{"id":25203,"date":"2017-08-22T01:39:17","date_gmt":"2017-08-22T01:39:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2017\/08\/22\/trump-afghanistan-strategy-calls-for-more-troops-regional-pressure\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T06:15:37","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T06:15:37","slug":"trump-afghanistan-strategy-calls-for-more-troops-regional-pressure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/pentagon\/2017\/08\/22\/trump-afghanistan-strategy-calls-for-more-troops-regional-pressure\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Afghanistan strategy calls for more troops, regional pressure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 President Donald Trump announced a new plan for Afghanistan Monday night with calls for additional U.S. forces, greater NATO participation and regional pressure that held echoes of the previous administrations even as the president said his way forward would be a much more aggressive plan that delivers results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNearly 16 years after the Sept. 11 attacks, the American people are weary of war without victory,\u201d Trump told a largely military audience at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Virginia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump said he was initially inclined to withdraw all forces. As he said on the campaign trail, he still feels that the U.S. had spent too much time, energy and money trying to rebuild Afghanistan, like Iraq, to resemble American governance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy original instinct was to pull out, and historically, I like following my instincts,\u201d Trump said. \u201cBut all my life I\u2019ve heard that decisions are much different when you sit behind the desk in the Oval Office.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After repeat consultation with his military advisers, however, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Joseph Dunford, Trump said he relented and determined that a withdrawal from Afghanistan would be a grave mistake. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur nation must seek an honorable and enduring outcome,\u201d worthy of the 2,300 U.S. lives lost there fighting in the last 16 years, he said. \u201dThe consequences of a rapid exit are both predictable and unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump said there are key differences between his plan and those of the last 16 years, even as it contained echoes of strategy from the Obama era.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, there would be no time-based strategies but a condition-based approach to determine when U.S. forces would withdraw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe will not talk about numbers of troops or our plans for further military action,\u201d Trump said. \u201cI will not say when we are going to attack. But attack we will.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keeping in line with that thinking, Trump did not state how many troops will be heading to Afghanistan. News reports throughout Monday indicated the Pentagon is looking at sending around 4,000 troops to America\u2019s longest war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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President Donald Trump speaks at Fort Myer in Arlington Va., Monday, Aug. 21, 2017, during an address to the nation about a strategy he believes will best position the U.S. to eventually declare victory in Afghanistan. (Carolyn Kaster\/AP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Second, the president said the U.S. would not be committing its military resources to reconstruction or rebuilding Afghanistan\u2019s governance.\u201cWe are not nation building again. we are killing terrorists,\u201d Trump said. 
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part of that will continue a trend of taking restrictions off the military fighting on the ground, although as with the troop numbers, Trump provided no details on how he would \u201dlift restrictions and expand authorities\u201d for warfighters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201dWe will also expand authorities for American armed forces to target the terrorists and criminal networks that sow violence and chaos throughout Afghanistan,\u201d he said.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He also indicated that America\u2019s resolve to the Afghan government will remain strong, as long as Kabul is doing its part.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur commitment is not unlimited and our support is not a blank check,\u201d Trump said. \u201cThe government of Afghanistan must carry their share of the military, political and economic burden.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ironically, that statement echoes a key takeaway from President Barack Obama\u2019s first major Afghanistan speech in December 2009 \u2014 that \u201cthe days of providing a blank check are over\u201d for Afghanistan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Partner focus<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The revised strategy, like the previous one, pursues a regional approach by calling for Pakistan to shore up its border with Afghanistan and confront terror groups such as the Islamic State and Haqqani network.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In June, Mattis declared that the Afghanistan review would not focus just on that country, but instead be part of a \u201dregional\u201d approach, in a phrasing that seemed to encompass how the U.S. would handle Pakistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pakistan, Trump said, often provides \u201csafe haven to agents of chaos, violence and terror,\u201d later adding that \u201dWe have been paying Pakistan billions and billions of dollars at the same time they are housing the very terrorists that we are fighting. But that will have to change, and that will change immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Trump administration has already made some changes in how it deals with Afghanistan\u2019s neighbor, having cut military aid<\/a> <\/a>in its planned fiscal 2018 budget. It could take further steps<\/a>, including listing the country as a state sponsor of terrorism or pushing NATO to remove Pakistan\u2019s listing as a partner nation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Obama also called for regional engagement but that ultimately failed because of the arbitrary withdrawal deadlines Obama had set, said Steven Bucci, a visiting national security fellow at the Heritage Foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDoing it the other way [announcing a date of withdrawal] was silly,\u201d Bucci said. \u201dIt plays well to a domestic audience but doesn\u2019t do well on the battlefield to say how many people are going to show up and how long they are going to be there.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bucci said continuing engagement with Pakistan now \u201chas more opportunity for success because in that part of the world, when you show strength and resolve, other people tend to get in line with you. If you waver, they scatter.\u201d  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s revised strategy also relies on NATO partners to continue to provide forces for Afghanistan operations, even though NATO has not met the troop requirements of the current plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of the 15,000 forces Resolute Support currently requires to execute the train-and-equip mission, NATO has filled 13,600 slots, as of the latest figures available in May 2017. The U.S. provides the lion\u2019s share of those forces, 6,900. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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President Donald Trump is calling for a greater troop presence in Afghanistan.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A long process<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coming to this decision was, according to multiple reports, a long and arduous process for Trump and his national security team.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Increasing the number of troops in Afghanistan was supported for several months by a group headlined by Mattis and national security adviser Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster. Opposing the move was a group of Trump staffers led by the recently departed Steve Bannon, who had supported a bid by Frontier Services Group chairman Erik Prince to replace U.S. forces with an army of contractors<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are already 23,525 contractors in Afghanistan supporting U.S. forces \u2014 about 9,500 of those contractors are American and the rest are foreign nationals, according to a July 2017 quarterly report released by U.S. Central Command.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Defense Department reports there are 8,400 U.S. troops serving in Afghanistan, but that figure does not take into account forces there on a temporary-duty assignment of 120 days or less. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Congressional Research Service has estimated the total cost of military options in Afghanistan since 2001 is more than $840 billion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For months, Mattis has said the White House was very close to selecting one of the options the Pentagon had developed. But as late as last week, the defense secretary said a full range of possibilities \u2014 from withdrawal, to the use of contracted forces, to adding about 4,000 additional troops \u2014 was on the table. <\/p>\n\n\n\t