Sim Tack: Hi, I’m Sim Tack, military analyst at Stratfor and I’m joined here today by Paul Floyd, another military analyst at Stratfor, and we'll be talking about the official ending to the ISAF mission in Afghanistan and what that means for Afghanistan’s future. So Paul, tell us. What actually changes on the ground with the end of this mission and the start of the follow on U.S. operation?
Paul Floyd: The short answer is not much. So this has been a transition that has been going on for years now, with the draw down. But more importantly we’ve seen Western forces… that NATO ISAF force has been pulling back from direct combat for a longtime and has been more in a training and supportive role of Afghan security forces. And this is really just kind of symbolically marking the official transition. But this is really kind of a no-later-than date of saying that this must be completely done by this time, but it has been going on and in a process of. And, as you know and as we’ve seen in the media, there’s still going to be a fairly robust force remaining after this in operation Resolute Support that will continue to train, advise and some will actually have outside of that, there will be some actual forces that will have combat operations abilities as well. Will there be a huge change on Jan. 1? No. Afghanistan is going to be along the same trajectory it’s been on for the last year or so.
The last French troops in Afghanistan salute during their end of NATO mission ceremony at Kabul International Airport (KAIA) in Kabul on Dec. 31, 2014. Shah Marai/AFP/Getty Images
Afghanistan After NATO
Video Transcript
Sim Tack: Hi, I’m Sim Tack, military analyst at Stratfor and I’m joined here today by Paul Floyd, another military analyst at Stratfor, and we'll be talking about the official ending to the ISAF mission in Afghanistan and what that means for Afghanistan’s future. So Paul, tell us. What actually changes on the ground with the end of this mission and the start of the follow on U.S. operation?
Paul Floyd: The short answer is not much. So this has been a transition that has been going on for years now, with the draw down. But more importantly we’ve seen Western forces… that NATO ISAF force has been pulling back from direct combat for a longtime and has been more in a training and supportive role of Afghan security forces. And this is really just kind of symbolically marking the official transition. But this is really kind of a no-later-than date of saying that this must be completely done by this time, but it has been going on and in a process of. And, as you know and as we’ve seen in the media, there’s still going to be a fairly robust force remaining after this in operation Resolute Support that will continue to train, advise and some will actually have outside of that, there will be some actual forces that will have combat operations abilities as well. Will there be a huge change on Jan. 1? No. Afghanistan is going to be along the same trajectory it’s been on for the last year or so.
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