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U.S. Afghan Review Says Forces Can Begin Withdrawal In July

December 16, 2010

By RFE/RL

The United States can begin withdrawing some of its troops from Afghanistan as planned in July of next year.

That is the main news contained in a summary released by the White House today of its latest review of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan.

But the summary gives no details as to how many U.S. troops could leave the country next year or on what kind of timetable.

Instead, the summary suggests that the withdrawal will be "conditions-based," that is -- as the White House has previously said -- determined by conditions on the ground.

The report summary argues that "specific components" of the U.S. strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan are working well and "there are notable operational gains."

It says that "most important, Al-Qaeda's senior leadership in Pakistan is weaker and under more sustained pressure than at any other point since it fled Afghanistan in 2001."

The summary praises cooperation with Pakistan, saying that Washington and Islamabad "worked jointly in the last year to disrupt the threat posed by al-Qaeda, and Pakistan has made progress against extremist safe havens."

And the assessment says that in Afghanistan, "the momentum achieved by the Taliban in recent years has been arrested in much of the country and reversed in some key areas, although these gains remain fragile and reversible."

Working With Pakistan

But the assessment summary also says that "the challenge remains to make our gains durable and sustainable" if the United States is to achieve its ultimate goal: the defeat of Al-Qaeda.

That defeat, the summary notes, will require not only sustained operations in Afghanistan, but "the sustained denial of the group's safe haven in the tribal areas of western Pakistan."

And, while the review says progress in Washington's relationship with Pakistan over the last year has been "substantial," it also calls that progress "uneven."

It says greater cooperation is needed with Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan and notes that the denial of extremist safe havens "cannot be achieved through military means alone, but must continue to be advanced by effective development strategies."

The review was compiled from data supplied by agencies across the U.S. government. It comes a year after President Barack Obama announced that he was sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan with the goal of creating conditions that will allow both the transfer of security responsibilities to the Afghans and let U.S. combat troops start coming home in the summer of 2011.

The year 2010 has been the bloodiest year so far of the nine-year-old war, with some 700 NATO troops -- at least 475 of them American -- killed in battles with the Taliban.

written by Charles Recknagel

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/looters_osh_uzbek_/2250519.html

Copyright (c) 2010. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.