ANYONE WHO thought he heard the magical word “withdrawal” in president Barack Obama’s speech on Tuesday night, think again.
Gen James Jones, the president’s national security adviser, stated clearly yesterday: “The US has no intention of leaving Afghanistan in the near future, certainly not in 2011.”
What Mr Obama actually said was: “After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home.” Since then, hearings on Capitol Hill have centred on the nuance between “will” and “will begin to”. Perhaps we were meant to misunderstand.
At a press conference yesterday, an Afghan journalist asked Gen Jones to comment on the fact that “US troops will leave in 2011”. Gen Jones bridled.
“It’s very important to use the right words where this is concerned,” he chided. “The words ‘US troops will leave in 2011’ are inaccurate.”
Only six months ago, Gen Jones famously warned top brass against asking the president for troop reinforcements in Afghanistan, saying: “If there were new requests for force now, the president would quite likely have a Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moment.” (In the military, WTF means “what the f**k.)
By yesterday, Gen Jones had become a salesman for Mr Obama’s decision to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, emphasising the need to destroy “insurgent sanctuaries” along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
Gen Jones indulged in a little theatrical routine with reporters at the foreign press centre. Journalists from Canada, Turkey and the Persian Gulf sheikdoms asked what the US would like their governments to do in Afghanistan. “Stay engaged,” the general pleaded.
He evaded the Al Jazeera reporter’s question as to why the US should succeed where Russia failed, saying only that he had “no perfect crystal ball”.
Gen Jones confirmed Russia’s president Dmitri Medvedev and Mr Obama would discuss Afghanistan in Copenhagen on December 9th. The two presidents yesterday issued a joint statement expressing their “commitment . . . to continue to work together in the spirit of the Start treaty following its expiration, as well as our firm intention to ensure that a new treaty on strategic arms enters into force at the earliest possible date.”
The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start) expires today. “We’ll extend the current treaty for two or three days or the couple of weeks it will take to finalise the new one,” Gen Jones said.
The US had hoped Mr Obama could sign an arms control treaty during his trip to receive the Nobel Peace Price, but the Russians are resisting US demands on verification and monitoring.
The Le Monde correspondent asked : How did Gen Jones explain the contradiction between Mr Obama receiving the peace prize while sending 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan? “I will leave it to others to discuss, to use your words, the contradiction,” Gen Jones replied. The objective was peace. “If this is what it takes to get it, then so be it.”
The general added that the possibility of Mr Obama returning to Copenhagen on December 17th- 18th for the end of the climate summit was still “under discussion”.