U.S. to Withdraw About 7,000 Troops From Afghanistan, Officials Say
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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/20/us/politics/afghanistan-troop-withdrawal.html
The Trump administration is withdrawing roughly 7,000 troops from Afghanistan in the coming months, two defense officials said Thursday, around half of what the American military has there now.
Mr. Trump made the decision at the same time he decided he was pulling American forces out of Syria, one official said. The move is likely one of the first steps to end the United States’ involvement in the 17-year-old war.
The 14,000 American troops currently in Afghanistan are divided between training and advising Afghan forces and a counterterror mission against groups like the Islamic State and Al Qaeda. The reduction, one official said, is in an effort to make Afghan forces more reliant on their own troops and not Western support.
And only 5 days left until Christmas...
I feel like ending the forever war is good but trump goes about everything in the worst way possible
If Trump accidentally bumbles into the right policy I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Either we start talking exit strategy or we admit that we're never going to leave.
Fuck the Middle East.
It's gonna be painful, but the US needs to leave. Next year, I will have the unreal experience of having subordinates born after the war started. Let that sink in.
I agree that our involvement is long overdue, but Afghanistan does not live in a vacum.
Once we are gone, china will expand into the country to secure the future of their silk road 2.0, and we've seen what they do to Muslims in their own country.
We'll be back, the country is extremely corrupt and will likely fall back into Taliban influence in a decade or two
well the last thing the world needs now is a terrorist state lording over 35 million people
Don't worry, by the time they've recovered from nonstop battle, climate change will be thoroughly fucking their economy and sheer water capacity.
America wins again, through pure accident?
rip afghanistan.
we can't secure it with 14,000 troops, cutting that in half arbitrarily during a taliban surge is just going to end in failure.
I guess it's time for Canada to send 7,000 troops to fill the void then.
This is Trump serving up the Middle East on a platter to his Russian masters.
Going back to square one and putting our national security in jeopardy to own the libs.
We have no possible method of "winning" in Afghanistan. Most of the folks there are sick of us being there, and want us to go. The Taliban already controls what... Half of the country right now? Unless we surge back up too 50,000 ~ 100,000 troops, we won't be able to do anything.
Trump criticized obama for withdrawing a significant number of troops from the middle east which is a bit ironic. Why do I feel like this is just going to backfire on him?
He'll be long gone by the time it backfires.
If they wish to bumble around there again, then by all means. At that rate it could be a game of hot potato.
I'd rather not.
I want to say what a shit show, but at the same time you can really see a lot of these people are defeated.
I don't know why so many people are thinking we are pulling out of Afghanistan. We have already promised to keep some bases and troops there in negotiations with the Taliban.
No way the US will completely withdraw. Considering China.
Russia gets to blow billions of dollars and tens of thousands of lives propping up an incompetent regime that hates them (again!).
I mean who wouldn't want to jump on this hand-grenade of an opportunity?
Yep, and after bitching out of Syria they will now give up the Silk Road.
Good job Trump... or Putin, whoever is actually in control.
Yay cant wait for radicals to take over the government and slaughter women and children again
planned withdrawing troops to a level that is manageable with the conditions at the time is different from withdrawing troops to an arbitrary level on a moments notice but then nuance is lost in today's political discourse.
Ah yes, let's leave Afghanistanis defensless because it takes a bit too long to build a stable-ish and modernish country from nothing.
I believe Afghanistan is winnable too. Sure literally all of the foreign aid has been funneled into terrorist organisations, the Afghan army is incompetent and cowardly (and often joins the Taliban), they sell the weapons we generously give them to the terrorists, the government officials rape kids and force US soldiers to cover it up, and the population hates the Kabul government (which has been steadily losing ground for years despite extensive support), but ignoring all of that the entire experience in Afghanistan was a great place to send young American boys to see the world (assuming they weren't maimed by IEDS).
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