U.S. Military Will Extend Stay in Afghanistan
October 16, 2015
American troops patrol a village along Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan. Department of Defense
Yesterday, October 15, U.S. President Barack Obama announced the extension of the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. The president’s original plan had been to draw down all but a small number of troops based at the American embassy in Kabul by the end of 2016. In the revised plan, at least 5,500 troops will remain in Afghanistan through 2017. The soldiers will be stationed at Kabul, Bagram, Jalalabad, and Kandahar.
An increase in Islamist Taliban attacks has worsened the security situation in Afghanistan over the past year. The militant Sunni organization held power in Afghanistan from the mid-1990′s until 2001. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States government demanded that the Taliban turn over a terrorist they were harboring, Saudi-born millionaire Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden and al-Qa`ida, his terrorist organization, orchestrated the September 11 attacks. After the Taliban refused to turn over bin Laden, the U.S. invaded Afghanistan and removed the Taliban from power. After that, the Taliban fought a sporadic guerrilla war against U.S. and coalition forces.
The war in Afghanistan became the longest deployment of American combat troops in U.S. history. At the war’s peak in 2010 and 2011, nearly 100,000 U.S. soldiers were serving in Afghanistan. Taliban attacks then dwindled to the point that the war was formally declared over on Dec. 28, 2014. U.S. troops were then steadily reduced, but the Taliban correspondingly grew in strength.
In April 2015, the Taliban began fighting for the northern Afghan city of Kunduz, which they briefly captured in late September. On October 3, while responding to a call for aid from the Afghan Army, the U.S. Air Force accidentally bombed a hospital in Kunduz run by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), killing 22 people. The growing Taliban threat (along with the emergence of Islamic State terrorists in Afghanistan) created the need for the U.S. military’s extended stay in strength.
