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Report: Obama Administration To Negotiate To Prolong Presence of U.S. Troops In Afghanistan

While President Barack Obama again heralded his keeping his promise to pull out of Afghanistan, news accounts this week revealed that the Administration is again discussing the extension of U.S. troops in that country past 2014. The Administration is determined to stay in a country where U.S. citizens are increasingly attacked not only by the Taliban but Afghan troops. Afghan President Hamid Karzai stated inclinations toward the Taliban and harsh treatment of women. Then there was Karzai’s recent position that women are worth less than men — presumably even those American women keeping Karzai and his corrupt family and friends in power.

Just a week ago, Vice President Joe Biden said in his debate that U.S. troops were leaving Afghanistan by 2014: “We are leaving in 2014, period, and in the process, we’re going to be saving over the next 10 years another $800 billion.” While he said this, the Administration was preparing for negotiations to keep troops in the country.

Many of us have long opposed any troops in the country and Obama has failed to end that presence after three years despite polls showing that a majority oppose our continued presence in the country. In the meantime, Obama has spent hundreds of billions on these wars and we have continued to incur the deaths and wounding of our personnel.

Just last May, Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement that assured an ongoing U.S. commitment to Afghanistan through 2024 — the very troops that Karzai has called “the enemy.” Reports indicate that we want to keep roughly 25,000 American troops in Afghanistan past 2014. Even a fraction of that is too many for many citizens who fail to see why we must continue to drain ourselves of treasure and lives in that country’s civil war.

In the meantime, our British cousins have set a hardcore deadline for 2013 to leave the country.

Source: Foreign Policy

51 thoughts on “Report: Obama Administration To Negotiate To Prolong Presence of U.S. Troops In Afghanistan”

  2. And my last statement is what we put on bumper stickers addressed to Nixon back in the Vietnam War.

  3. Pakistan and Afghanistan are both pirate territories. They are not self governing enough or policed sufficiently to be termed sovereign states. That means that we must advise our citizens to stay the hell out. If our citizens persist in going in there then they know that they are in pirate country and to expect to get raped, robbed, pillaged and not always in that order. Therefore, we as a nation should not spend money or lives to protect lives of our citizens in that pirate zone. Quit terming these pirate territories as countries and the dialogue will be advanced. Obama, pull out now like your father should have.

  5. lee, It is rather strange for anti-war folks to prefer a candidate that has Jon Bolton as a top foreign policy advisor. Even Chomsky is advocating for a vote for Obama in swing states.

  6. Staging areas for special ops and such makes tactical sense. I agree that the regular combat troops should be withdrawn and that is my understanding of the policy. Would you isolationists withdraw troops from Europe, Korea and other foreign places, like Texas?

  8. “After 2014, an unspecified number of US troops may remain to train Afghan forces and target al-Qaeda remnants, depending on funding from Congress. Obama emphasized that the US is not seeking a permanent military base there.”
    Read more: http://india.nydailynews.com/newsarticle/ffb6ee33f99e224e6a7c7c87ef0c89ff/3rd-lead-obama-karzai-seal-partnership-to-2024-in-surprise-meeting#ixzz29ZsAr0fM

    “May” not definitively.
    Like Iraq makes sense to me that we do not just willy nilly leave after turning both countriesiinto war zones.
    Would I rather they be out now? You bet.
    Would I rather if not now then 2014? You bet again.
    But you don;t just walk away from the mess that you helped make. If it is necessary to keep some troops there to help themk become self sufficicent then we must do that, in both countries.
    I find it interesting that the professor waited until now to write this post. More and more I feel nothing but animosity from the professor towards the president. Waiting until the election only 3 weeks away makes no sense unless you are tyring to sway opinion rather then inform and generate debate.

  9. I am not sure who is the bigger war hawk….. But then again….it’s them versus us….. Not doing what’s right to begin with…..Is a matter for the sitting president to decide…..

  10. But that crazy old Ron Paul would’ve taken all the troops back home and put them in the private sector where they should be, and closed all the foreign U.S. military bases that shouldn’t be trespassing on those foreign lands. How nuts is that? Instead, we neeeed this empire, so that we can feed the hungry fatcats of the military-industrial-complex, and bankrupt America out of existence. That’s more like it.

  11. First of all, in the linked article the Secretary of State official denied that any 25,000 soldier level has been set. Secondly, at the very time people are screaming that we need to protect our embassies in troubled area, it is not surprising that some number of troops will be maintained for security purposes. I am not a fan of the training mission because of the Afghan Army and Police attacks on our personnel. The best situation is to leave now.

  15. reports “indicate” I would like some clicks. I will be very disappointed if this is true, much less if it happens.

  16. It is unfortunate that Romney and Ryan are such war hawks complaining all the time that Obama is leaving Afghanistan and Iraq too quickly.

  17. Our president could decide to lie, cheat and steal on a continual basis and half our country would still love him dearly.

  20. What a shame, that in a country of 320 million people, we can’t find a decent President….

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