TROOP LEVELS
President Barack Obama has not decided how many U.S. troops to keep in Afghanistan after 2014 if an agreement with Afghanistan is approved. Here are current troop levels:
Total NATO troops: 86,834
Top four contributing nations:
U.S. — 60,000
U.K. — 7,900
Germany — 4,400
Italy — 2,800
Source: International Security Assistance Force
New discord surfaced between the U.S. and Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday, with Karzai saying he would prefer his successor sign a new security agreement with the United States, and Washington saying that no signatures by the end of 2013 could be a deal breaker.
Secretary of State John Kerry and Karzai agreed this week to a proposed bilateral security pact that could allow thousands of U.S. troops to remain in Afghanistan as trainers and advisers after 2014 when the NATO-led combat mission ends.
But then, just as about 2,500 tribal elders from around Afghanistan assembled in Kabul to consider the document, Karzai said he wanted it to be signed by the next president, who won’t be elected until April at the earliest. That could make the draft document a political football in the Afghan presidential election and complicate U.S. efforts to prepare for a residual force to battle terrorists and train, equip and assist Afghan forces beyond 2014.
It’s unclear why Karzai said he would rather his successor sign any deal, which has been the focus of nearly a year of negotiations fraught with frequent ups and downs and pauses. James Dobbins, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said U.S. officials are trying to get Karzai to change his mind.
“I think delaying the signing to April will make it much more difficult for us to make our commitments,” Dobbins told “PBS NewsHour.”
“It’ll make it more difficult — and make it virtually impossible for other countries to make their commitments. I think it’ll have a long-term, deleterious impact on the scale of international assistance to Afghanistan,” he said.
Asked if the U.S. was trying to get Karzai to reconsider, Dobbins replied: “Absolutely. And besides that, it’s a two-round election and it’s not necessarily over in April. It could well extend several months beyond that because if the first round doesn’t produce a clear winner, there’ll be a second round.”
Afghan experts in the U.S. suggested Karzai might be trying to pressure the U.S. into making more concessions. His move also could be his attempt to avoid taking personal responsibility for an agreement that Afghans might see as selling out to foreign interests.
Karzai hinted that asking for the deferral could be personal — that neither he nor the U.S. trust each other and that it would be better if someone else put pen to paper.
“It all turns to trust, and between me and America, there is not very good trust,” Karzai told the elders on Thursday. “I don’t trust them and they don’t trust me. The last 10 years has shown this to me. I have had fights with them and they have had propaganda against me.”
The Obama administration pushed back, with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel saying Karzai’s move “puts the United States in a very, very difficult position.”
The agreement is set to remain in force until the end of 2024 and beyond, unless terminated by mutual agreement or by either party with two years’ written notice. The agreement was designed to give some U.S. forces the legal right to remain in the country after the NATO-led mission concludes in December 2014, and to pledge U.S. backing for Afghanistan and its security forces for many years to come.
About the Author
