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Subscribe to RSSOn the one-year anniversary of the death of Osama bin Laden, President Obama made an unannounced visit to Afghanistan and said his goal "to defeat al-Qaida and deny it a chance to rebuild is now within our reach." NBC's Atia Abawi reports.
Wrapping up a surprise visit to Afghanistan, President Barack Obama made a televised address from the war-torn country to discuss an agreement he signed with President Hamid Karzai, which would see 23,000 U.S. troops withdrawn by the end of the summer. The agreement, he said, hails “a new kind of relationship” that would see the United States in a more supportive role.
“As our coalition agreed, by the end of 2014 the Afghans will be fully responsible for the security of their country," Obama said. But the president was clear that the U.S. would stay engaged into the future.
“The agreement we signed today sends a clear message to the Afghan people. As you stand up, you will not stand alone,” Obama said. “It establishes the basis of our cooperation over the next decade, including shared commitments to combat terrorism and strengthen democratic institutions.”
President Obama’s visit to Afghanistan was kept secret until he met with Karzai. During Tuesday's meeting, which took place around midnight, the two leaders signed a post-war agreement that provides a framework to the U.S.’s commitment to Afghanistan after the long and unpopular war comes to an end.
The agreement opens the possibility for continued training of Afghan forces and targeted operations against al-Qaida, which is present in neighboring Pakistan but has a nominal presence inside Afghanistan.
President Obama goes to Afghanistan to sign post-war agreement
At the podium at Bagram Air Field, Obama noted that 10,000 troops were withdrawn last year and that nearly half the Afghan population lives in areas where Afghan Security Forces are taking the lead.
“The Iraq War is over,” the president said. “The number of our troops in harm's way has been cut in half, and more will be coming home soon. We have a clear path to fulfill our mission in Afghanistan, while delivering justice to al-Qaida.”
On Tuesday night, President Barack Obama addressed the American people from Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan to announce an agreement he signed with President Hamid Karzai: "The goal that I set -- to defeat al-Qaida, and deny it a chance to rebuild -- is within reach." Watch the full speech here.
Still, Obama struck a cautionary note, warning of “more difficult days ahead” and acknowledged that “many Americans are tired of war.” But “we must finish the job we started in Afghanistan and end this war responsibly,” he said.
Transcript of Obama's speech from Bagram Air Base
International troops would continue to train and advise the Afghans, Obama said, and the U.S. would not build permanent bases in Afghanistan or patrol the country's cities and mountains.
The president also said the U.S. would not build permanent bases in Afghanistan or patrol the country’s cities and mountains.
The Afghan Security Forces would grow its force to 352,000 this year, Obama said, and sustain that level for three years.
“That will be the job of the Afghan people,” he said.
Obama planned to be on the ground for about seven hours in Afghanistan, where the United States has been engaged in war for more than a decade following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. More than 1,800 U.S. forces have been killed and 15,700 wounded in that time.
The trip also carries major symbolic significance for a president seeking a second term and allows him to showcase the killing a year ago of 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden.
Media traveling with Obama on the 13-hour flight had to agree to keep it secret until Obama had safely finished a helicopter flight to the nation's capital, Kabul still launch lethal attacks.
Obama also addressed Pakistan, where bin Laden spent nine years hiding in a safe house in Abbottabad.
“I have made it clear to Afghanistan's neighbor - Pakistan - that it can and should be an equal partner in this process in a way that respects Pakistan's sovereignty, interests, and democratic institutions,” Obama said. “In pursuit of a durable peace, America has no designs beyond an end to al-Qaida safe-havens, and respect for Afghan sovereignty.”
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Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world
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The next 20 minutes would be a good time to leave Afghanistan. I support Obama and will vote for him next November, but I am really sad to see him stand next to that pondscum Karzai and declare everlasting friendship. Karzai ignores the poppy fields, the men who shoot at our soldiers, and stuffs all our taxpayer monies right into his pocket. On the other hand, Obama did make the decision to get Bin Laden (which Bush gave up on long ago), and he has sent far more drones into Pakistan to successfully whack Al Quada leaders.
I love when he says we when a job needs to be done, and I when others do it!! Here is a child, Obama, with low self esteem and huge ego. He has always been helped and can not understand he killed America and his record on Jobs and the economy we voted him in on his promises including to end all wars HE lies about now.
Do you think his two daughters will fight in a war let alone join a military service? Jan can you imagine you have children that die for Karzai years after Obama is retired and playing golf? I voted for him too last time but not this time.
Nice job of more junk news from MSNBC too.
So after 3.5 years into his presidency after campaigning on the need to "win" in Afghanistan, Barak Obama delivers a speech filled with "I", "Me" and "Commander-in-Chief" not addressed to the soldiers sitting in front of him but a campaign speech as described by many of the reporters that were present.
The fact is that 1,275 americans have died in Afghanistan under Obama's watch as he dithered for months and months about our military leaders recommended surge troop levels only to water down the levels against their recommendations. As a result of the diminishment and delay in acting on their recommendations, by all accounts we are now losing the war in Afghanistan and Obama has reluctantly has made this speech which is his ONLY substantive statement on Afghanistan in almost ONE YEAR! What a great "Commander-In-Chief". This guy is shameless !
Obama=
Diminishment, Delay
Decipt, Demagogue
Debt and Dependency
I have the utmost respect for our soldiers they should be thanked and honored for their service around the world. However I fear that this country Afghanistan will become a bottomless pit with the US taxpayer supplying huge amounts of foreign aid. It is time to end all foreign aid until this country and its people become the priority of our government and their health and welfare put first.
This new kind of relationship where the U.S. only throws billions of taxpayer dollars at Karzai actually isn't new to President Obama.
His solution to every problem is to throw billions at it.
In this case, you can be sure Karzai won't appreciate it, and the program will fail.
What a great relationship ..........Like so many others we have......We give billions and in return they allow us to have our pipeline and pillage all their resources. Karzai the crook gets rich and the people stay poor!
Sorry all you people thinking of S.S., college grants, welfare, health care, etc,etc. But we (U.S.A.) will NOT have the money! We must think of our Afghan friends (NOT) & helping the Middle East. Karzai has to eat to. You must be patient we only have to feed them trillions untill 2024. Then all you greedy seniors, & kids thinking about college can get back on track. You people that are hungry or sick, think about Mr. Karzai when his family gets a cold! Bottom line is we must not be this selfish, share please
Larry
Why isn't the commander in chief speaking up about the riots taking place on the Liberal west coast since it's starting to look like Afghanistan, he could fly in at night and make a speech! Maybe Obama likes to see the riots it enforces his policy of redistributing the wealth
What kind of relationship is that? We give them lots of money and those in the government and well connected get most of it, nobody really cares about fighting the Taliban or Al-Quida, and in their hearts, they hate us relationship? Kind of reminds me of the marriage to Vietnam. Nice little divorce, with the overloaded helicopter full of people trying to flee falling off the roof whie the North Vietnamese army rolling into Saigon. Or maybe the more current one with Iraq, same thing, different place. Are we desperate for friends or do we still believe by spreading our troops all over the world and spending billions of dollars that we will be respected as a world power? Yeah, one of those relationships. With friends like these, who needs ememies.
I believe most of us would like a clarification of what "finish the job" means. It appears the longer we stay, the worse our relationship with the existing government there becomes. I for one would like to know Obama's goals.
I wonder if the new relationship will continue Karzai's privilege to continue to rip off the American taxpayers to line his pockets and the pockets of his cronies.
A "new relationship with Afghanistan?" When in the hell will the American People get a new relationship with our government and Private Enterprise??? I am so sick of BOTH Repugs and Demwits throwing billions (trillions actually) toward the War Machine and its "missions."
Whatever the hell happened to JOBS??? Where are they???
Whatever the hell happened to The Financial Crisis??? Can anyone name ONE PERSON from government, Wall Street or banking that has gone to jail for collapsing our economy, collapsing the housing values for millions of Americans and crippled retirements????
Whose side are the Repugs and Demwits on????
A "new relationship with Afghanistan"? REALLY??? How about a "new relationship with the American People" who are hurting out here on "main street"??? How about THAT relationship?!!!
While we may very well bring our troops home in 2014, we have not come close to accomplishing the mission. Until such time as we either get Pakistan to actually live up to it's word, or as someone stated earlier, do it for them, we can never have peace.
As long as your enemies have safe haven, you can control them. I do think Obama has been right to use Drones as it has made a huge impact on just how safe they are in the areas of Pakistan they do go to. Even now, Pakistan is upset that we continue the Drone attacks.
And there is NO WAY that the leaders of Pakistan did not know that Osama was living next door to their Military Academy. Do you think Hitler could live next door to Westpoint and nobody notice? He lived there for years and they say that they did not know. Just how stupid do they think we are?
We were much more effective in getting the people to turn against the terrorists in Iraq than we have been in either Afghanistan or Pakistan. I do think that a few weeks of carpet bombing by B52's would really straighten out their attitude....
But as long as our Political leaders think it is ok to do this halfway, we need to bring our Troops home. We can not keep sending to a war that our leaders will not let them fight or win...
Every "troop" we removed from Iraq was repalced with a military contractor better known as a "mercenary".... at four times the cost of the troops.
Our "occupation" and COST increases as we "bring troops home". It is a complete joke. What have to see is our TOTAL US occupion diminishing and our costs going down. This crap of "bringing troops home" is meaningless.
We have a "volunteer" military now which for all practical purposes is a "mercenary" force. Trading one volunteer for another volunteer that costs four times as much is simply a marketing ploy. Corporate profits and taxpayer costs skyrocket as we bring "troops" home.
We leave "occupational contractors" WE PAY but they answer to the corporations they work for. Yep, this ought to work out REAL well.
Now that Obama the Foreigner is out of the country, it would be a perfect time to put him on the no-fly list so that Biden(a person with no doubt of being born in the US) can take over as a legal President of the United States.
3 1/2 years later.....
It is not about any party affiliation at this point. When you add Obama to the current GOP candidate pool they look like a car full of drunks with Ron Paul the only sober person but none of them want to let him drive. They are determined to let their lobby driven agendas drive the car right off the cliff.....again.
This entire insanity that "we the taxpayers" give all our money to this tiny gang of irremovable thugs in Washington then beg for some chump change back from the most arrogant uncaring bunch of crooks has to stop.
These lobby owned candidates have become nothing more than marketing managers for the Federal Reserve, Oil companies, Military contractors, Fannie/Freddie, Goldman Sachs etc etc. They could not give a damn about the taxpayers or even the citizens. It is all about keeping the corporations and unions sucking off the taxpayers.
Even the entitlement programs are funded, managed and profited by the lobby's. The bankers and military contractors would just as soon throw all the "borrowed" money into a hole after taking their cut but they have to create social programs and wars to cover their butts with the thievery.
So the solution is? Do the bad guys wear black hats and the good guys wear white ones. Looks to me as if Obama is helping make Karzai a rich, powerful dictator(errr... drug dealer) who will be able to use American money and military know how to advance the taliban cause tremendously, while calling it his security force. I get it now....he'll arm the enemy as well as we are and not show discrimination or unfairness. American taxpayers will rebuild everything for the afghans as America crumbles. One other thought.
Did he apologize to karzai before he left? Community organizer=taking money from those who earned it and giving it to those that didn't.
If you notice every one of these countries threatened to go OFF the IMF/Federal Reserve's "petro-dollar" mafia where they have to convert every barrel of oil to US dollars to sell it to any other country. Both Iraq and Libya were negotiating to move from the petro-dollar. Iraq was moving to the "then" stronger Euro.
Libya wanted to trade the oil directly to France for goods to import, cutting out the Federal Reserve petro dollar mafia. Libya also wanted to cancel all its contracts with British Petroleum to pump all the domestic and offshore oil in Libya. God forbid if they used their own labor and trade their own goods without paying off the "global cartel".
A "terrorist" NOW is anyone who threatens the empire building of these people. In case you have not noticed we have more terrorists in San Diego from the Mexico drug cartels than all of Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan put together since 9/11. The statistics of crimes on the American people CLEARLY bear that out.
Left unsaid but undoubtably true, Afganistan and Pakistan will become permanent recipients of billions of US aid money annually to help "fund" their fight against "terrorism".
The apparently never ending but futile attempts by the US to buy friends and influence on the backs of current and future US taxpayers.
Will the insanity ever end?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=JsrSAqRrCc0
powerful video showing Obama's role in getting OBL and his concerns....
Are you kidding???????? That video is a freaking "paid for by Obama" political marketing advertisement!!!
Good night, at least get an independent source. That is about as enlightening as a Bush paid for, Bush starred in, Bush produced video on the Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq......... starring all his political cronies and puppets to back up all the lies and fabricated evidence.
That has to be the sorriest excuse for "proof of anything" I have ever seen. I am frightened you call that "powerful". Are our news sources now to be staged videos starring our politicians??? Geeeezzzz
Adams~ Which video did you watch? That video was on The Campaign Spot. ....... Look at it again.
All I see is a paid for political announcement. Even if there was something after the paid for political announcement I could not give it any credibility. I also have a huge problem with the body being dumped off the side of a ship and all the Seal's conveniently killed in mysterious accidents as soon as they started talking.
The whole thing lacks any semblance of credibility and smells of a fake or at least "heavily" altered situation. I also have a HUGE problem with the fact we have Afghanistan completely locked down under marshal law and can't even slightly dent the poppy production and heroin production. The Afghani's produce 85% of the global supply of heroin and the US has a monster sized drug eradication program costing us trillions of dollars yet we just let mountains of heroin leave Afghanistan every day. THAT is collusion.
Nothing but corporate and drug dealer profiteering is being accomplished in Afghanistan and I don't see Obama doing anything but perpetuating it. The entire "terrorist" scare has been over for a decade. We are chasing ghosts at close to $2 trillion a year. We never had a plan, way to measure results or an exit strategy.... we never will as long as the people profitting are allowed to lobby our government.
Heck the military contractors take taxpayer paid for profits and lobby Washington with it for MORE contract money. They literally use our taxpayer money to corrupt our politicians and increase the military spending. That is insane.
Obama knows all this and is just looking the other way for business as usual. Both the Democratic and GOP campaign chests are stuffed full of blatant bribery money.
If Dubya hadn't wasted YEARS doing crazy things with crazy "czars" then DROPPING the BALL by "taking his game to a new playground" starting a foolish CRUSADE for non-existant WMD in IRAQ this could have ended long ago.
After forgetting this needed war against our ACTUAL enemies, (Remember, the ones who hit us on 9/11?) this "war on terror" in Afghanistan could have been wrapped up YEARS ago. Without unneeded deaths AND wasted billions of dollars in the wrong country and before he left office (after shoes were thrown at his head).
Obama wouldn't (shouldn't) have to deal with the Taliban at all.
I'm not thrilled about this, but we need to take the long view. 70 years later we still have strategic forces in Europe and various locations on the Pacific rim. Karzai will be gone within a few years and having a strategic, but low profile, presence in Afghanistan has more to do with containing Pakistan which is the unstable country in the region that already has nuclear weapons.
What an absolute waste of time, money and lives to appease the biggest drug dealer on the planet. What the hell is wrong with this country. Our politicians are nothing but self-serving wimps and a$$ kissers to other nations.
I wonder if this 'new kind of relationship' continues Karzai's ability to rob the U.S. taxpayers blind so he can line the pockets of himself and his cronies. This is one more common trait that the Afghanistan war has with the Vietnam war.
It is foolish to think the UN represents anything but the highest levels of corporate interests. The UN will sanction anything the banking or oil cartels want. It was simply giving a name to the financial organization that already existed prior to WWII.
The other problem is the sick way we let Generals move into the military contractor industry. In some years, the move from general staff to industry is a virtual clean sweep. Thirty-four out of 39 three- and four-star generals and admirals who retired in 2007 are now working in defense roles — nearly 90 percent.
Dozens of retired generals employed by defense firms maintain Pentagon advisory roles, giving them unparalleled levels of influence and access to inside information on Department of Defense procurement plans. These Generals who become lobbyists under the guise of "advisers" are pure poison to our government. We actually "fabricate" wars to keep these stocks moving up and management bonus's being paid.
The generals are, in many cases, recruited for private sector roles well before they retire, raising questions about their independence and judgment while still in uniform. The Pentagon is aware and even supports this practice.
Then you all wonder why we are invading foreign countries with no clear motives and ZERO consistency.
What we have learned from this 'escapade' by the fraud and his hokum about Afghanistan is this: there is none. Except for the fact that suitcases after suitcases full of American Cash still flows freely into the pockets of that dishonored Karzai. And the US of A will still have thousands of American troops in that hell hole Nation.
But then the fraud and his minions will still be cashing in the many favors which are handed out today by the 'pant suit lady' all from our pockets of course.
Another giveaway of American Treasure without return. Go figure.