Crucial military support for Afghanistan forces facing Taliban attacks will end when American forces leave later this year, putting at risk a U.S. friendly government propped up for two decades, the commander overseeing the withdrawal admitted Thursday.
President Joe Biden declared an end to America’s longest war last week when he announced his decision to withdraw the remaining 2,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan by Sept. 11. Congressional Republicans continue crying foul over his plan, while the Taliban have not yet broken with al Qaeda and continue daily attacks against the Afghan government. U.S. Central Command Gen. Frank McKenzie told members of Congress that “zero is going to be zero” when asked if any troops or contractors would remain in the country to help fight terrorists.
“At some point, it’s going to end because we’re going to leave,” McKenzie said at a Pentagon press briefing.
“We will attempt to keep collective security with our Afghan partners as long as we can, as long as the capabilities exist either in the country or out of the country until we leave,” he added. “The first line of defense for our forces in Afghanistan are our Afghan partners.”
McKenzie said six countries border Afghanistan, including Pakistan and the Central Asian countries of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan.
“We have no significant basing agreements with any of those countries right now,” he said when discussing possible “over the horizon” support and counterterrorism operations.
“I think it’s very concerning to all the neighboring states,” he added. “Everybody has a vested interest in an Afghanistan that does not harbor terrorist groups, such as al Qaeda and ISIS that have an apocalyptic vision of a future world.”
McKenzie told members of Congress Thursday morning that the transit time for an MQ-9 Reaper drone from Gulf partner nations where the United States has basing agreements is longer than four hours each way, leaving less time for a platform to remain over a potential target.
He also said intelligence and fire support to the Afghan Armed Forces will go away once U.S. troops and thousands of contractors leave the country.
Some estimates predict that al Qaeda and ISIS could reconstitute in 18 to 36 months, an estimate McKenzie did not deny in testimony.
With a shrug from behind the Pentagon lectern later, the Centcom commander said the Taliban promised not to allow that to happen.
“Al Qaeda and ISIS will be able to regenerate if pressure is not kept on them. That pressure could be kept on them by the government of Afghanistan, we just don’t know the exact composition of what the future government of Afghanistan is going to look like,” he said. “The Taliban have actually undertaken to do this. They have said that they will not allow al Qaeda or ISIS to base out of Afghanistan.”
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Still, McKenzie emphasized that the original mission for the war in Afghanistan had been achieved.
“I think that we have accomplished the mission that we set out to do, which is to prevent an attack against the United States,” he said. “We can all have judgments about what other missions crept in during the 20 years that we were engaged in there. But the core mission of preventing an attack on the United States was actually accomplished, and we will find ways to continue to execute that mission even as we leave Afghanistan.”
