U.S. President Joe Biden announced on Wednesday, "It is time to end the forever war" in Afghanistan. The president indicated that the United States had long ago accomplished its primary mission of denying terrorists a dwelling place in the country. He also stated that leaving American forces there was no longer worth all the money and blood.
Biden: It is Time to End the Forever War in Afghanistan
Biden spoke from the same White House spot where former President George W. Bush greenlighted the start of the war following the September 11 attacks almost two decades ago. But the current president made a case that there was no longer justification -- or there was none ever since -- to believe that the military presence could transform Afghanistan into a stable democracy.
The United States will continue to support Afghanistan following the withdrawal of all U.S. troops, but not "militarily," according to Biden's vow. He stated, "It is time to end America's longest war," reported BBC.
Biden's plan is to pull out all American forces, currently standing at 2,500, by September 11, the anniversary of the attacks coordinated from Afghanistan. Soon following Biden's announcement, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg in Brussels remarked the alliance had agreed to withdraw its estimated 7,000 forces from Afghanistan. This matched the U.S. president's decision to begin a final pullout by May 1, reported AP.
According to Biden, "We went to Afghanistan because of a horrific attack that happened 20 years ago. That cannot explain why we should remain there in 2021," reported NPR.
He added, "We were attacked, we went to war with clear goals. We achieved those objectives. Bin Laden is dead, and al-Qaida is degraded in Afghanistan, and it's time to end this forever war."
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Biden is currently the fourth U.S. president to preside over an American troop presence in Afghanistan. He oversaw them after two Democrats and two Republicans. He concluded he would not pass the responsibility to a fifth. Biden then added that the American mission would be solely committed to providing assistance to Afghanistan and carrying out diplomacy.
U.S. presidents have pledged to withdraw troops from Afghanistan since Bush initially deployed them in the advent of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The deployments were executed to overthrow the Taliban government that concealed Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda Islamists.
Biden took out a card from his suit jacket that he indicated he had kept with him for 12 years to record war casualties. He said in the two decades of war against Afghanistan, and foreign militants, 2,488 fatalities of U.S. citizens have been recorded, and 20,722 have been wounded.
According to him, the United States "cannot continue the cycle of extending or expanding our military presence in Afghanistan hoping to create the ideal conditions for our withdrawal, and expecting a different result." He said it is the right timing for American troops to return home.
Over 38,500 Afghanistan civilians have died, and at least 72,300 were wounded since 2009, which was the first year the U.N. began counting Afghan civilian casualties. Although Afghan military fatalities have been shielded or classified, according to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, at least 48,000 Afghan security personnel were killed from 2014 to 2020.
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