U.S. President Barack Obama announced Tuesday that a troop surge of 30,000 will be deployed to Afghanistan.
"These are the resources we need," Obama said in a nationally televised speech to cadets at West Point Military Academy. "I did not take this decision lightly."
There are currently 68,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, which includes the 33,000 sent this year. 44 countries have allied troops in Afghanistan, including 40,000 International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and NATO forces.
The new troops will be deployed by the summer of 2010. The surge will have a defined length, said White House senior administration officials in a Tuesday teleconference.
"We did not ask for this fight," said Obama.
"I make this decision because I believe our security is at stake," said Obama, adding that "this danger will only grow if this region slides backwards and al Qaeda can keep operating with impunity."
"Before this war began we were united," said Obama. "I refuse to accept the notion that we cannot obtain that unity again"
The morning before his speech, Obama spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Poland Prime Minister Donald Tust, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, and Pakistan President Asif Zardari. It is hoped that the 44 allied countries with troops in Afghanistan will also increase their forces.
Obama's announcement draws from the March 2009 strategic review.
According to a senior administration official, the goal is to "disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al Qaeda and to prevent their return to either Afghanistan or Pakistan."
There will be goals for both Pakistan and Afghanistan. In Pakistan, the focus will be to fight off al Qaeda and deal with political, economic, and security issues, according to the officials. "The Pakistanis require help across all three of these aspects, in particular on the security front where they face internal extremists, the Pakistani Taliban, if you will, who actually threaten their state," they said.
The goal in Afghanistan will be to prevent the return of al Qaeda and "prevent the Taliban from overthrowing the Afghan government," an official said. The new troops will train Afghan security forces, fight the Taliban, and secure populated areas.
Morale
According to American Foreign Policy Council research fellow Jeff Smith, Obama's delay on announcing the Afghanistan strategy may have adversely affected troop morale. The upcoming announcement has left military personnel “anxious to hear new developments,” said Smith.
The U.S. will be fighting both the Taliban and al Qaeda. Smith added that there is a “debate raging in D.C. on how much you want to add the Taliban to this [issue]." The Taliban is a localized force and Al Qaeda is an international organization.
Smith emphasized the importance of Pakistan's role in the conflict. “Everything begins and ends in Pakistan,” he said. Reports have emerged saying that al Qaeda and the Taliban are recruiting forces from Pakistan.
U.S. troops who refuse deployment can face court martial. According to Iraq Veterans Against the War, some troops have fled to Canada or have gone AWOL to avoid deployment to Afghanistan.
Anti-war protests were scheduled by several groups across the country preceding Obama's speech on Tuesday.
A total of 929 U.S. troops have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001, according to icasualties.org. The UK has lost 236 troops and the other countries have lost a total of 367. In the ongoing war in Iraq, 4,367 U.S. troops have been killed since 2003.
Past Wars in Afghanistan
"Afghanistan is bigger than Iraq. The population is much more diffused. What exactly the troops are to be applied for—the mission they're trying to achieve—that's the real question," said military analyst Nathahn Hughes with Stratfor, a geopolitical intelligence company.
"Nobody's talking about us having 100,000 troops in Afghanistan in the next decade or further," Hughes said. "The heart of the strategy is training the security forces and the police forces in the country."
The Afghan security forces then would be able "to deal with their own problems," allowing for the withdrawal of U.S. forces, he said.
In 1978, Afghanistan had a brief communist regime which collapsed. The former Soviet Socialist Republic invaded Afghanistan in 1979 to support the communist government. They remained in the country for ten years.
Between 875,000 and 1,200,000 civilians died under the Soviet occupation, according to reports from USAID and Gallup in 1986 and 1987, respectively. Later estimates are as high as two million civilian deaths.
