Why did US attack afghanistan?
HISTORY OF AFGHANISTAN WAR:-
October 15, 1999
An Al-Qaeda and Taliban Nexus
The United Nations Security Council adopts Resolution 1267, developing the so-known as al-Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Committee, which hyperlinks the two organizations as terrorist entities and imposes sanctions on their investment, tour, and arms shipments. The UN move follows a period of ascendancy for al-Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin Laden, who guided the phobia group from Afghanistan and Peshawar, Pakistan, inside the past due 1980s, to Sudan in 1991, and back to Afghanistan within the mid-Nineteen Nineties. The Taliban, which rose from the ashes of Afghanistan’s submit-Soviet civil conflict, affords al-Qaeda sanctuary for operations.
September 9, 2001
A Northern Alliance Assassination
Ahmad Shah Massoud, commander of the Northern Alliance, an anti-Taliban coalition, is assassinated by al-Qaeda operatives. The killing of Massoud, a grasp of guerilla struggle called the Lion of the Panjshir, deals a severe blow to the anti-Taliban resistance. Terrorism specialists consider his assassination confident Osama bin Laden protection by means of the Taliban after the Sep 11 assaults. Expert Peter Bergen later calls Massoud’s assassination “the curtain raiser for the attacks on New York City and Washington, DC.”
9/11, 2001
Terrorists Strike the USA
Al-Qaeda operatives hijack 4 business airliners, crashing them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, DC. A fourth plane crashes in a subject in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Close to three thousand human beings die inside the attacks. Although Afghanistan is the base for al-Qaeda, none of the nineteen hijackers are Afghan nationals. Mohammed Atta, an Egyptian, led the organization, and fifteen of the hijackers originated from Saudi Arabia. President George W. Bush vows to “win the warfare towards terrorism,” and later zeros in on al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan. Bush in the end calls on the Taliban regime to “deliver to the United States government all the leaders of al-Qaeda who disguise on your land,” or proportion in their destiny.
September 18, 2001
A War Footing
President George W. Bush symptoms into regulation a joint decision authorizing using force towards those chargeable for attacking the US on Sep 11. This joint decision will later be cited by way of the Bush administration as felony intent for its decision to take sweeping measures to combat terrorism, from invading Afghanistan, to eavesdropping on U.S. Residents with out a courtroom order, to status up the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
October 7, 2001
The Opening Salvo
The U.S. Military, with British support, begins a bombing campaign against Taliban forces, formally launching Operation Enduring Freedom. Canada, Australia, Germany, and France pledge future support. The struggle’s early phase [PDF] especially entails U.S. Air strikes on al-Qaeda and Taliban forces which are assisted via a partnership of about one thousand U.S. Unique forces, the Northern Alliance, and ethnic Pashtun anti-Taliban forces. The first wave of conventional ground forces arrives twelve days later. Most of the ground combat is among the Taliban and its Afghan warring parties.
November 2001
The Taliban in Retreat
The Taliban regime unravels rapidly after its loss at Mazar-e-Sharif on November nine, 2001, to forces dependable to Abdul Rashid Dostum, an ethnic Uzbek army leader. Over the subsequent week Taliban strongholds disintegrate after coalition and Northern Alliance offensives on Taloqan (eleven/eleven), Bamiyan (eleven/11), Herat (11/12), Kabul (11/thirteen), and Jalalabad (11/14). On November 14, 2001, the UN Security Council passes Resolution 1378, calling for a “principal function” for the United Nations in setting up a transitional administration and inviting member states to send peacekeeping forces to sell stability and resource shipping.
December 2001
Bin Laden Escapes
After tracking al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden to the nicely-geared up Tora Bora cave complicated southeast of Kabul, Afghan militias have interaction in a fierce two-week conflict (December three to 17) with al-Qaeda militants. It results in some hundred deaths and the eventual escape of bin Laden, who's idea to have left for Pakistan on horseback on December sixteen—only a day before Afghan forces capture twenty of his closing guys. Despite intelligence pointing to bin Laden’s presence in Tora Bora, U.S. Forces do no longer lead the assault, which is done through a ragtag Afghan contingent led through Hazrat Ali, Haji Zaman, and Haji Zahir. Some critics will later query why U.S. Forces did now not take a greater assertive role in the engagement.
December five, 2001
An Interim Government
After the autumn of Kabul in November 2001, the United Nations invitations foremost Afghan factions, maximum prominently the Northern Alliance and a group led by using the former king (but not the Taliban), to a convention in Bonn, Germany. On December 5, 2001, the factions signal the Bonn Agreement, recommended through UN Security Council Resolution 1383. The agreement, reportedly reached with enormous Iranian diplomatic assist because of Iran’s guide for the Northern Alliance faction, installs Hamid Karzai as interim management head, and creates an international peacekeeping pressure to hold security in Kabul. The Bonn Agreement is followed by way of UN Security Council Resolution 1386 on December 20, which establishes the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF.
December nine, 2001
The Taliban Collapses
The give up of the Taliban regime is generally tied to this date, when the Taliban give up Kandahar [PDF] and Taliban chief Mullah Omar flees the city, leaving it below tribal law administered by means of Pashtun leaders. Despite the professional fall of the Taliban, however, al-Qaeda leaders keep to cover out in the mountains.
March 2002
Mixed Signals
Operation Anaconda, the first important ground attack and the biggest operation for the reason that Tora Bora, is launched in opposition to an envisioned 8 hundred al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters within the Shah-i-Kot Valley south of the town of Gardez (Paktia Province). Nearly thousand U.S. And 1000 Afghan troops war the militants. Despite the operation’s length, but, Anaconda does now not represent a broadening of the struggle effort. Instead, Pentagon planners start shifting army and intelligence sources away from Afghanistan inside the course of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, that's increasingly stated as a chief U.S. Danger within the “conflict on terror.”
April 17, 2002
Reconstructing Afghanistan
President George W. Bush requires the reconstruction of Afghanistan in a speech on the Virginia Military Institute. “By supporting to construct an Afghanistan that is unfastened from this evil and is a higher location in which to live, we are running in the exceptional traditions of George Marshall,” he says, evoking the post-World War II Marshall Plan that revived Western Europe. But the USA and the global network do not come close to Marshall Plan-like reconstruction spending for Afghanistan. The U.S. Congress appropriates over $38 billion in humanitarian and reconstruction help to Afghanistan from 2001 to 2009.
June 2002
Transitional Government Named
Hamid Karzai, chairman of Afghanistan’s interim administration when you consider that December 2001, is picked to head the usa’s transitional government. His selection comes at some point of an emergency loya jirga assembled in Kabul, attended through 1,550 delegates (inclusive of about 2 hundred girls) from Afghanistan’s 364 districts. Karzai, leader of the effective Popalzai tribe of Durrani Pashtuns, returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan after the September 11 attacks to organize Pashtun resistance to the Taliban. Some observers allege Karzai tolerates corruption by using participants of his clan and his government. The Northern Alliance, ruled by way of ethnic Tajiks, fails in its effort to set up a high ministership, but does achieve checking presidential powers by way of assigning predominant government to the elected parliament, which include the energy to veto senior authentic nominees and to question a president.
November 2002
Establishing a Reconstruction Model
The U.S. Army creates a civil affairs framework to coordinate redevelopment with UN and nongovernmental organizations and to increase the authority of the Kabul authorities. These so-called provincial reconstruction groups, or PRTs, are stood up first in Gardez in November, followed with the aid of Bamiyan, Kunduz, Mazar-e-Sharif, Kandahar, and Herat. Command for character PRTs is subsequently handed over to NATO states. While credited with enhancing protection for aid companies, the version is not universally praised. Concern mounts that the PRT system lacks important controlling authority, is disorganized, and creates what a U.S. Institute of Peace file calls “an advert hoc technique” to protection and development. Such criticism grows beyond the PRT application and turns into a commonplace subject inside the NATO conflict attempt, as a maze of ìnational caveatsî restricts the sports of member forces. Critics contend this boundaries the coalition’s effectiveness.
May 1, 2003
‘Major Combat’ Over
During a briefing with newshounds in Kabul, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declares an cease to “important fight.” The assertion coincides with President George W. Bush’s “challenge performed” declaration of an give up to combating in Iraq. Rumsfeld says President Bush, U.S. Central Command Chief Gen. Tommy Franks, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai “have concluded that we're at a point in which we honestly have moved from principal fight hobby to a period of stability and stabilization and reconstruction and sports.” There are handiest eight thousand U.S. Soldiers stationed in Afghanistan. It is anticipated that the transition from combat to reconstruction will open the door for many resource businesses, mainly European agencies, that had balked at sending troops, supplies, or other assistance.
August 8, 2003
An International Mission
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) assumes manage of worldwide safety forces (ISAF) in Afghanistan, increasing NATO/ISAF’s role across the u . S .. It is NATO’s first operational commitment outside of Europe. Originally tasked with securing Kabul and its surrounding areas, NATO expands in September 2005, July 2006, and October 2006. The wide variety of ISAF troops grows consequently, from an preliminary five thousand to round sixty-5 thousand troops from 40-two nations, inclusive of all twenty-8 NATO member states. In 2006, ISAF assumes command of the international army forces in japanese Afghanistan from the U.S.-led coalition, and additionally turns into more concerned in in depth combat operations in southern Afghanistan.
January 2004
A Constitution for Afghanistan
An meeting of 502 Afghan delegates is of the same opinion on a charter for Afghanistan, creating a robust presidential device supposed to unite the country’s various ethnic corporations. The act is seen as a superb step towards democracy. “Afghans have seized the possibility supplied by means of the United States and its worldwide partners to put the inspiration for democratic establishments and provide a framework for country wide elections,” broadcasts U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad.
October 9, 2004
A New President for Afghanistan
In historic countrywide voting, Karzai turns into the first democratically elected head of Afghanistan. Voters turn out in excessive numbers notwithstanding threats of violence and intimidation. Karzai wins with 55 percent of the vote, while his closest rival, former training minister Younis Qanooni, polls sixteen percentage. Karzai’s election victory is marred by way of accusations of fraud by way of his fighters and by using the kidnapping of three foreign UN election people by means of a militant group. But the election is nonetheless hailed as a victory for the fragile country; Afghans had not long gone to the polls considering 1969, once they cast ballots in parliamentary elections throughout the reign of King Mohammed Zahir Shah.
October 29, 2004
Bin Laden Surfaces
Signaling the continual challenges going through the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden releases a videotaped message three weeks after the united states of america’s presidential election and simply days before the U.S. Polls in which George W. Bush will win reelection. In feedback aired at the Arab tv community Al Jazeera, bin Laden name callings the Bush administration and takes responsibility for the attacks of 9-11, 2001. “We want to restore freedom to our country, just as you lay waste to our country,” bin Laden says.
May 23, 2005
An Enduring U.S. Commitment
Afghan president Hamid Karzai and U.S. President George W. Bush problem a joint assertion that announces their respective countries strategic companions. The assertion gives U.S. Forces get right of entry to to Afghan army facilities to prosecute “the struggle towards worldwide terror and the struggle against violent extremism.” The alliance’s goal, the agreement says, is to “toughen U.S.-Afghan ties and help make certain Afghanistan’s lengthy-time period safety, democracy, and prosperity.” Moreover, the settlement calls for Washington to “help arrange, educate, equip, and maintain Afghan security forces as Afghanistan develops the ability to undertake this obligation,” and to hold to rebuild the u . S . A .’s economic system and political democracy.
September 18, 2005
Democracy and Afghanistan
More than six million Afghans flip out to vote for the Wolesi Jirga (Council of People), the Meshrano Jirga (Council of Elders), and neighborhood councils. Considered the most democratic elections ever in Afghanistan, almost 1/2 those casting ballots are girls, considered as a sign of political development in a quite patriarchal and conservative society. Sixty-eight out of 249 seats are set apart for lady individuals of Afghanistan’s decrease residence of parliament and 23 out of 102 are reserved inside the top house.
July 2006
A Bloody Resurgence
Violence will increase across the u . S . A . At some point of the summer time months, with intense fighting erupting within the south in July. The range of suicide attacks quintuples from 27 in 2005 to 139 in 2006, while remotely detonated bombings more than double, to at least one,677. Despite a string of recent election successes, a few experts blame a faltering critical authorities for the spike in attacks. “As with most insurgencies, the vital precondition [to the Afghan insurgency] is the fall apart of governance,” says Afghanistan professional Seth G. Jones. Jones and other specialists point to the many Afghans who lack basic offerings, the government’s difficultly putting in place its police forces, and the lack of worldwide forces to help with security.
November 2006
Cracks in the Coalition
At the NATO summit in Riga, rifts emerge amongst member states on troop commitments to Afghanistan. NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer units a target of 2008 for the Afghan National Army to start to take manage of safety. “I might hope that by way of 2008 we are able to have made extensive development,” he says, “with a extra stable political architecture in area, and with a robust interface between NATO and the civilian groups and effective, relied on Afghan safety forces gradually taking manage.” Leaders of the twenty-six countries conform to cast off some country wide regulations on how, while, and where forces may be used. But friction continues. With violence against nongovernmental useful resource people increasing, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates criticizes NATO nations in late 2007 for no longer sending greater infantrymen. “Our development in Afghanistan is actual however it's far fragile,” Gates says. “At this time, many allies are unwilling to share the risks, commit the sources, and observe via on collective commitments to this challenge and to each different. As a end result, we danger allowing what has been done in Afghanistan to slip away.”
May 2007
A Taliban Commander Falls
A infamous Taliban military commander, Mullah Dadullah, is killed in a joint operation by way of Afghan, U.S., and NATO forces inside the south of Afghanistan. Dadullah is assumed to were a pacesetter of guerrilla forces inside the battle in Helmand Province, deploying suicide bombers and ordering the kidnapping of Westerners. He as soon as advised the BBC that hundreds of suicide bombers awaited his command to release an offensive against foreign.
August 22, 2008
Collateral Killings Mount
Afghan and UN investigations discover that errant hearth from a U.S. Gunship killed dozens of Afghan civilians in the Shindand District of western Herat Province, drawing condemnation from President Hamid Karzai and bolstering Taliban claims that coalition forces are not able to shield the populace. U.S. Navy officers dispute the demise toll in this incident as well as claims that a separate incident in Farah Province left as many as 140 civilians dead. After being named top U.S. Commander in Afghanistan in mid-2009, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal orders an overhaul of U.S. Air strike strategies. “We must keep away from the trap of triumphing tactical victories, however struggling strategic defeats, by way of inflicting civilian casualties or immoderate harm and hence alienating the people,” the overall writes.
February 17, 2009
Obama Recommits to Afghanistan
New U.S. President Barack Obama proclaims plans to send seventeen thousand extra troops to the struggle zone. Obama reaffirms marketing campaign statements that Afghanistan is the extra crucial U.S. The front in opposition to terrorist forces. He says america will keep on with a timetable to attract down most fight forces from Iraq via the end of 2011. As of January 2009 the Pentagon has thirty-seven thousand troops in Afghanistan, kind of divided among U.S. And NATO commands. Reinforcements consciousness on countering a “resurgent” Taliban and stemming the float of overseas fighters over the Afghan-Pakistan border within the south. Speaking at the troop increase, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates describes the unique challenge in Afghanistan as “too large” and requires establishing confined dreams consisting of preventing and proscribing terrorist secure havens.
March 27, 2009
A New American Strategy
President Obama proclaims a brand new method for the warfare effort, linking success in Afghanistan to a stable Pakistan. The middle purpose of the strategy, as mentioned in an interagency white paper, is “to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda and its secure havens in Pakistan, and to prevent their return to Pakistan or Afghanistan.” The strategy urges the passage of extended resource to Pakistan and a strict widespread of measuring development in preventing al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Plans additionally call for the deployment of an extra four thousand infantrymen to help train the Afghan navy and police force. President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan welcomes the strategy, stating that the plan will carry Afghanistan and the global network in the direction of fulfillment.
April 2009
A Different Call to NATO
Senior U.S. Military officers and commanders, altering direction from the Bush administration, name on NATO international locations to deliver non-navy assets to Afghanistan. Officials pressure the need for NATO participants to step up in building Afghan civil society, together with offering resources for provincial reconstruction teams, or PRTs. A two-day NATO summit in early April ends with a promise by way of NATO countries to send an extra 5 thousand troops to teach the Afghan army and police pressure, and to offer protection for the u . S .’s August presidential election.
May eleven, 2009
Command Change
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates replaces the pinnacle U.S. Commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David D. McKiernan, with counterinsurgency and special operations guru Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal. McKiernan’s removal comes 11 months after he assumed command of NATO forces in Afghanistan. Gates says the Pentagon desires “clean questioning” and “clean eyes” at the Afghanistan warfare at a time when many analysts say operations there are spiraling out of manage. Reports imply that the appointment of McChrystal is intended to bring a extra “competitive and modern” method to the Afghan warfare attempt in music with a extra focused counterinsurgency approach.
July 2009
New Strategy, Old Battles
U.S. Marines launch a major offensive in southern Afghanistan, representing a chief check for the U.S. Navy’s new counterinsurgency approach. The offensive, regarding 4 thousand Marines, is released in response to a growing Taliban insurgency within the us of a’s southern provinces, in particular Helmand Province. The operation specializes in restoring government services, bolstering nearby police forces, and defensive civilians from Taliban incursion. By August 2009 U.S. Forces are to wide variety among sixty thousand and sixty-eight thousand.
November 2009
Afghan Presidential Election
After more than two months of uncertainty following a disputed presidential election on August 20, President Hamid Karzai wins another time period. The August 20 election, which pitted Karzai in opposition to top contenders Abdullah Abdullah and Ashraf Ghani, was marred with the aid of fraud allegations. An research via the UN-subsidized Electoral Complaints Commission reveals Karzai gained only forty nine.Sixty seven percent of the vote, under the 50 percentage-plus-one threshold had to avoid a runoff. Under worldwide stress, Karzai consents to a runoff vote on November 7. But every week earlier than the runoff, Karzai’s important rival Abdullah pulls out, and Karzai is declared the winner. Concerns over Karzai’s legitimacy grow, and the United States and other international partners call for improved governance. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ties all destiny civilian resource to greater efforts via the Karzai administration to fight corruption.
December 1, 2009
Obama’s Afghan Surge
Nine months after renewing the U.S. Commitment to the Afghan struggle attempt, President Obama pronounces a first-rate escalation of the U.S. Task. In a nationally televised speech, the president commits an extra thirty thousand forces to the combat, on top of the sixty-8 thousand in region. These forces, Obama says, “will increase our ability to train ready Afghan Security Forces, and to associate with them so that greater Afghans can get into the fight. And they'll help create the situations for the US to transfer responsibility to the Afghans.” For the primary time within the 8-12 months war attempt, a time body is put on the U.S. Navy presence, as Obama sets July 2011 as the begin of a troop drawdown. But the president does no longer element how long a drawdown will take. Obama says U.S. Country wide hobbies are related to achievement within the Afghan struggle attempt, and argues that this brief surge will pressure Afghan political and army establishments to expect obligation for their personal affairs.
June 23, 2010
Gen. McChrystal Relieved from Afghan Command
Gen. Stanley McChrystal is relieved of his submit as commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, following a controversial Rolling Stone article in which he and his aides have been quoted criticizing the administration. President Barack Obama nominates Gen. David Petraeus, head of the army’s Central Command and architect of the 2007 Iraq surge, to replace McChrystal. The alternate in command comes at a crucial time in the conflict, as additional surge forces are scheduled to arrive in advance of a crucial operation in Kandahar. Obama emphasizes that his recognition of McChrystal’s resignation does no longer replicate confrontation over the counterinsurgency method he had helped shape. “We are in complete agreement approximately our method,” says Obama. “This is a exchange in personnel, not a change in coverage.”
November 2010
Timetable for Security Transition
At a summit in Lisbon, NATO member countries sign a assertion agreeing handy over complete responsibility for safety in Afghanistan to Afghan forces by means of the stop of 2014. The transition procedure is set to begin in July 2011, with local protection forces taking up manage in especially stable provinces and towns. The initial handover is to coincide with the begin of a drawdown within the a hundred thousand-robust contingent of U.S. Troops deployed in Afghanistan, although the wide variety of U.S. Soldiers leaving is predicted to be a token quantity. But many in Afghanistan and within the West, inclusive of participants of the Afghan parliament, are involved approximately the capability of countrywide forces to take over from global troops.
May 1, 2011
Osama bin Laden Killed
On May 1, 2011, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, liable for the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington, is killed by way of U.S. Forces in Pakistan. The loss of life of America’s primary target for a struggle that started out ten years in the past fuels the long-simmering debate about persevering with the Afghanistan war. As President Obama prepares to announce the withdrawal of a few or all of the thirty thousand surge troops in July, congressional lawmakers increasingly more name for a hastened drawdown of U.S. Troops, although some analysts argue for a sustained navy engagement. Meanwhile, anti-Pakistan rhetoric grows in Afghanistan, where officials have long blamed terrorist safe havens in Pakistan for violence in Afghanistan. Afghan President Hamid Karzai reiterates that international forces must recognition their army efforts across the border in Pakistan.
June 22, 2011
Obama Announces Troop Drawdown
President Obama outlines a plan to withdraw thirty-three thousand troops by means of the summer of 2012—the surge troops despatched in December 2009—consisting of ten thousand with the aid of the end of 2011. Polls show a file quantity of Americans do not aid the struggle, and Obama faces stress from lawmakers, specifically Democrats, to sizably lessen U.S. Forces in Afghanistan. After the surge troops depart, an anticipated seventy thousand U.S. Troops are scheduled to live through as a minimum 2014. Obama confirms that the U.S. Is holding initial peace talks with the Taliban management. With reconciliation in thoughts, the UN Security Council days in advance splits a sanctions listing between contributors of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, making it easier to add and do away with people and entites.
October 7, 2011
Ten Years of War
The U.S. Struggle in Afghanistan marks its 10th anniversary, with approximately hundred thousand U.S. Troops deployed in a counterinsurgency function, primarily in southern and japanese areas. President Barack Obama plans to withdraw all fight troops by 2014, however severe doubts continue to be approximately the Afghan government’s potential to relaxed the u . S .. Amid a resilient insurgency, U.S. Goals in Afghanistan remain uncertain and terrorist secure havens in Pakistan maintain to undermine U.S. Efforts. A decade in, the war’s tolls include 1,800 U.S. Troop casualties and $444 billion in spending. The charges have eroded U.S. Public help, with a international economic downturn, a 9.1 percent unemployment fee, and a $1.Three trillion annual price range deficit. While there are military gains, hopes for a deal with the Taliban to assist wind down the conflict continue to be riddled with setbacks. President Karzai suspends the talks following the September 20 assassination of Burhanuddin Rabbani, the government’s chief negotiator, which Afghan officers blame on the Pakistan-primarily based Haqqani network.
December five, 2011
Bonn Conference
Ten years after the first international convention that discussed Afghanistan’s political destiny, dozens of countries and agencies meet once more in Bonn, Germany, to devise a roadmap of cooperation beyond the international troop withdrawal in 2014. Afghan President Hamid Karzai says the usa would require $10 billion annually over the following decade to shore up security and reconstruction, and commits to tackling corruption in exchange for continued international help. The conference fails to obtain its goals—to lay down a blueprint for Afghanistan's transition to a self-maintaining and relaxed authorities—as the insurgency keeps to rage, and Pakistan, a essential participant, refuses to wait.
March 2012
Taliban Cancels Talks; U.S.-Afghan Tensions Flare
In January, the Taliban moves a deal to open an workplace in Qatar, a circulate toward peace talks that the United States sees as a crucial part of a political agreement to make certain a strong Afghanistan. But two months later, the Taliban suspends initial talks, accusing Washington of reneging on guarantees to take meaningful steps closer to a prisoner switch. In February, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta proclaims the Pentagon’s plan to conclude fight missions by means of as early as mid-2013 and shift to a in most cases security assistance role in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, numerous incidents function blows to the international challenge, including an unintended burning of Qurans via U.S. Troops and allegations that a U.S. Soldier murdered at least 16 Afghan villagers. President Hamid Karzai demands that foreign troops be withdrawn from village outposts and restrained to army bases, which analysts say could significantly accelerate the tempo of transition from NATO to Afghan manipulate.
June 2013
Afghan Security Takeover Completed
Afghan forces take the lead in security obligation national as NATO fingers over control of the ultimate ninety-five districts. The U.S.-led coalition’s focus shifts to navy training and unique operations-pushed counterterrorism. The handover happens at the equal day because the assertion that Taliban and U.S. Officials will resume talks in Doha, Qatar, where the Taliban has just opened an office. President Hamid Karzai, believing the office will confer legitimacy at the insurgent organization and function a diplomatic outpost, suspends negotiations with the USA. With its mandate expiring in December 2014, the USA have to negotiate a bilateral protection agreement with the Karzai authorities to hold a navy presence.
May 27, 2014
Obama Announces U.S. Troop Withdrawal
President Barack Obama pronounces a timetable for taking flight maximum U.S. Forces from Afghanistan via the give up of 2016. The first segment of his plan calls for nine,800 U.S. Troops to stay after the fight task concludes on the stop of 2014, restrained to schooling Afghan forces and engaging in operations against “the remnants of al-Qaeda.” Obama says the drawdown will loose assets for counterterrorism priorities someplace else. Some analysts factor to the insurgency’s resilience and question the plan’s rigidity. Both applicants vying to be triumphant President Hamid Karzai have promised to sign the safety agreement that may be a prerequisite of any publish-2014 U.S. Troop presence.
September 21, 2014
Ghani and Abdullah Agree to Unity Government
Ashraf Ghani, the newly elected president, signs a power-sharing agreement together with his chief opponent, Abdullah Abdullah, who had mobilized thousands of protestors as he challenged the vote casting effects. The agreement, brokered after in depth diplomacy through U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, establishes the function of chief govt officer for Abdullah. While the agreement staves off civil unrest, it ushers in protracted government disorder as Ghani and Abdullah tussle over their respective prerogatives, inclusive of appointments to protection posts, at a time while the Taliban are making gains in the nation-state. Ghani, a former World Bank specialist, is a Pashtun from the country’s south, like Karzai, however is visible by means of the Obama administration as a welcome alternate. Karzai had railed against civilian casualties in the U.S. Struggle attempt and became visible as fostering public corruption.
April 13, 2017
U.S. Attacks Islamic State Redoubt
The United States drops its most effective non-nuclear bomb on suspected self-proclaimed Islamic State militants at a cave complicated in jap Nangarhar Province. The weapon, recognized colloquially as “the mom of all bombs,” comes as newly elected President Donald Trump delegates choice-making authorities to commanders, consisting of the opportunity of adding several thousand U.S. Troops to the almost nine thousand already deployed there. (There are about as many U.S. Contractors as well.) The bombing casts a highlight at the emergence of the Islamic State in Afghanistan. At the identical time, the Taliban appears to be as strong as ever, and the U.S. Army describes the warfare as a stalemate. Kabul experiences suicide bombings [PDF] on a scale in no way earlier than visible, at the same time as the Taliban manage or contest extra than a third [PDF] of the country. U.S. Marines are once more dispatched to Helmand Province.
August 21, 2017
Trump Signals Prolonged Afghan War
President Trump outlines his Afghanistan coverage in an address to troops in Arlington, VA, announcing that though his “authentic intuition turned into to tug out,” he's going to as a substitute press in advance with an open-ended army dedication to prevent the emergence of “a vacuum for terrorists.” Differentiating his coverage from Obama’s, Trump says decisions about withdrawal could be primarily based on “situations at the floor,” in preference to arbitrary timelines. He invitations India to play a extra position in rebuilding Afghanistan at the same time as castigating Pakistan for harboring insurgents. He additionally pledges to loosen regulations on fight whilst the United Nations reviews an uptick [PDF] in civilian casualties due to Afghan and coalition air moves. A political settlement with the Taliban, Trump says, is a ways off.
January 2018
Taliban Launches Major Attacks Amid U.S. Escalation
The Taliban perform a series of ambitious terror attacks in Kabul that kill greater than one hundred fifteen humans amid a broader upsurge in violence. The assaults come as the Trump management implements its Afghanistan plan, deploying troops across rural Afghanistan to recommend Afghan brigades and launching air strikes against opium labs to try and decimate the Taliban’s finances. The management also cuts off protection help worth billions of greenbacks to Pakistan for what President Trump referred to as its “lies and deceit” in harboring Taliban militants. Critics of the National Unity Government say domestic politics—extensively a showdown with a provincial governor—have distracted President Ghani from protection.
February 2019
U.S.-Taliban Peace Talks Progress
Negotiations between the USA and the Taliban in Doha input their highest degree yet, constructing on momentum that started out in late 2018. The talks among U.S. Unique envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and top Taliban respectable Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar center on the United States taking flight its troops from Afghanistan in exchange for the Taliban pledging to block international terrorist businesses from running on Afghan soil. The ramped-up international relations follows alerts that President Trump plans to pull out seven thousand troops, approximately half the overall U.S. Deployment. Khalilzad says the United States will insist that the Taliban agree to take part in an intra-Afghan communicate on the united states’s political shape, as well as a cease-fire. It is uncertain whether or not Trump will situation the troop withdrawal on those phrases.
Troops stand close to a blue pickup truck that is battered by way of an explosion and surrounded through particles.
September 7, 2019
Trump Calls Off Peace Talks
President Trump all at once breaks off peace talks a week after top U.S. Negotiator Khalilzad announced that an agreement had been reached “in principle” with Taliban leaders. In a tweet, Trump says he canceled a secret meeting with the Taliban and Afghan President Ghani at Camp David after a U.S. Soldier was killed in a Taliban attack. The Taliban says it’s “committed to continuing negotiations,” however warns that the cancellation will motive an growth within the wide variety of deaths.
February 29, 2020
U.S., Taliban Sign Deal on Path to Peace
U.S. Envoy Khalilzad and the Taliban’s Baradar sign an settlement [PDF] that paves the way for a tremendous drawdown of U.S. Troops in Afghanistan and consists of guarantees from the Taliban that the country will no longer be used for terrorist activities. The deal says intra-Afghan negotiations must start the following month, but Afghan President Ghani says the Taliban ought to meet his government’s very own situations earlier than it enters talks. The U.S.-Taliban deal doesn’t call for a right away give up-fireplace, and inside the days after its signing, Taliban combatants carry out dozens of attacks on Afghan security forces. U.S. Forces respond with an air strike towards the Taliban in the southern province of Helmand.
September 12, 2020
Intra-Afghan Peace Talks Begin
Representatives of the Taliban and of the Afghan government and civil society meet face to face for the first time in Doha, Qatar, after almost twenty years of struggle. The direct negotiations, which were delayed for months over a prisoner switch proposed in the earlier U.S.-Taliban deal, start after the Afghan government completes the release of five thousand Taliban prisoners. During beginning feedback, each facets explicit eagerness to bring peace to Afghanistan and establish a framework for Afghan society after U.S. Troops withdraw. The government pushes for a stop-fire, even as the Taliban reiterates its call for the country to be ruled via an Islamic gadget.
November 17, 2020
U.S. Announces Troop Withdrawal
Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Christopher C. Miller declares plans to halve the number of troops in Afghanistan to 2,500 by mid-January, days earlier than President-Elect Joe Biden might be inaugurated. Thousands of troops had already been pulled out following an agreement with the Taliban in February, transferring closer to enjoyable President Trump’s marketing campaign promise to stop the so-referred to as for all time wars. The statement comes as negotiations among the Afghan authorities and the Taliban are deadlocked and the militant group keeps to launch deadly attacks. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warns that withdrawing troops too early may want to allow Afghanistan to turn out to be a haven for terrorists and the Islamic State to rebuild its caliphate.
April 14, 2021
Biden Decides on Complete U.S. Withdrawal via 9-11
President Biden publicizes that the US will now not meet the deadline set underneath the U.S.-Taliban agreement to withdraw all troops with the aid of May 1 and as an alternative releases a plan for a full withdrawal with the aid of September 11, 2021. “It’s time to cease America’s longest battle,” he says. The last three,500 troops in Afghanistan may be withdrawn regardless of whether or not progress is made in intra-Afghan peace talks or the Taliban reduces its assaults on Afghan security forces and residents. NATO troops in Afghanistan will also leave. Biden says Washington will retain to help Afghan security forces and assist the peace method. The Taliban says it will not participate in “any conference” on Afghanistan’s destiny till all overseas troops depart