WASHINGTON (NewsNation Now) — Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller on Tuesday announced plans to reduce U.S. troop levels in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying the decision fulfills President Donald Trump’s pledge to bring forces home when conditions were met that kept the U.S. and its allies safe.
The new plan will accelerate troop withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan in Trump’s final days in office, despite arguments from some senior military officials in favor of a slower, more methodical pullout. Trump has refused to concede his election loss to Democrat Joe Biden, who takes office Jan. 20, just five days after the troop withdrawals are slated to finish.
Miller said commanders and advisers agreed with the withdrawal plan, which will cut the number of troops in Afghanistan from more than 4,500 to 2,500, and in Iraq from about 3,000 to 2,500. He refused to take questions from reporters.
Speaking a week after taking over for former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who was fired by Trump, Miller notably did not say that the drawdown plan had been recommended or endorsed by Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or by other senior military officers. He said only that military commanders had agreed to execute it.
Miller said the U.S. remains ready to respond if conditions in Afghanistan or Iraq deteriorate.
“If the forces of terror, instability, division and hate begin a deliberate campaign to disrupt our efforts, we stand ready to apply the capabilities required to thwart them,” he said in a roughly eight-minute statement — his first extended public remarks since taking office.
The decision has already received a cool reception from some Republican leaders on Capitol Hill and a somewhat uncharacteristically blunt critique from NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.
“I believe these additional reductions of American troops from terrorist areas are a mistake,” said Rep. Mac Thornberry of Texas, who is the ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee. He said the Taliban, whose hold on power in Kabul was destroyed when U.S. troops invaded the country in October 2001, have “done nothing — met no condition — that would justify this cut.”
Some military leadership, including Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, top U.S. commander for the Middle East have worried that too-fast troop reductions in Afghanistan would strengthen the negotiating hand of the Taliban and weaken the position of an already-weak Afghan government.
But officials suggested that commanders will be able to live with the partial pullout, which allows them to keep counterterrorism troops in Afghanistan and gives them time to remove critical equipment.
Rep. Adam Smith, a Washington Democrat and chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, endorsed the Trump decision.
“Our primary goal has been, and continues to be, the prevention of transnational terrorists from launching an attack against the United States from Afghanistan,” Smith said. “In order to contain the terrorist threat as we draw down our troop levels, it is critical that we coordinate the drawdown closely with our allies, as well as our partners in the Afghan government, to protect our interests and those of our allies in Afghanistan.”
Stoltenberg earlier Tuesday warned that NATO could pay a heavy price for leaving Afghanistan too early.
NATO has fewer than 12,000 troops from dozens of nations helping to train and advise the Afghan national security forces. The 30-nation alliance relies heavily on the United States armed forces for transport, logistics and other support.
“We now face a difficult decision. We have been in Afghanistan for almost 20 years, and no NATO ally wants to stay any longer than necessary. But at the same time, the price for leaving too soon or in an uncoordinated way could be very high,” Stoltenberg said in a statement.
Trump’s national security adviser Robert O’Brien said the president is keeping his promise to the American people to get U.S. troops out of war zones. “By May, it is President Trump’s hope that they will all come home safely and in their entirety,” O’Brien told reporters at the White House shortly after Miller made the announcement at the Pentagon.
“I want to reiterate that this policy is not new,” O’Brien said. “This has been the president’s policy since he took office.”