Afghanistan’s embattled President Ashraf Ghani fled the country Sunday as the Taliban moved further into Kabul, officials said. His countrymen and foreigners alike raced for the exit. The beleaguered central government, meanwhile, had hoped for an interim administration, but increasingly had few cards to play. Civilians fearing that the Taliban could reimpose the kind of brutal rule that all but eliminated women’s rights rushed to leave the country, lining up at cash machines to withdraw their life savings. As seen in this photo from @apnews, helicopters buzzed overhead to evacuate personnel from the U.S. Embassy, while smoke rose near the compound as staff destroyed important documents. Several other Western missions also prepared to pull their people out. The Taliban will form an interim government, after seizing provincial capitals across Afghanistan over the last week. The swift takeover happened despite the hundreds of billions of dollars spent by the U.S. and NATO over nearly two decades to build up Afghan security forces.