18 years into the US occupation of Afghanistan, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY)
is looking to ensure that the war can continue to be a sinkhole for US
troops and money for years to come, introducing the Ensuring a Security
Afghanistan Act.
The bill, which Cheney is cosponsoring with Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Mike Waltz (R-FL), would forbid the president from reducing the US troop level in Afghanistan below 10,000 unless a broad and unlikely set of military requirements are first met.
Cheney argued that an unoccupied Afghanistan would be a “safe haven for
terrorism,” claiming that al-Qaeda remains close to the Taliban and that
the conditions on the ground don’t support the US leaving.
In reality, there is no sign of an active Taliban relationship with
al-Qaeda at all, and the Taliban have openly promised that in any peace
deal they would forbid al-Qaeda and ISIS from being present in
Afghanistan.
She and her limited Congressional supporters argue that the deal in the
process of being negotiated is a “bad deal,” and that the bill is
designed to prevent it. They argue keeping US troops there will keep
Afghanistan “stable and safe,” despite Afghanistan suffering repeated
military defeats to the Taliban, and still nowhere near self-sufficient
after a generation of war.
Liz Cheney Proposes Bill to Keep US Troops in Afghanistan
Would set a series of requirements to prevent peace deal, pullout
Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.
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