President Donald Trump has said that he is considering sending troops into Afghanistan in order to mop up what remains of the Taliban after his use of the Mother of all Bombs (MOAB) on a tunnel network owned by the radical Islamic terrorist group, ISIS.
This comes after a raid on an ISIS stronghold in which Islamic State leader Sheikh Abdul Hasib was killed. Based on the success of this attack, Trump seems emboldened to conduct more ground fighting against the Taliban, which reports say, has been growing since the Sunni radical militants took center stage.
A new plan is on the table to do just that, and it is awaiting the approval of the president. It calls for the expansion of the U.S. military’s current role in the region in curtailing the advancement of Taliban forces. This plan punctuates a series of discussions over Trump’s review of current policies concerning U.S. military strategy in Afghanistan. The president has expressed great concern about the failure to make important gains against the Taliban saying, he wants us to “start winning again.”
The new plan would give the Pentagon – rather than the White House – the authority to decide how many troops are deployed at any given time. It would also give military leaders more control over their use of air strikes as they target Taliban members and assets.
This is a decidedly divergent move away from the kinds of policies that have reigned since George W. Bush entered into the war against terrorism last decade. Many of the military failures presided over by Obama and Bush were characterized by their being ordered in both scope and direction from the White House. The military actions by those two administrations were also explicitly political in nature and ineffective.
During his campaign for the Presidency, Donald Trump said several times that he would no longer announce the military actions he would authorize before implementing them. Trump complained that Obama’s doing so was politically motivated, but he also suggested that presidents who announced U.S. military attacks before they happened were also setting those attacks up to fail. He once said in a debate that Obama announces what he’s going to do, and by the time our forces get to the target area, the targets have left.
Placing management powers over military actions back in the hands of military experts is another way he is showing that he does not intend to use the military strikes authorized by him for immediate political gain.
The president is expected to deliver his final decision on the plan at a NATO summit before the end of the month.
According to the Washington Post, the plan to send more troops to Afghanistan is being spearheaded by Trump’s recent appointee to the position of National Security Advisor, H.R. McMaster. This fact is creating a great deal of tension between populist and globalist representatives within the Trump administration.
It has come out, for example, that Steve Bannon fears the “surge” will merely be an extension of the failed policies of the last twelve years concerning the Middle East and that no permanent gains would result. Bannon and others within the administration are calling it “McMaster’s War.”
At the same time, reports are emerging that President Trump is losing his patience with McMaster. The decision to appoint him was praised as a serious move in a more professional direction. But numerous reports have surfaced that Trump and McMaster have had several bitter arguments.
Bannon has been warning Trump that McMaster’s plan is a prelude to more nation building – something Trump has long said he would not do.
These mixed messaged would seem to indicate that Trump is beginning to regret appointing McMaster.
The plan, as it exists, would send no less than 3,000 troops to bolster our current presence in Afghanistan, bringing the total number to 11,400 American troops in the region. The military will have the final say so when it comes to setting the final number, as Trump has made it clear that he wants military professionals in charge of the details.
After Trump’s bombardment the airfield in Syria, many were concerned that he would enter into a ground war to depose president Assad as he had promised on the campaign trail to always put America’s needs before international interests. But these fears did not manifest – a good sign for Trump supporters who expect him to put America first.
The surge will raise the current annual expenditure of $23 billion on conflicts in the region.
~ Conservative Zone
