In surprise visit, Pompeo vows U.S. is Afghanistan’s partner
KABUL, Afghanistan — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Afghanistan for a few hours Monday, but the brevity and extraordinary security of the trip contrasted sharply with his upbeat assessment of a country ravaged by a 17-year-old war.
“Now more than ever the United States stands as an enduring partner for Afghanistan,” Pompeo said.
Pompeo and President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan held a news conference where both insisted that, despite the Taliban insurgency’s control of a growing portion of the country as well as its recent rejection of peace talks, there was reason to hope that peace was at hand.
“An element of the progress is the capacity that we now have to believe there is hope that many of the Taliban now see that they can’t win militarily,” Pompeo said.
Ghani declared that “the strategy is working,” adding that “It has had a significant impact.”
While security in the country has ebbs and flows, the extraordinary precautions taken for Pompeo to spend even a couple of hours in the country demonstrated that conditions are some of the worst seen in the war.
Pompeo flew into Bagram Air Base, transferred to a second plane for the 10-minute flight into Hamid Karzai International Airport, then boarded a helicopter for a brief flight to the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the capital.
From there, he and his entourage rode in armored vehicles for the brief trip to the presidential palace. Walking would have been faster but not safe.
A year ago, the Trump administration announced a new strategy that officials said would give commanders the freedom and resources to push back Taliban advances. They said they would evaluate needs according to conditions on the ground, rejecting what they said were the artificial timelines of the Obama administration.
Although U.S. airstrikes continue to pound Taliban positions, Afghan ground forces have struggled to regain or hold areas previously seized by the Taliban.
One outcome is that the administration has expressed a profound eagerness to engage the Taliban in negotiations, with officials saying that there would be no preconditions and that everything, including the future of U.S. and NATO forces, would be up for discussion.
“Peace must be decided by the Afghans and settled among them,” Pompeo said Monday.
It was Pompeo’s first visit to Afghanistan as secretary of state. The visit was not announced in advance.