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“White House looks to be more serious to bring the Afghan war to a rational end. Obama wanted to end the mission in Afghanistan before the end of his tenure”
AT Monitoring Desk-KABUL: Following the recent visit of Afghan leaders to the United States where the US President Barack Obama agreed on slowing down its troop’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, Philadelphia Inquirer quoted an American analyst, Trudy Rubin as saying that President Obama is overeager to leave Afghanistan. President Ashrf Ghani and CEO Dr. Abdullah Abdullah trip to Washington last week had opened a new chapter in bilateral relations of the two countries.
President Obama would utilize this opportunity in order to bring war in Afghanistan to a happy ending, Rubin said. “This time the White House is looking more serious to bring war into a rational end and also committed to help new government in stabilizing Afghanistan,” Rubin said. She adds that Obama agreed to delay pullout of the last 10,000 US troops as they are currently engaged in training and assisting Afghan forces.
Rubin went on saying that President Obama has yet to change the plan of 2016 complete withdrawal from Afghanistan. “Very clearly the President wanted to end the war before leaving his office,” she said.
Terming Afghan forces brave and capably Rubin said that they still needed US help with air, intelligence, and logistic support, as well as financing after 2016. “Our 10,000 advisors have symbolic value that transcends its military importance. It signals to the world that the United States is still committed to a stable Afghanistan,” she said.
She said that decision and deadline to keep US forces until end of 2016 in Afghanistan had brought new changes in thinking of the Taliban as they have already decreased interest in negotiating peace deal with new government.
The insurgent groups say they would never hold peace talks until complete pullout of foreign troops from the country.
The deadline would definitely have negative impact on president Ghani’s activities to persuade Pakistan, Iran, India, and China to come to the fore and jointly work for stabilizing Afghanistan, she said.
She said that Abdullah Abdullah, Chief Executive of the National Unity Government, in Afghan embassy told the author that they have seen a change in tone in Pakistan however adding that there was a lot of interaction between civil and military leadership. Abdullah said that Pakistan impelled to make target Pakistani Taliban groups as they were being hit by terrorist attacks.
“The Afghan government has not seen evidence so far that Pakistan has cut its support to the Afghan Taliban, but there is a much more positive environment there,” he said.
