Pentagon Deploys 4,000 More Troops to Afghanistan

A Trump administration official said on Thursday that the Pentagon will deploy 4,000 additional American soldiers to Afghanistan, hoping to change the tide of the prolonged conflict.  The war in Afghanistan has been at a stalemate for three terms, now passed on to President Trump as the Commander in Chief.

The administration official said that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ decision could be announced as early as Sunday of next week.  The decision mirrors Trump’s authorization for Mr. Mattis to deploy additional troops to Afghanistan, addressing the issue that the United States does not have enough force to help the Afghan army against the Taliban insurgency.  The increasing danger posed by the Islamic State, such as the earlier attacks in Kabul, have pushed for a stronger U.S. presence in the area.

These troops will train and advise the Afghan military in combat, while a smaller number of forces will function as special operations, countering terrorism.  The administration was not authorized to discuss details, but it seems that such special operations will be handled by Navy SEALs or some other branch of special military.

It is reported that, “Although Trump has delegated authority for U.S. troops numbers in Afghanistan, the responsibility for America’s wars and the men and women who fight in them rests on his shoulders.  Trump has inherited America’s longest conflict with no clear endpoint or a defined strategy for American success, though U.S. troop levels are far lower than they were under Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush.  In 2009, Obama authorized a surge of 30,000 troops into Afghanistan, bringing the total there to more than 100,000, before drawing down over the rest of his presidency.”  It is clear that throughout three terms, countless troops have been deployed to Afghanistan—this decision by President Trump has thus added to the numbers.

During both his campaign and his term so far, Trump has rarely spoken about Afghanistan; instead, he has voiced out on combating the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.  His predecessors, Obama and Bush, sporadically contributed towards purging Afghanistan of the Taliban, but both failed to do so.

Mattis’ deployment of troops to Afghanistan will be smaller than that of Obama’s, who’s cap “a year ago [was] 8,400 troops in Afghanistan after slowing the pace of what he hoped would be a U.S. withdrawal.”

Responding to the press, Mattis said that “reconciliation” is the goal.  He concludes, “We’re not looking at a purely military strategy.  All wars come to an end.  Our job is to end it as quickly as possible without losing the very mission that we’ve recognized, through several administrations, that was worth putting those young Americans on the line for.”

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