Report: Obama to announce withdrawal of 34,000 U.S. troops from Afghanistan tonight
The decision by Mr. Obama appears to be a careful balancing of political interests and military requirements. The announcement enables the White House to say that slightly more than half of the American force — 34,000 troops — will be home by a year from now.
But the plan appears to give the military command in Afghanistan the flexibility it has long sought in determining the pace of the reductions. It appears that the command would be able to keep the bulk of the American force through the next fighting season, which ends in September and October.
American commanders want to keep sufficient forces — including troops, air power and medical evacuation units — to support the Afghan troops during this period. They also want to try to consolidate gains before rapidly drawing down American forces.
Blowback
Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.
Trackbacks/Pings
Trackback URL
Comments
What a colossal waste of lives, resources and time. Afghanistan 2015 will be identical to Afghanistan 2001.
Once again politicians perverted a military mission and the goal was not accomplished.
ButterflyDragon on February 12, 2013 at 11:24 AM
Screw the afghans pull them all out now. Another year of Obama’s screwed up rules of engagement will accomplish nothing but getting more of our troops killed.
bannor on February 12, 2013 at 11:24 AM
So, why keep the bulk of the force through the next “fighting season”? Surely the enemy won’t be launching any major events between now and then, might as well just bring all but the trainers home now.
I mean, as long as we’re not in it to win it, then we should get out of it. Let the pacifists figure out that the congenial approach to war does not work, and Obama’s legacy be the period during which radical Islam overtook all of the middle east and more than half of Africa. No more service members deaths or grave injuries are worth the cause of surrender.
BKeyser on February 12, 2013 at 11:27 AM
He should pull them all out. There is nothing to defend in that place and never was. We should have taken out the Taliban, the Al-Qaeda networks and left.
sharrukin on February 12, 2013 at 11:31 AM
We haven’t fought to win a war since Kuwait when we drove out Saddam’s troops. Until we are prepared to bring the full force and devastation our military can deliver we shouldn’t go in. This PC fighting we have been doing accomplishes nothing besides killing patriotic Americans.
trs on February 12, 2013 at 11:33 AM
That’s never going to happen. I believe that several times during the WoT in the Bush years we repeatedly heard that we’d just have to “get used” to terrorism. Plus there is a significant faction in the Republican party which does not care if the Middle East falls to some Iranian or al-Qaida led neo-Caliphate, it’s “over there” and thus “not our problem.”
Doomberg on February 12, 2013 at 11:33 AM
Precisely. There are no resources there worth the effort, unless said effort involves rendering the entire ‘nation’ lifeless from afar. They aren’t Iraq, the world needs nothing they have.
We should have hosed every poppy field with planeloads of Agent Orange, the cities with napalm, every mosque with a MOAB, everything that even looked like a training camp with poison gas, and then left behind nothing but jet contrails and unexploded ordinance.
MelonCollie on February 12, 2013 at 11:36 AM
It was worthwhile. AQ has ceased to exist with the exception of Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Nigeria, Algeria, Syria, Saudi, Turkey, and all the other Stans.
CorporatePiggy on February 12, 2013 at 11:40 AM
Absolutely agree. Forget this idiot nonsense about ‘if you break it you own it‘. Let them clean up the ruins and think long and hard about the wisdom of harboring terrorists.
sharrukin on February 12, 2013 at 11:48 AM
The notion that the civilized man is somehow ‘responsible’ for every dried-dirt building he blows up and every Raggedy Mohammed he orphans in the course of putting the fear of God and ordered societies into head-chopping savages is utterly ludicrous.
When the residents of Whereverstan see a silver bird in the sky and instantly start praying to whatever pagan deity they believe in that it contains a missionary and not a string of bombs, that will be a good start to reducing terrorist attacks.
We should be so feared that the locals put up arrows and the words “BOMB HERE”, which they know will be seen from air or satellite, that point to meeting-places and factories belonging to those who are dumb enough to attack us.
MelonCollie on February 12, 2013 at 11:58 AM
Power is the only thing they do respect. They do not respect or understand western restraint and that restraint is seen only as weakness to be exploited.
sharrukin on February 12, 2013 at 12:01 PM
I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I have to defend Obama on the ROE. Bush started the “nation building” ROE stupidity in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was a bad idea then, bad idea now, and it will always be a bad idea. You can only “nation build” after you have completely defeated and disarmed the enemy, including the civilian population.
Yeah, Obama apparently (apparently as in I am basing this on reading not personal experience) made the ROEs a little worse. Apparently he has made and continues to make bad decisions on troop strength, but really, at this point, the entire city is in flames and discussing Obama’s ROEs is like arguing about the functioning of a single fire hydrant.
deepdiver on February 12, 2013 at 12:16 PM
You cannot make a nation something it isn’t. They aren’t a blank canvas on which anything can be painted. A nation like Japan or Germany can be molded to a certain degree, but not beyond who the people fundamentally are. Democracy was easy in Germany and doable in Japan because of the culture and history of those nations. That isn’t true in Iraq and Afghanistan because Islam is not like Christianity or Japanese Shintoism. Kemal Atatürk tried modernization in Turkey and it didn’t take. Mohammad Reza Shah tried modernization in Iran and it didn’t take. King Amanullah tried modernization in Afghanistan, and again, it didn’t take.
In Egypt…
http://frontpagemag.com/2010/jamie-glazov/how-the-veil-conquered-cairo-university/
sharrukin on February 12, 2013 at 12:31 PM
You are of course correct. I should have better said, “You can only attempt “nation building” after you have completely defeated and disarmed the enemy, including the civilian population.
I agree with your further comments and considered wading into that territory but was trying to fight my nature and instead be succinct. I think I failed on both counts.
deepdiver on February 12, 2013 at 12:53 PM
Not really, I just used your comment to add something I thought was important. Some people… and religions are just no damn good.
sharrukin on February 12, 2013 at 1:00 PM