US to Leave More Troops in Afghanistan than First Planned

Local Editor

The US military likely will keep a slightly larger force in Afghanistan in 2015 than first planned and American troops will have authority to come to the aid of Afghan forces if necessary, officials said on Tuesday.

The United States may have to deploy hundreds of additional forces in coming months, beyond the 9,800-strong contingent announced previously, because of a shortfall in troop contributions from NATO members, officials said.

One official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that commanders were still working out the details but there was a shortage of roughly 400 to 700 NATO troops that would need to be filled temporarily by US forces through the winter months of 2015.

"This is just to bridge the gap," the official said.

There are currently 16,100 US troops in Afghanistan.

The post-2014 NATO "mission" calls for 12,500 troops to remain on the ground starting in January, with about 2,700 non-US forces.

The change in troop plans came as US President Barack Obama's administration revised the parameters of the "mission" for American troops next year in 2015.

Obama had said the US combat "mission" in Afghanistan will end this year [2014] as the bulk of the NATO force withdraws, with remaining troops focused on training Afghan soldiers and targeting Al-Qaeda militants.

Yet, US national security officials recently last week decided that American forces would be permitted to take action to help Afghan army and police in battles with the Taliban insurgency.

Both the Pentagon and the US State Department insisted the "mission" had not been expanded in any way, but officials acknowledged privately that the question of combat support for Afghan troops had remained unresolved.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team