Pentagon Chief Pays Surprise Visit to Afghan Front Lines
- Ayaz Gul
- Dec 18, 2015
- 3 min read
U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter greets Army Lt. Gen. Sean MacFarland after arriving in Baghdad, Dec. 16, 2015. Carter is on a weeklong trip to the Middle East.
ISLAMABAD—U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter made a surprise visit on Friday to Afghanistan, where he met U.S. military commanders and Afghan officials.
The visit comes as a new Afghan political group is pressuring the Kabul government to do more to stabilize the strife-torn country.
Carter arrived amid an intensified Taliban insurgency and new concerns over Islamic State loyalists, whose emergence has complicated U.S.-led international efforts to stabilize Afghanistan.
The secretary traveled to Jalalabad, the capital of eastern Nangarhar province, where several hundred U.S. soldiers are stationed. Pro-IS extremists have conducted attacks against local security forces in the province and are said to have seized control of a few remote districts.
The U.S. base in Jalalabad, called Operating Base Fenty, is engaged in training, logistics and counter-terrorism activities under the auspices of NATO’s Resolute Support Afghan mission.
Carter's visit to the eastern Afghan region underscores the emerging threat posed by IS, which has proclaimed an Islamic caliphate in Iraq and Syria.
He held a joint news conference with acting Afghan Defense Minister Masoom Stanekzai.
“We are seeing little nests of ISIL spring up around the world, including here in Afghanistan," Carter said, using an acronym for the militant group. "That is a threat that we track very closely, it is one that we are determined to defeat, not just here in Afghanistan, but around the world."
Gained territory
The Taliban this year has gained control of more territory and inflicted unprecedented casualties on Afghan security forces, which are now confronting the Islamist insurgency without direct ground or air support from NATO-led forces.
The Pentagon, in a report released to the U.S. Congress earlier this week, painted a grim picture of the security situation in 2015. It found that Afghan forces have suffered 27 percent more casualties than in the previous year, while high-profile attacks in Kabul have risen by a similar amount.
During the current fighting season, the Taliban briefly overran the key northern city of Kunduz, while Afghan security forces have been struggling for weeks to flush the insurgents from southern Helmand province.
Carter acknowledged the setbacks, saying, “The Taliban’s advances in some parts of the country, even if only temporary, underscore that this a tough fight and its far from over.”
US troop levels
The Taliban advances prompted U.S. President Barack Obama to reverse plans to reduce U.S. troops to a small embassy-level force in Kabul.
Under the revised plans, around 10,000 American troops will stay in Afghanistan through most of 2016.
Carter said Friday the United States is working closely with Afghanistan to ensure its security forces will be able to provide their own air support in the coming months.
Former Afghan warlord Abdul Rasool Sayyaf, center, attends the inauguration of the Afghanistan Protection and Stability Council in Kabul, Afghanistan, Dec. 18, 2015.
Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani’s national unity government has come under fire for being unable to improve security and economic conditions, or to deliver on promises of electoral reforms and reduced corruption.
Ghani took office in September 2014 after a U.S.-mediated power-sharing deal with election rival Abdullah Abdullah, who is serving as the chief executive in the unity government.
But the government has not made any significant progress on commitments to end the war and improve the economy, with unemployment at around 24 percent.
Frustration over the lack of progress has prompted the emergence of a new political grouping calling itself the Afghanistan Protection and Stability Council.
Inaugural speeches
In their inaugural speeches in Kabul Friday, its leaders said they want “fundamental reforms” in the country's governance but do not seek to destabilize the government.
This is the first political party to have been set up in Afghanistan since the Taliban was dislodged from power in 2001.
Analysts say they do not see the group posing a serious challenge to the Ghani government, noting the presence in its leadership of politicians who had been part of the previous administration.
Some had been blamed for allowing corruption to deepen its roots in government institutions.
Comments