President Joe Biden is facing pressure to decide whether to abide by the May 1 deadline negotiated by the Trump administration to fully withdraw remaining U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
Despite initially hinting interest in meeting the May deadline, President Biden has since conceded that an estimated 2,500 troops could still be in Afghanistan after the deadline.
In a March 16 interview with ABC News, Biden said it would be “tough” to meet the May deadline, adding that it was not “a very solidly negotiated deal.” He added that even if the United States did not meet the deadline, American troops will not be in Afghanistan much longer.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki on Tuesday acknowledged the difficulty of meeting the tight schedule: “…First, it wasn’t a deadline we set.”
But she reminded reporters that as vice president, Biden “spoke out about his concerns about the war” during the Obama years even when that was not a dominant view.
“So that should hopefully give people confidence about his commitments,” Psaki said. “But it’s also an important decision – one he needs to make in close consultation with our allies and also with our national security team here in this administration. And we want to give him the time to do that.”
The May 1 goal stems from an agreement negotiated between the Trump administration and the Taliban signed in Doha, Qatar in February 2020.
The deal would see a total withdrawal of troops from the country nearly 20 years after the U.S.-led invasion. In exchange, the Taliban would sever ties with al-Qaida and end attacks on American forces.
The Afghan government, led by President Ashraf Ghani, was left out of negotiations.
Since the accord, the Taliban has stepped up violence in the country, expanding its control and influence.
Despite this, leaked State Department documents obtained by the New York Times in late February outlined Biden’s proposal for a political settlement, calling for replacing Afghanistan’s current government with temporary leaders, the drafting of a new constitution, and securing a cease-fire.
However, Ghani has said the only way to form a government is through an election.
“I advise those who go to this or that gate to gain power is that political power in Afghanistan has a gate, and the key is the vote of the Afghan people,” Ghani said at the opening of the parliament session in Kabul on March 6.
Ghani offered a three-step peace plan at the Heart of Asia conference on March 30 in Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe, that includes the possibility of an election. The plan has since been rejected by the Taliban, which insists the Doha agreement is the “best plan.”
In addition, the Taliban has confirmed a meeting with Gen. Scott Miller, the head of U.S. forces and the NATO-led non-combat Resolute Support mission and diplomat Zalmay Khalilzad, where “both sides expressed their commitment to the Doha agreement and discussed its full implementation.”
Top-ranking U.S. officials and many on Capitol Hill believe a total withdrawal by May 1 will be unlikely.
Sen. Robert Menendez, D-New Jersey, and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is among a group of congressional Democrats urging Biden to reconsider the agreement, citing the Taliban’s violation of the deal and the poor chances of creating a viable peace agreement between the Taliban and the Afghan government.
“No one wants to bring our sons and daughters home as much as I do, but I also don’t want to have shed so much blood and national treasure and see it fall back into chaos,” Menendez said during a March 9 press conference.
But others in Congress are pressing the White House to stick to the withdrawal timeline. In a March 18 letter to Biden, Reps. Barbara Lee, D-California, and Ken Buck, R-Colorado, said meeting the May 1 deadline was “vital.”
“We believe that continued diplomatic engagement with all parties to the Afghanistan conflict, including women and civil society groups, as well as carefully tailored assistance programs, are essential to the success of the peace process,” the lawmakers said. “But it is long past time for the United States to end its military role in a complex conflict that predates our initial invasion two decades ago.”
The U.S. presence in Afghanistan dates back to the U.S. invasion Oct. 7, 2001 – less than a month after the deadly terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. There are currently an estimated 3,500 American troops as well as 7,000 NATO and allied troops who depend on U.S. forces for logistics and protection.
For Marvin Weinbaum, the director of Afghanistan and Pakistan Studies at the Middle East Institute, a dignified American departure would entail an interim arrangement where the United States could justify leaving by saying it did all it could for Afghanistan and finding a permanent solution is up to that nation’s government.
“We won’t wipe our hands of Afghanistan, but certainly militarily, we will find no reason to be there,” Weinbaum told Capital News Service.
The main concern for Afghanistan is the possibility of a civil war if U.S. and NATO forces pull out without a peace deal, as the Taliban has already threatened to target those troops if the withdrawal deadline is missed.
Weinbaum said the current initiative is based on a lot of moving parts and it will be a difficult process to bring them together.
“The hard part comes when the Taliban and the Afghans, again, even if it’s not specifically the government, have to sit down and negotiate the terms of an interim government if they could never agree on a constitution for a permanent government,” he said.
The Afghanistan Study Group, established by Congress in 2019, issued a Feb. 3 report that urged the Biden administration to seek an extension of the withdrawal deadline.
The peace talks “will not succeed as long as the United States declares itself willing to withdraw its forces regardless of how much or how little progress is made during the negotiations,” the bipartisan group warned.
“The United States is in a position where effective diplomacy, modest continuing aid levels, and strong coordination across civilian and military lines of effort against a clear and unified objective can create the conditions for a responsible exit from Afghanistan that does not endanger our national security,” the group’s report said. “The opportunities presented by this position must be exhausted before more radical alternatives are considered.”
Biden is most likely to seek a change in the troop withdrawal date and ask other nations in the region, including China and Pakistan, to convince the Taliban to agree, Max Boot, senior fellow for national security studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in February.
“If the Taliban doesn’t agree to an extension (the odds are that it won’t), the Biden administration will be left with the unpalatable choices of pulling out anyway – risking a collapse of the Afghan state – or remaining embroiled in the ‘forever war,’” Boot said.
Weinbaum believes the U.S. withdrawal and removal of supporting airpower would deal a devastating blow to the Afghan security forces.
“We give both technical support and psychological support,” he said. “So, I would anticipate the unraveling of the security forces over a not too long period of time.”
But Boot said that if the cycle of violence by the Taliban resumed but it failed to achieve its objectives, “it could eventually return to the negotiating table.”
Biden faces pressure to address May 1 Afghanistan withdrawal deadline