On Jan. 8, 2013, President Barack Obama made a statement to the press saying that the U.S. is planning to pull out most troops in Afghanistan by 2014, but concrete plans have not yet been finalized. This was an option that would defy the Pentagon’s view that thousands of troops may be needed to keep an eye on Al-Qaeda and to strengthen Afghan forces. There were over 100,000 troops in the country as of 2010 but the number has lowered to around 66,000, recorded earlier in 2012. This issue will be one of the main priorities when Afghan President Hamid Karazi meets with President Barack Obama later in the week.
“I think Barack Obama needs to make the important decision of whether we are going to fight for a cause that is good or not,” senior Matheus Santos said.
This will be hard because there is a risk Afghanistan will collapse and return to the state of chaos it was in before the U.S. troops arrived in the 1990s. Many people want the troops to stay in Afghanistan because they are helping keep the country safe.
“I think we don’t need to keep the troops in Afghanistan because they have been there for too long and it’s pretty harsh in that territory right now,” junior Jasmine Torres-Colon said.
There are constantly stories on the news about innocent people and even troops getting killed in Afghanistan and Pakistan due to terrorist attacks or random bombings in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Al-Qaeda is one of the leading terrorist groups in the Middle East and has ruled for almost a decade.
“I think that the U.S. government should eliminate Al-Qaeda and stay in the country to make sure there are not any more problems,” Torres-Colon said.
The Navy Seals took out famous leader Osama Bin Laden in 2011. There was a movie released in December 2012 called Zero Dark Thirty that dramatizes how the U.S. captured and killed Bin Laden. The troops were sent into Afghanistan in the first place to prevent all the attacks from happening again.
“I think if we take the troops out of Afghanistan it will hurt us because we are spending money on an issue that’s not ours,” Santos said.
There are many issues that are keeping Obama from taking out the troops, leaving him with a lot of decisions to make in the next couple of years. The Obama administration will no doubt promise that the U.S. will continue to provide assistance to the Afghan military.
“The most important decision Obama will need to make in the next year will be whether or not he will listen to the commanders on the ground,” Senior Army Instructor for Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Major John Napoli said.
There is also the fear that the Afghan-Pakistan border is going to be dangerous because there are people who can come out of hiding in Pakistan and attack at any moment. The United States will soon have to make a decision on whether it is more important to keep troops in Afghanistan to help stop all the terrorist attacks or to bring them home.
“I believe that the Afghan Army is unable to protect the people in Afghanistan right now because they don’t have the weaponry or the resolve to be free and there are just too many tribes,” Napoli said.
