Tag: Afghanistan

Trump’s photo op play: Facing impeachment, the president strives to look hard at work

Washington Post logoPALM BEACH, Fla. — As Democrats in Congress push to impeach him, President Trump has toured a manufacturing plant in Texas, boasted about economic gains and signed numerous bills. He served turkey to U.S. troops in Afghanistan on Thanksgiving and grieved with the families of fallen service members at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

And next week, Trump is scheduled to jet to London to meet with European allies and be received at Buckingham Palace by Queen Elizabeth II.

Sure, Trump has been consumed by the impeachment proceedings, popping off daily, if not hourly, about what he dubs a “hoax.” But he and his aides also have staged photo opportunities and public events designed to showcase the president on the job — a strategy one year out from the election to convince the American people that he is hard at work for them at the same time that Democrats are trying to remove him from office.

View the complete November 30 article by Philip Rucker on The Washington Post website here.

In Afghanistan, Trump Creates Confusion Over U.S. Policy on Taliban

New York Times logoThe president said stalled talks with the militant group were back on and called for a cease-fire — something his negotiators had deemed unrealistic.

KABUL, Afghanistan — After abruptly axing nearly a year of delicate peace talks with the Taliban in September, President Trump put the negotiations back on the front-burner this week in a similarly jolting fashion by seeming to demand a cease-fire that his negotiators had long concluded was overly ambitious.

Despite a sense of relief at the prospect of resuming talks to end the 18-year conflict, Western diplomats and Taliban leaders were scrambling to figure out whether Mr. Trump had suddenly moved the goal posts for negotiations.

They were particularly confused by his remarks, made during an unannounced Thanksgiving visit to Afghanistan, that the United States was once again meeting with the Taliban to discuss a deal, but that “we’re saying it has to be a cease-fire.”

View the complete November 29 article by Mujib Mashal on The New York Times website here.

Pelosi and congressional delegation make unannounced trip to Afghanistan in outreach to allies after Trump’s decision on Syria

Washington Post logoHouse Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) led an unannounced congressional visit to Afghanistan and Jordan over the weekend, highlighting her sharp disagreement with President Trump over his abrupt removal of U.S. troops from northern Syria and Turkey’s subsequent attacks on Kurdish enclaves.

In Afghanistan, the delegation met with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, chief executive Abdullah Abdullah, Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper, top U.S. military commanders and diplomats, senior Afghan government officials and civil society leaders. The delegation also traveled to Camp Morehead to meet with Resolute Support Mission troops.  

“Our delegation received briefings from Ambassador John Bass and other top diplomats on reconciliation efforts with the Taliban, which has been responsible for violent attacks in Afghanistan. We also heard more about the still-pending status of results from the Afghanistan presidential election in September, which we all hope will be available soon,” Pelosi said in a statement Sunday night.

View the complete October 20 article by Steve Hendrix on The Washington Post website here.

Bolton sidelined from Afghanistan policy as his standing with Trump falters

Washington Post logoAs the president’s top aides prepared for a high-stakes meeting on the future of Afghanistan earlier this month, one senior official was not on the original invite list: national security adviser John Bolton.

The attendance of the top security aide would normally be critical, but the omission was no mistake, senior U.S. officials said. Bolton, who has long advocated an expansive military presence around the world, has become a staunch internal foe of an emerging peace deal aimed at ending America’s longest war, the officials said.

His opposition to the diplomatic effort in Afghanistan has irritated President Trump, these officials said, and led aides to leave the National Security Council out of sensitive discussions about the agreement.

View the complete August 30 article by John Hudson and Josh Dawsey on The Washington Post website here.

Trump’s bizarre history lesson on the Soviet Union, Russia and Afghanistan

During a Cabinet meeting Jan. 2, President Trump spoke about foreign involvement in Afghanistan and his decision to withdraw U.S. troops. (The Washington Post)

President Trump said a lot of strange, untrue things after Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting. But the most bizarre snippet might have been his “history” lesson on the Soviet Union.

Trump, who has assured us he is the foremost expert on many topics for which he has no formal education or training, gave his own version of why the USSR collapsed. And to be clear, it is his own version.

Here’s what he said:

“Russia used to be the Soviet Union. Afghanistan made it Russia, because they went bankrupt fighting in Afghanistan. Russia. … The reason Russia was in Afghanistan was because terrorists were going into Russia. They were right to be there. The problem is, it was a tough fight. And literally they went bankrupt; they went into being called Russia again, as opposed to the Soviet Union. You know, a lot of these places you’re reading about now are no longer part of Russia, because of Afghanistan.”