(Newswire.net — November 26, 2014) — The NATO’s mission in Afghanistan is far from over as US president Obama plans to dispatch more US troops to that country.
According to Reuters’ unnamed sources, the exact number of US soldiers will depend on the gap left in the NATO mission by other contributing nations.
This decision comes as a surprise because President Obama promised US forces are only providing logistics and training local forces to combat Taliban. A Reuter’s source said the US forces need to secure the mission’s bases until other nations send its armed forces or until they are no longer needed.
Earlier this year, the US president announced that American troops would be cut to 9,800 by the end of the year as the Western mission is finishing its operations in the Afghanistan. He added that in 2015 the figure is expected to be cut in half, and by 2016 reduced to a normal embassy presence with security assistance.
“There will be 9,800 troops, plus at least a few hundred above and beyond that,” the same source told Reuters. Of these 9,800, some 8,000 are intended for the NATO force and the remainder for a separate anti-terrorism operation.
Under name Resolute Support, the NATO’s mission have 12,000 troops deployed in Afghanistan to assist local forces to maintain the stability. Obama secretly signed an order recently that expands the country’s direct combat role in Afghanistan throughout 2015 – after the mission expires, by deploying fighter jets, bombers, and drones.
The order says nothing about the ground troops; however, the new Afghanistan government signed on Sunday an agreement allowing the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to maintain thousands of troops beyond 2014.
How much this agreement is worth to NATO says the fact that a new Afghan President Ashraf Ghani signed the deal after taking office in September from former president Hamid Karzai, who refused to sign.
So far, the war in Afghanistan claimed 222 deaths of US soldiers in combat, however, this is less than total of troops (247) who commited suicide this year, according to a CNN.