WASHINGTON — President Trump’s nationwide safety adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, added to the confusion round Mr. Trump’s plans for Afghanistan on Frid
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s nationwide safety adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, added to the confusion round Mr. Trump’s plans for Afghanistan on Friday, reiterating an assertion that the USA will draw all the way down to about 2,500 troops by early subsequent yr — and not directly rebuking the Joint Chiefs of Workers chairman for overtly questioning that timeline.
Talking from the White Home throughout a web based session hosted by the Aspen Technique Group, Mr. O’Brien repeated a press release he made throughout a public discuss final Wednesday, saying that Mr. Trump had directed that the USA, which now has about 4,500 troops within the nation, would “be all the way down to 2500 troops” in “the early a part of subsequent yr.”
“It has been steered by some that that’s hypothesis. I can assure you, that’s the plan of the president the USA,” Mr. O’Brien mentioned. That was a transparent reference to feedback by the chairman, Gen. Mark A. Milley, in an interview on Sunday with NPR, that Mr. O’Brien’s earlier troop-level projection amounted to “hypothesis” and never the “rigorous evaluation” of situations on the bottom that the overall would apply.
On Friday, Mr. O’Brien insisted that he was reflecting Mr. Trump’s true intentions.
“It’s not hypothesis,” he repeated. “That’s the order of the commander in chief,” he mentioned, including that the Protection Division and its secretary, Mark T. Esper, are “absolutely on board and implementing them.”
The US struck an settlement with the Taliban in February that dedicated to a full troop withdrawal by subsequent Could, however tied to situations that the Afghan rebel group has but to fulfill.
Mr. O’Brien additionally sought to clarify away a tweet by Mr. Trump, posted hours after his remarks final week, by which the president appeared to supply a completely totally different, and far sooner, timeline for an American exit. “We must always have the small remaining variety of our BRAVE Males and Girls serving in Afghanistan house by Christmas!” Mr. Trump wrote.
“I feel what the president was doing is, he was expressing the identical want — I feel each president for the reason that Revolutionary Battle has mentioned, at any time when we’re at battle, whether or not it was the Revolutionary Battle, the Civil Battle, World Battle I, or World Battle II — all presidents, all G.I.s need the troops house by Christmas,” he mentioned.
“There’d be nothing better than having our troops house by Christmas,” he continued, including that the USA was “on a path proper now that appears like about 4,500.”
Mr. O’Brien additionally sought to downplay concern that Mr. Trump would search to exit the North Atlantic Treaty Group in a second time period, a day after Mr. Trump, talking on a podcast hosted by the American Enterprise Institute, wouldn’t decide to remaining within the alliance if re-elected.
Requested about claims by Mr. Trump’s earlier nationwide safety adviser, John R. Bolton, that the president has threatened to exit the alliance solely, Mr. O’Brien mentioned, “I’ve by no means heard him discuss getting out of NATO.”