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Washington:
The US navy is continuing with President Donald Trump’s order to slash troops in Afghanistan to 2,500 by mid-January, the Pentagon’s high normal stated Wednesday, calling the scenario on the bottom a “strategic stalemate.”
Joint Chiefs Chairman General Mark Milley, who earlier appeared against cuts on the estimated 4,500 US troops presently there, stated the United States had been profitable “to a large measure” at its authentic purpose of hitting Al-Qaeda after the September 11, 2001 assaults.
The US went to Afghanistan in 2001, he stated, “to ensure that Afghanistan never again became a platform for terrorists to strike against the United States.
“To a big measure, now we have been, at the very least so far, profitable in stopping that from occurring once more,” Milley said in an online Brookings Institution forum.
“We consider that now after 20 years, twenty years of constant effort there we have achieved a modicum of success.”
Milley said it has been clear for the past five to seven years that the situation on the ground has been a strategic stalemate, with neither Afghan government forces or Taliban insurgents able to defeat the other.
The only way that war could come to an end — in a way that is aligned with US security needs — he said, was through a negotiated settlement between Kabul and the Taliban.
With negotiations on a peace deal underway in Doha, he said, the Trump administration has decided to cut US troop levels — which were at about 13,000 a year ago — to 2,500 by January 15.
At that degree, he stated, the US will maintain “a pair” main bases and several smaller satellite bases in the country.
In early November, Trump fired defense secretary Mark Esper, who had resisted accelerating a troop withdrawal schedule, and replaced him with White House aide Chris Miller, who backs the drawdown plans.
“We’re within the means of executing that call proper now,” Milley said.
“What comes after that, that will likely be as much as a brand new administration,” he said, referring to President-elect Joe Biden, who will replace Trump in late January.
“We’ll discover that out on January 20 and past,” Milley added.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is printed from a syndicated feed.)
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