KABUL, Afghanistan – The United States will keep about 1,000 more troops in Afghanistan than planned early next year to fill a temporary NATO troop gap in the new mission to advise and train Afghan security forces, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Saturday on his final visit to this war-weary country as Pentagon chief.
At a news conference with President Ashraf Ghani, Hagel said the original plan to cut U.S. troop levels to 9,800 by the end of 2014 had been abandoned, but not because of a recent surge in Taliban attacks.
Hagel said the U.S. will keep up to 10,800 troops for the first few months of 2015 and then restart the drawdown, which is scheduled to reach 5,500 troops by the end of next year.
The U.S. decided to keep additional forces in the country temporarily because planned troop commitments by U.S. allies for a NATO train-and-assist mission starting in January have been slow to materialize.
Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, told reporters in an interview later Saturday that he is confident NATO members will furnish the necessary number of troops for the new training mission, which will begin Jan. 1. It’s just going to take a few extra weeks or months to get them in Afghanistan, he said.
At his news conference, Hagel said President Barack Obama agreed to allow Campbell the extra 1,000 troops “for a few months” only.
“But the president’s authorization will not change our troops’ missions, or the long-term timeline for our drawdown,” Hagel said.
Hagel said the U.S. also will keep pursuing a “limited” counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan beyond 2014.
“We have not forgotten what brought America’s armed forces here over a decade ago,” he said. “We are committed to preventing al-Qaida from using Afghanistan as a safe haven to threaten the United States, our allies and partners, and the Afghan people. And we will take appropriate measures against Taliban members who directly threaten U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan or provide direct support to al-Qaida.”
