In the Crosshairs: Will US Troops Remain in Afghanistan After 2014?

The deadline for troop withdrawal is inching closer everyday, but the question remains: How much longer with U.S. troops remain in Afghanistan? The war in Afghanistan, the longest in American history, is at a crossroads as Washington and Kabul debate what will happen to U.S. troops after the 2014 withdrawal deadline.

The fate of a security agreement outlining the future of U.S. troop involvement now hangs in the balance. Afghan President Hamid Karzai recently criticized what he called pressure from the U.S. to sign the agreement.

During an interview with France’s Le Monde, Karzai said that James Dobbins, the special U.S. envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan had essentially told him there would be no peace if he didn’t sign the security agreement. Karzai said he interpreted that to mean, “If you don’t sign the agreement, we will provoke fighting in your country, we will cause trouble.”

The U.S. has threatened to pull all troops out of Afghanistan if a deal isn’t reached, Reuters reported. That would open Afghanistan up to a resurgence of the Islamist Taliban insurgency. “Even if they are serious, they can’t push us up against the wall,” Karzai told Le Monde.

He continued, “What I’ve been hearing in recent days and heard in the past is classic colonial exploitation. Afghans will not submit, they have already fought colonial masters, they don’t accept it.”

The current security agreement on the table would allow a training and counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan until 2024 and would involve between 8,000 and 12,000 troops. According to the New York Times, the agreement does not establish a final troop number after the end of the NATO combat mission in December 2014, but around two-thirds of the troops would be American.

Troops remaining in Afghanistan would train, advise and assist Afghan forces.

According to the Times, the agreement includes concessions from both sides, despite criticism from Afghan officials during the negotiation process. In an initial agreement, Afghan officials promised American soldiers would not face Afghan prosecution during their time in the country. U.S. Special Operation forces will also continue conducting antiterrorism raids in private Afghan homes.

In return, Afghanistan would be assured that over $4 billion in annual international security assistance would continue to flow in.

In November, a senior Obama administration official stated that while the agreement allows for involvement until 2024, forces would not remain there until then. “While we are open to keeping a residual force in Afghanistan to carry out the narrow missions of counterterrorism and training,” the official said, “There is no scenario in which those forces would stay in Afghanistan until anywhere near 2024.”

Most troops remaining in Afghanistan would not see combat and would be assigned to major headquarters, the Times reported. American and NATO plan for a smaller counterterrorism force.

Despite resisting the security agreement with the U.S., Karzai agreed to a cooperation pact with Iran during a trip to Tehran on Sunday. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani reiterated Tehran’s opposition to the continued presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan.