Washington: President Barack Obama is expected to withdraw roughly 10,000 US troops from Afghanistan this year, with about 5,000 forces leaving this summer and an additional 5,000 Americans coming home by the end of the year, a senior US defense official said on Tuesday.
Obama could also announce a timetable for recalling the 20,000 other troops he ordered to Afghanistan as part of his December 2009 decision to send reinforcements to reverse the Taliban's battlefield momentum. The official spoke on condition of anonymity in order to discuss the plans before Obama's formal announcement.
Obama spokesman Jay Carney said Tuesday that the president had finalized his decision on the withdrawal plan and would address the nation from the White House at 8 p.m. Wednesday. He said the president informed his national security team of his plans during a White House meeting Tuesday morning.
While Carney would not discuss the details of Obama's decision, he said the drawdown set to begin next month puts the US on a path toward giving Afghans control of their own security by 2014.
A reduction this year totaling 10,000 troops would be the rough equivalent of two brigades, which are the main building blocks of an Army division. It's not clear whether Obama's decision would require the Pentagon to pull out two full brigades or, instead, a collection of smaller combat and support units with an equivalent number of troops.
Obama was given a range of options for the withdrawal last week by Gen. David Petraeus, the top US and NATO commander in Afghanistan. The military has favored a gradual reduction in troops but other advisers were advocating for significant decrease in the coming months.
The president has said he favors a "significant" withdrawal, his advisers have not quantified that statement.
At a democratic fundraiser in Washington Monday night, Obama said that by the end of the year, "we will be transitioning in Afghanistan to turn over more and more security to the Afghan people."
Following the announcement on the drawdown, Obama will visit troops Thursday at Fort Drum, the upstate New York military base that is home to the 10th Mountain Division, one of the most frequently deployed divisions to Afghanistan and Iraq.
While much of the attention is focused on how many troops will leave Afghanistan next month, the more telling aspects of Obama's decision center on what happens after July, particularly how long the president plans to keep the surge forces in the country.
Military commanders want to keep as many of those forces in Afghanistan for as long as possible, arguing that too fast a withdrawal could undermine the fragile security gains in the fight against the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan, the al-Qaida training ground for the Sept. 11 attacks. There are also concerns about pulling out a substantial number of U.S. forces as the heightened summer fighting season gets under way.
Gates, who is retiring from the Pentagon next week, has said he believes the initial drawdown should be "modest."
But other advisers backed a more significant withdrawal that starts in July and proceeds steadily through the following months. That camp believes the slow yet steady security gains in Afghanistan, combined with the death of Osama bin Laden and U.S. success in dismantling much of the al-Qaida network in the country, give the president an opportunity to make larger reductions this year.
Gates said Monday that Obama's decision needs to incorporate domestic concerns about the war in Afghanistan into his decision on drawing down American troops there.
"It goes without saying that there are a lot of reservations in the Congress about the war in Afghanistan and our level of commitment. There are concerns among the American people who are tired of a decade of war," Gates said during a news conference at the State Department.
Twenty-seven senators, Democrats as well as Republicans, sent Obama a letter last week pressing for a shift in Afghanistan strategy and major troop cuts.
"Given our successes, it is the right moment to initiate a sizable and sustained reduction in forces, with the goal of steadily redeploying all regular combat troops," the senators wrote. "The costs of prolonging the war far outweigh the benefits."
Arizona Sen. John McCain, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, differed with that assessment. He told ABC's "Good Morning America" on Tuesday that he agreed with Gates in hoping the withdrawal would be "modest."
"I believe that one more fighting season and we can get this thing pretty well wrapped up," McCain said.
There is broad public support for starting to withdraw U.S. troops. According to an Associated Press-GfK poll last month, 80 percent of Americans say they approve of Obama's decision to begin withdrawal of combat troops in July and end U.S. combat operations in Afghanistan by 2014. Just 15 percent disapprove.
Obama has tripled the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan since taking office, bringing the total there to about 100,000. The 30,000-troop surge he announced at the end of 2009 came with the condition that he would start bringing forces home in July 2011.
The president took months to settle on the surge strategy. This time around, aides say the process is far less formal and Obama is far more knowledgeable about the situation in Afghanistan than he was in 2009, his first year in office.
With the troop withdrawal set to begin next month, U.S. officials in Afghanistan said that military operations will become more focused and less ambitious over the coming three years. As troop levels decline the military will shift from a comprehensive counterinsurgency doctrine, which emphasizes small military-led development projects to gain the confidence of the local population, to counterterrorism, which focuses on capturing and killing insurgents, officials said.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because Obama has not announced the troop plan yet.
There are also indications that the administration, having learned from the U.S. experience in Iraq, will set deadline dates for the drawdown as it progresses, in order to keep pressure on the Afghans and give Congress mileposts.
With Iraq as a blueprint, commanders will need time to figure out what they call "battlefield geometry" - what types of troops are needed where. Those could include trainers, intelligence officers, special operations forces, various support units - from medical and construction to air transport - as well as combat troops.
Much of that will depend on where the Afghan security forces are able to take the lead, as well as the state of the insurgency. Part of the debate will also require commanders to determine the appropriate ratio of trainers versus combat troops.
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