Alwaght-The White House
has dropped plans to slash the number of US soldiers in Afghanistan to 5,500
this year, AP reported. Official sources
claim the withdrawal is likely to be much slower and have 9,800 US troops
remain in Afghanistan well into 2016, as Russia Today recorded.
The report,
citing unnamed officials, states that no final decision has been made, but
discussions are ongoing about keeping US troops in Afghanistan or nearby even
after 2016.
It is believed
that US President Barack Obama will use Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s visit
later this month as an opportunity to announce a new withdrawal deadline. In the past, Ghani made clear he wanted the
pace of US withdrawal to be slower.
Obama is
scheduled to host Ghani for a number of meetings and a working lunch at the
White House on March 24.
Over the past
several weeks, US officials have been dropping hints about the possible
delay. In February, Defense Secretary Ashton
Carter said while visiting Kabul that America was looking into the idea.
“Our priority
now is to make sure this progress sticks,” Carter said at a news conference in
Kabul with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. “That is why President Obama is
considering a number of options to reinforce our support for President Ghani’s
security strategy, including possible changes to the timeline for our drawdown
of US troops.”
In one of the
latest developments, the senior US official told Reuters that discussions are
continuing and Army General John Campbell’s recommendations for Afghanistan are
being reviewed, but “no decisions have yet been made.”
Under the
current arrangement, the 11,000-strong US force should be cut to roughly half
of that by the end of 2015, before pulling out altogether the following
year. By the end of 2016, US military
presence is expected to shrink to a “normal” embassy security contingent.
During the most
active stages of the war in Afghanistan, the US and NATO had 130,000 of their
troops participating in the conflict.
Last year, the mission wrapped up its combat operations against the
insurgency and left a contingent of over 11,000 US troops to train
Afghanistan’s 350,000 soldiers and police.
