Trump bringing home the troops

| November 17, 2020

Well most anyway. Breaking news! CNBC is covering the announcement from the acting Secretary of Defense that Trump has ordered all but 2,500 troops each in Iraq and Afghanistan home by January 15.

Acting Pentagon chief Christopher Miller said Tuesday that the United States will reduce its military presence in Afghanistan to 2,500 troops and 2,500 troops in Iraq by Jan. 15.

The United States has approximately 4,500 troops currently in Afghanistan and more than 3,000 in Iraq.

“This decision by the president is based on continuous engagement with his national security cabinet over the past several months including ongoing discussions with me and my colleagues across the United States government,” Miller said at the Pentagon.

“And just this morning, I spoke with key leaders in Congress as well as our allies and partners abroad to update them on these plans in light of our shared approach,” Miller said, adding that he spoke with NATO Secretary-General Stoltenberg and Afghanistan’s President Ghani on Tuesday.

“We went in together, we adjust together and when the time is right, we will leave together,” Miller said.

Last week, Miller ascended to the Pentagon’s acting Secretary of Defense role after President Donald Trump’s sudden termination of Secretary of Defense Mark Esper.

In an early Saturday morning message to Department of Defense employees, Miller said he was “weary of war” and that it was time to end America’s conflicts in the Middle East.

“We are not a people of perpetual war — it is the antithesis of everything for which we stand for which our ancestors fought. All wars must end,” Miller wrote, adding that the U.S. was “on the verge of defeating Al Qaida and its associates.”

“We met the challenge; we gave it our all. Now, it’s time to come home,” Miller wrote.

More at the source; CNBC

Category: Afghanistan, Big Pentagon, Breaking News, Iraq, Trump!

23 Comments
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Toxic Deplorable Racist SAH B Woodman

And once the troops are home, even if Al Quidah or ISIS or any other muzzie terrorist pops up, f##k ’em, we should stay home. We are NOT the world’s police force.

Graybeard

Will this result in fewer rotations for our special ops guys, or more? They’ve taken a beating in terms of carrying the load.

But, overall, good.

I hope the rag-heads of AQ, ISIS, et al don’t re-emerge anytime soon, but IMHO they will, and we need to be prepared to beat them down quickly and convincingly. MOABs, Nukes, napalm – whatever it takes.

YMMV

5th/77th FA

Testify!

Anonymous

Hate_me

It will, invariably, result in a higher OPTEMPO for our SOF bubbas. Likely, they will be more enjoyable tours (more business suits and embassy girls than ghillie suits and chai), but not always. Just as the Cold War was pretty hot, for some, those conventional enemies will adapt.

Graybeard

Their OPTEMPO is already too high, IMHO.

But if Joe BiteMe comes into power, it’ll all go to hell in a handbasket.

YMMV

Hate_me

A Biden presidency will be horrible for our military. If possible, I will spend every day from 2021-2025 deployed overseas.

I can’t think of a worse place than in garrison, during that time.

Anonymous

Get some!

Toxic Deplorable Racist SAH B Woodman

Simple ROEs; bomb ’em to rubble, then make the rubble bounce.

Only Army Mom

We need to bring those last 2,500 home as well, as soon as we get all our assets out. And give our Spec Ops guys a break, too. When they return to their usual killing of each other, oppressing their women and goat-raping, let them. But, remind them if they threaten us or ours and we are forced to return, it won’t be us, just our armament. Lots of armament, with special long-range delivery.

Graybeard

AMEN and AMEN! Only Army Mom.

My son’s nightmares are getting fewer, but I don’t want anyone else to become a Gold Star parent or watch their child struggle with the after-effects unless absolutely necessary to protect our freedoms.

I, too, prefer long-distance delivery of a very strong statement of disapproval.

11B-Mailclerk

And -this- is why they want to overthrow Trump.

Anonymous

Because enough of our guys haven’t died nation-building in sh*tholes for them to feel good about themselves.

Tally Whagger

What we have here, is a failure to communicate.

Trump’s most magnificent accomplishment was preventing Hillary. How much better can you do, when you’re an outsider?

Being an outsider is one of Trump’s finest qualities, as well as one of his blind areas. It seems as though he believes that others are as motivated, as he.

Loyalty runs both ways. He trusted devoted government snakes to be other than what they are and they took every opportunity to subvert his administration, bit him in the ass and anywhere else that they could.

Like a hog, Trump was generally immune to venom. Regrettably, he was so full of his own venom as to be distracted from durable plans.

Nonetheless, he prevented Hillary.

God bless America and Americans. Satan will deal with the rest. Delighted to learn that Esper has been disenfranchised.

The stuff with Mattis and Kelley seems to be elusive. Those guys were very capable in their various roles and skill set(s). In the redux, they were government employees.

I don’t think that Trump has ever fully contemplated the nature of bureaucracies.

Four more years!

Only Army Mom

Lots of respect for both Mattis and Kelly, but. Both were hawks who believe the military way, I.e. continued military presence was the answer. In general, forgive the pun, I’m all for putting a loud boom of an exclamation point at the end of a diplomatic solution. But, it is not a military defeat to bring our troops home while the bad guys are still killing each other, not an opinion IIRC either are prone to share.

Now, if things and times were different? Hells to the yes. End the blood lines of the blood lines.

5JC

I don’t know why I keep thinking about the fall of Saigon.

And hey after nearly 20 years of “making improvement” good to know we are now “on the verge” of taking down AQ. Essnetially today a whole military career happened during the War in Afghanistan.

SFC D

That’s a fact. A PFC that worked for me in Bagram (2002) is a SFC now.

26Limabeans

“fall of Saigon”

Now they make our underwear.

Toxic Deplorable Racist SAH B Woodman

Simple ROEs; bomb ’em to rubble, then make the rubble bounce.

11B-Mailclerk

Victory is a thing. Lack of focus on it is how we got here.

We said we would -conquer- and -destroy- the Nazi Reich and the Empire of Japan.

We did so. Simultaneously.

Had we vowed to extinguish the regime of our current enemies, and done the needful, they would now be done. There is no nice or limited way to Victory.

None.

We are advised otherwise by enemies and their agents. Remember that.

Skippy

It’s long overdue. Too bad he’s had to deal
With so much cancer in his administration
Who were opposed to this

C-RATs

One of the most succinct and impactfull expressions of the American way of War I have ever read:

“We are not a people of perpetual war — it is the antithesis of everything for which we stand for which our ancestors fought. All wars must end.”

“We met the challenge; we gave it our all. Now, it’s time to come home.”

IMO, the next time we use the military to nation-build we should not. Turn it over to the civilians and…THAT point should start from the still-smoldering rubble of what was once an enemy’s country, working with the few remaining survivors whose will to fight we have utterly shattered.

The above should also define what victory looks like before we ever start.

samir sardana

If Trump ACTUALLY leaves office (which I doubt),then he will make a move on Iran and Taiwan.The move on Iran will also involve the IAF.(Israeli Air Force). dindooohindoo This is a certainty Post RCEP,as it is the largest Trading block in the world (by population).RCEP has knitted the ASEAN into the PRC garment. This will make the ASEAN people and the ASEAN governments DEPENDENT on PRC,and enable ASEAN to be partners in the PRC success story.Thereafter, excluding Nippon and South Korea,no other nation will ally with the Americans,and might also,not allow their ports,to be used by the US Navy – as the financial and economic loss,will be tangible and huge – with no ostensible strategic benefits,to the ASEAN nations. THAT IS A NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT TO THE USA AND SO,THE AMERICANS WILL TEST THE GARMENT. Once a clash starts over Taiwan between USA and PRC, “SOME” ASEAN nations will join the US bandwagon. The 1st to break will be the Pinos and Malaysia (in the post Mahatir era).Japan and Seoul will always be in the American camp.Japan has A LARGE population and cannot to have a Tax and TBT on exports to PRC – as it is an export driven economy – and so,their joining RCEP is an economic compulsion, and they will remain an implacable foe of the PRC. Besides, Nippon and Seoul are signalling Beijing – that they expect Xi and the PLA to REIN IN DPRK ! The same applies to Aussie and Kiwis.If Kiwi Agri exports fall,or are subject to Import Taxes and TBT in PRC – there will be a revolution in Kiwi land. Aussies have the same problem in minerals and agri exports to PRC – besides the fact that Indonesia is next to PRC, and has a HUGE Freight differential advantage w.r.t Aussies and w/o the concessional duties the Aussie Coal exports to PRC, would vanish.Like Japan, the Aussies will be an implacable foe of PRC as their interests and ideologies,will NEVER match or converge. Therefore ,with RCEP, it is CERTAIN that some disaster will happen in South China Sea BEFORE January 20,2021,… Read more »