Combat Troop Withdrawal (Afghanistan)
Debate between Jonathan Edwards and Lord Robathan(12 years ago)
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Jonathan Edwards
Just out of interest, how long do the Government and the MOD expect the Karzai regime to stay in place once western troops are removed?
Mr Robathan
I am afraid that is something on which neither I nor any other Minister will speculate. Of course, as we understand it President Karzai will be standing down next year before the presidential elections.
In the first six months of this year, the ANSF led 80% of conventional operations in Afghanistan. ANSF troops are deploying in formed units, carrying out their own operations and planning complex security arrangements. They are also carrying out 85% of their own training, and in the areas covered by all three tranches of transition there has been a year-to-date decrease of enemy-initiated attacks.
As transition progresses, the campaign shifts from an ISAF-led counter-insurgency mission to an Afghan one. For ISAF, this means that the mission is gradually evolving from one primarily focused on combat to one based on the concepts of training, advising and assisting. The security force assistance model is the mechanism that oversees this process. It has been implemented this year and will be fully operational by mid-2013, when we expect the final Afghan districts to enter the transition process. That will mark a point of huge significance, when the Afghans will be in the security lead across the country.