The US Military Forces Might Slow Down Its Withdrawal From Afghanistan: Pentagon

The US military might slow down its withdrawal from Afghanistan as the Taliban arise, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said.

Kirby added that the date for the complete withdrawal of the military by President Joe Biden will remain the same. However, the pace of withdrawal could be adjusted based on the conditions.

“The situation in Afghanistan changes as the Taliban continue to conduct these attacks and to raid district centres as well as the violence, which is still too high,” he told reporters.

“If there need to be changes made to the pace, or to the scope and scale of the retrograde, on any given day or in any given week, we want to maintain the flexibility to do that,” he said.

“We’re constantly taking a look at this, every single day: what´s the situation on the ground, what capabilities do we have, what additional resources do we need to move out of Afghanistan and at what pace.”

“All of these decisions are literally being made in real-time,” he added.

The US military has been fighting Al-Qaida and helping the Afghan government forces to battle the Taliban for two decades now. Last week Pentagon said that the withdrawal orders given by Biden back in April had completed almost 50pc.

When Biden passed the orders of withdrawal, 2,500 US troops and 16,000 contractors, mostly US citizens, were in Afghanistan. The Pentagon had already handed over some of its key bases to the government and had withdrawn hundreds of cargo plane-loads of equipment.

Pentagon spokesman said that the US forces will continue to support the Afghan government troops in fighting the Taliban.

“So long as we have the capability in Afghanistan, we will continue to provide assistance to Afghan forces,” he said.

“But as the retrograde gets closer to completion, those capabilities will wane and will no longer be available.”

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