Afghans Worry US Forces May Leave

The US military has killed thousands of insurgents in Afghanistan that have done far more in the daily work of war than Osama bin Laden ever could hidden in his walled white house in a Pakistani military town. Taliban shadow governors, bomb-builders, would-be suicide attackers have all fallen at an unprecedented pace in recent months.

The level of violence in Afghanistan is again is surpassing that of the previous year with the Taliban forces spread out to the far reaches of the country. Therefore, bin Laden’s death was greeted by Afghans with relief and satisfaction but far less jubilation than in the United States. From their vantage point, the violent reality of their country remains largely unchanged.

In fact, many feared it could get worse. One persistent worry repeated here was that US support for the war could erode at an accelerated pace now that America’s most wanted man is dead. With that decade-long goal achieved, Afghan officials said, the case for troop withdrawal becomes that much more convincing for Americans.

Many Afghans say the death of bin Laden in a town deep inside Pakistan should instead convince the US that a successful outcome in Afghanistan depends on US pressure on insurgents based in Pakistan.

President Hamid Karzai, who praised American troops for killing bin Laden, used the opportunity to reiterate his message that the locus of terrorism remains beyond Afghan borders. “For years we have said that the fight against terrorism is not in Afghan villages and houses.

For many Afghan civilians Presidents Karzai‘s remarks would come at the most inopportune time and would flame fears that US forces would leave Afghan civilians to their fate. Already many Afghans have voiced their opinions and protested against Pakistan’s current government.

President Obama has already marked July of this year as the time when US troops will begin to leave, starting to reduce the 30,000 additional troops he sent to Afghanistan 18 months before. Even though the vast majority of the U.S. troops have been fighting the Taliban, their presence has been justified in large part by al-Qaeda’s continued survival.

Afghans urged US officials not to lose this window of opportunity. Amarullah Saleh, the former director of Afghanistan’s intelligence agency urged to use the evidence of bin Laden‘s killing to force Pakistani civilians to understand that many of Pakistan’s problems may stem from terrorist influence rather than US.

(아주경제 앤드류 이 기자)

Park Sae-jin swatchsjp@ajunews.com