Afghanistan updates: Cities fall to Taliban at striking speed as crisis intensifies

The State Department will begin reducing its staff levels at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and the Pentagon will send troops in to help facilitate those departures, as Taliban forces advance on more provincial capitals.

There wasn't any specific event that led President Joe Biden and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to execute the plan, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said Thursday afternoon, but rather the overall worsening trend in Afghanistan.

"There wasn't one precipitating event in the last couple of days that led the president and the secretary to make...