I encourage you all you read my new report with my colleague Scott Bates of the Center for National Policy, NATO Strategy in Afghanistan: A New Way Forward.Scott and I propose a change of course that will allow us to provide sustainable support to the Afghan people and security forces will focusing on our core interests in the region: containing transnational violent actors and sufficient regional stability.
The main elements of this plan, some of which are already in place, are as follows:
•Continue transition plans to place Afghan Government and Security Forces in the lead across the country by April 2013.
•Dissolve the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and place Combined Forces Special Operations Component Command-Afghanistan (CFSOCC-A) in charge of the military mission by April 2013.
•This will be accompanied by a drawdown of US-NATO troop levels to a force of approximately 30,000 – 6,000-8,000 of whom should be non-U.S. military personnel. This will involve the UK still playing a significant role.
•Full transition of governance and development efforts in Afghanistan to the United Nations by April 2013. Governance and development efforts do not aggregate to form an American political strategy.
•The United States and NATO allies will provide enduring material and political support to the Afghan state
Read the full report here. Looking forward to all your comments!