Donald Trump's bold new plans for Afghanistan are that he doesn't really have any bold new plans for Afghanistan, but he can't really admit he's doing it the same way Bush and Obama did it. He's fooling precisely no one, and the Democrats are calling him on it.
President Donald Trump's prime-time speech on his plan for Afghanistan split lawmakers along party lines, with Democrats criticizing the lack of real details and Republicans lauding the move away from arbitrary deadlines for drawing down troops.
Democrats argued Trump was proposing an open-ended commitment with no exit strategy or ceiling on US troops there.
"Tonight, the President said he knew what he was getting into and had a plan to go forward. Clearly, he did not," House minority leader Nancy Pelosi said in a statement. "The President's announcement is low on details but raises serious questions."
New York Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand said Trump's speech was "terribly lacking" in details, substance and "a vision of what success in Afghanistan looks like."
And Rep. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat and Marine Corps veteran, accused Trump of "repeating the mistakes of previous administrations."
"Tonight, the American people should have heard a detailed, realistic strategy with achievable objectives and measurable benchmarks," Gallego said. "Instead, we got only vague promises and wishful thinking."
Functionally, Trump is going to be sending in about 4,000 more troops, most certainly special operations troops and their support staff, in order to lead more targeted strikes on Taliban leadership and ISIS targets of opportunity, and help Afghan forces secure territory while oh yeah, going across the border to Pakistan and keeping an eye on the mess there. He can't actually say that, but that's what's coming and everyone knows it.
So he's going to pretend that continuing Obama's strategy is his own brilliant idea.
Leadership for a new era or something, whee.
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