraft – will carry out air strikes on any Taliban units approaching the airport, senior military sources say. The air cover will be co-ordinated from the Combined Air Operations Centre at Al Udeid air base in Qatar.

As panic gripped Kabul, foreign embassies began burning sensitive documents. The US embassy informed staff that 'burn bins' and an incinerator were available to destroy material including papers and electronic devices to 'reduce the amount of sensitive material on the property', according to a document seen by Reuters.

The speed of the Taliban advance has stunned the MoD. Only eight days ago, General Sir Nick Carter, head of the UK's Armed Forces, wrote that there were 'increasing indications that moderate Afghans are determined to fight and their armed forces are holding their own'.

The Taliban yesterday launched a multi-pronged assault on Mazar-i-Sharif, a city in northern Afghanistan defended by powerful former warlords. The insurgents also captured Sharana, the capital of Paktika province, which borders Pakistan. Pictures emerged online of the Taliban tarring men accused of theft and parading them around the streets of the newly captured city Herat, in western Afghanistan.

The images raised fears of a repetition of the human rights abuses committed by the fanatics in the 1990s. They included the beating of women for walking on the street without a male chaperone.

The SAS are believed to be preparing to evacuate the British ambassador and his staff from Kabul by tomorrow evening

An Afghan police officer in Kabul mans a check point despite the approaching Taliban

Terrorist fighters have been congregating in the city of Heret, west of Kabul

It remains unclear how many Afghan interpreters and others who helped the British will be rescued from the country. Canada has said it will take in up to 20,000 Afghan refugees, including prominent women and government workers facing threats from the Taliban.

Johnny Mercer, a former Defence Minister who served three tours in Afghanistan before becoming an MP, said he was talking to former interpreters who were 'petrified' of Taliban reprisals.

'Obviously the Taliban haven't taken Kabul but their people are everywhere. They are starting to go door to door in Kabul. I dread to think what has happened to the ones in Lashkar Gah and Nad-e-Ali areas of Helmand province that have already fallen to the . We need to get a move on.'

Meanwhile, Lord Dannatt, a former head of the British Army, yesterday warned of a 'tragedy in the making' and urged the Government to consider launching a humanitarian aid operation to alleviate the refugee crisis in Kabul.

He said: 'Let's show the Afghan government we are not completely abandoning them and that we still stand side by side with them. It is quite possible to do that.'

Labour leader Keir Starmer also heaped pressure on Boris Johnson, declaring 'we cannot just walk away' from the war-torn country.

'We have obligations to Afghanistan, we made promises to Afghanistan, and we cannot just walk away and let this turn into a humanitarian crisis, and probably a refugee crisis as well,' he added.

'There is a real risk now that international terrorism will take hold again in Afghanistan.'

Speculation is mounting that Afghanistan's beleaguered President Ashraf Ghani could resign, heralding the collapse of the government. In a vague television address yesterday – his first public appearance in days – he said he was 'holding consultations with local leaders and international partners'.

There were only seven commercial international flights out of Kabul yesterday. Those without tickets have been urged not to go to the airport, but that has not stopped them from turning up and desperately searching for flights.

Home Office staff are set to run a processing centre from a hangar at the airport which will check the passports and luggage of those due to be flown out, using biometric equipment to ensure that Taliban sympathisers do not try to infiltrate the evacuees.

'Biden has to own this': Former commander of US forces in Afghanistan David Patraeus says withdrawal is 'catastrophic for the US', a 'serious mistake' and an 'enormous national security setback'

President Biden must take responsibility for his decision to withdraw from Afghanistan, as Taliban warlords roll into its capital Kabul, a top US general has warned

General David Petraeus the former Commander of US and International Forces in Afghanistan, is calling the withdrawal a 'serious mistake' and says the decision could be 'catastrophic for the United States and the world'.

'This is an enormous national security setback and it is on the verge of getting much worse unless we decide to take really significant action,' Petraeus told host WABC Radio Rita Cosby.

'The outcome, whether it is the Taliban taking over the country or it's the kind of civil war that we saw in the wake of the collapse of the post-Soviet government, there are no good outcomes here,' Petraeus said. 'In fact there is nothing more than horrible outcomes unless we are willing to acknowledge that this is not going as more optimistic projections laid out and take stock.'

Petraeus spoke after President Biden has reaffirmed his administration's plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan as Taliban forces continue to advance on the country.

Biden announced in a statement Saturday that 'approximately 5,000' U.S. soldiers will assist with the evacuation process.

The president has set an August 31 deadline for the competition of the withdrawal. The pentagon estimates that 30,000 people will need to be evacuated in this process.

General David Petraeus , the former Commander of US and International Forces in Afghanistan, is calling the withdrawal a 'serious mistake' and says the decision could be 'catastrophic for the United States and the world'

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According to Biden, he and his security team made the decision in an effort to 'protect our interests and values as we end our military mission in Afghanistan.'

Government leaders are trying to ensure an 'orderly and safe drawdown of U.S. personnel and other allied personnel' and an 'orderly and safe evacuation of Afghans who helped our troops during our mission and those at special risk from the Taliban advance'.

The president says the U.S. government is also actively working to 'process, transport, and relocate Afghan Special Immigrant Visa applicants and other Afghan allies'.

However, Petraeus is concerned about the 'psychological collapse' that is likely to follow when Afghan troops are 'unable to uphold the level of support they are accustomed to' when fighting the Taliban.

'We are now in a situation where the Taliban are trying to encircle Kabul – a city of 5 or 6 million – before hundreds of thousands of refugees starting flooding into it,' he argued. 'If we communicate effectively with the Taliban that they need to halt what they are doing, or we will bring the might of the U.S. military down upon them, we can stop this.'

President Joe Biden has reaffirmed his administration's plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan as Taliban forces continue to advance on the country. He announced Saturday that 'approximately 5,000' U.S. soldiers will assist with the evacuation process

Petraeus is concerned about the 'psychological collapse' that is likely to follow when Afghan troops are 'unable to uphold the level of support they are accustomed to' in their fight against the Taliban (pictured: Taliban fighters in Jalalabad province on August 15, 2021)

Sickening moment maskless 'Karen' COUGHS in the face of grocery store customer, then claims she doesn't have to wear a mask because she 'isn't sick'

A woman was captured on camera following a customer through a supermarket as she coughs on her after claiming she does not need a mask because she is not sick. Video of the incident, which has garnered hundreds of thousands of views on Twitter alone, allegedly took place in a Su per Saver in Lincoln, Nebraska according to Twitter user @davenewworld_2. In it, an unidentified woman was captured dramatically coughing as she smiles saying 'Excuse me! I'm coming through' in the direction of the customer recording her. Scroll down for video An unidentified woman was captured dramatically coughing as she smiles saying 'Excuse me! I'm coming through' in the direction of a woman recording her A woman was captured on camera following a customer as she coughs on her in a supermarket without a mask on claiming she does not need one because she is not sick @chaiteabugz #karen #covid #karens #karensgonewild #karensalert #masks we were just wearing a mask at the store. ¿ o

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