U.S. moving to expand airstrikes in Afghanistan, official says

WASHINGTON – After months of debate, the U.S. is close to a decision to expand the military’s authority to conduct airstrikes against the Taliban as the violence in Afghanistan escalates, a senior U.S. defense official said Thursday.

The official said a final decision has not been made, but the discussions are in their final stages. There is a broad desire across the Obama administration to give the military greater ability to help the Afghans fight and win the war. The official said the U.S. is likely to expand the authority of U.S. commanders to strike the Taliban and do whatever else is necessary with the forces they have to support the Afghan operations.

The 9,800 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan, however, would still not be involved in direct combat.

The official was not authorized to talk publicly about the discussions and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The expected decision comes as the Afghans struggle with a resurgent Taliban, particularly in the south. But it is fraught with political sensitivities because President Barack Obama has made clear his commitment to get U.S. forces out of Afghanistan. That effort, however, has been stalled by the slow development of the Afghan military and the resilience of the Taliban.

The Taliban are refocusing their attention mostly on the southern provinces of Helmand, Kandahar and Uruzgan, according to U.S. and Afghan military officials, although the insurgents also have struck elsewhere, such as Kunduz province in the north, where they overran and held the provincial capital for a few days last fall.

The results have been daunting: The U.N. says 3,545 Afghan civilians were killed and 7,457 wounded in 2015, most of them by the Taliban.

The U.S. has continued to conduct counterterrorism strikes against al-Qaida and Islamic State militants in Afghanistan. But strikes against the Taliban were largely halted at the end of 2014, when the U.S.-led coalition’s combat role ended. Limited strikes have been allowed in cases of self-defense or when Afghan forces were in danger of being overrun.

Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, has discussed with Defense Secretary Ash Carter his recommendations for moves the U.S. can make to further assist the Afghans. And there have been ongoing conversations with the White House.

Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook, who was asked Thursday whether the administration was looking at expanding the U.S. military’s authorities to strike the Taliban more broadly, said: “In every step of our review of Afghanistan, the question of what’s the best way to use our forces is something we’re constantly looking at. It’s also in the same sense that we’re looking at the number of troops. We are always looking at the authorities question and the best use of our troops.”

Nicholson’s predecessor, Gen. John Campbell, made it known before he left Kabul in March that he believed Carter should consider expanding U.S. military authorities to take on the Taliban.