Fox News host Tucker Carlson had some serious accusations to level at the U.S. military for lying about the “illusion of progress” in Afghanistan for nearly two decades.

As the catastrophe in Afghanistan continues to unfold in the wake of the disastrous military pullout, many have placed the blame squarely on President Joe Biden. Carlson, however, lashed out at the Pentagon for what he asserted was 20 years of lies on his show, Tucker Carlson Tonight.

The scathing attack on the Pentagon began with retelling an alleged encounter then-President Trump had when meeting the Joint Chiefs of Staff in July 2017. Citing Foreign Policy magazine, Carlson recounted that Trump told them “you’re all losers. You don’t know how to win anymore.” Carlson then alleged, citing Major General Paul Eaton, that the humiliated, angered chiefs had an axe to grind with Trump from that moment on, and that the mission of the Pentagon shifted to undermining civilian control of the military.

“I was really shocked by how many of my former colleagues voted for the former president and openly supported him. But when [Trump] turned on the military, well, the military turned on him,” Carlson quoted Eaton as saying.

(Video: Fox News)

Yet the real issue, according to Carlson, isn’t one like the military allegedly refusing to pull out of Syria and Afghanistan, but rather how it got to this point in the first place, and Carlson went on to allege that the military repeatedly lied about the real status of the situation in Afghanistan. He then trotted out a line of various generals whom he quoted as repeatedly saying there was “progress,” which Carlson asserts was never there:

“Over the three years that we’ve been operating there, [Afghanistan] has shown interesting progress,” said General John Abizaid to reporters in 2005.

“I’d like to point out that there is significant progress in the forward move of the Afghan National Army,” said General Dan McNeil in 2007, to the “Task and Purpose” website.

“I think we have made significant progress in setting the conditions in 2009 and beginning some progress, and that we’ll make real progress in 2010,” said General Stanley McChrystal to reporters in 2010.

“At this point, we have made significant progress,” said General Joseph Dunford in 2013.

“We are seeing some progress,” General John Nicholson said in 2016.

Carlson then went on to accuse the Pentagon of leaking the bombshell of Biden’s phone conversation with former Afghan president Ashraf Ghani, allegedly promising aid in exchange for assisting with covering up how bad the situation really was in Afghanistan. According to Carlson, this isn’t the first time either. The Fox News host alleged that the Pentagon was behind leaking stories that Trump was ignoring the Russian bounty on American soldiers in Afghanistan.

The supposed reason for all this? Carlson alleged that the Pentagon did it to protect a “neocon project” of “permanent war.” According to the outspoken primetime host, these are unforgivable sins that the Pentagon cannot forgive, and undermines presidents in order to prevent.

“Lying to the rest of us about what is actually happening with our troops with our money in our name in a foreign country has been the philosophy of this nation’s military establishment for the last twenty years, and it’s also the philosophy of every high-ranking official in the Biden administration. Project the illusion of progress, even when it’s clear we’re failing,” he said.

The show ended on a pessimistic view of the future, asserting that Secretary of State Tony Blinken‘s talk about “leading with diplomacy” is just another trick of “progress being made,” as it has been for the last 20 years.

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