Fears in US of bad peace deal with the Taliban
An Afghanistan peace agreement that the US seems close to reaching with the Taliban has prompted worries that President Donald Trump’s desire to quickly withdraw US troops could further plunge the country into civil war.
Trump said Friday he was pleased with talks on ending the war, 18 years after the September 11, attacks that prompted the US invasion of Afghanistan in the first place.
In recent days several US officials have suggested that an accord could be imminent in discussions with the Taliban in Qatar.
The US negotiator, Zalmay Khalilzad, is expected to return to the region very soon in hopes of sealing an agreement with the Afghan rebel force.
Such a potentially historic accord has raised an outcry from an eclectic assortment of critics in Washington, ranging from neo-conservatives to former Democratic administration officials to ex-military heroes.
In tweets, interviews and op-ed pieces in newspapers they are cautioning against hastily bringing home the 14,000 US troops in Afghanistan, a warning which some hope will also score points ahead of next year’s presidential election.
And they are calling on Trump to treat this war as he did North Korea and its nuclear weapons and insist on no deal rather than a bad deal.
“Under no circumstances should the Trump administration repeat the mistake its predecessor made in Iraq and agree to a total withdrawal of combat forces from Afghanistan,” retired general David Petraeus, who used to command those soldiers, warned in a piece for The Wall Street Journal.
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