November 13, 2020
In a recent series of sweeping changes within the Pentagon-US Defense Department, comes the appointment of retired Army Col. Macgregor, as senior advisor to the acting Secretary of Defense, Christopher Miller. The appointment was made after the US Defense Secretary Mark Esper was fired from his position, along with other Pentagon top officials.
The change within the civilian leadership of the Defense Department has sent an alarm among the US National Security officials, particularly those concerned with Afghanistan. The newly appointed senior advisor, whose position regarding US military, had been that of a total withdrawal from Afghanistan. Moreover, he had also been advocative of closing the US embassy in Afghanistan, cutting off all sorts of ties with the country, without taking into account the continued presence of terrorist groups and lingering conflict there.
All these changes come in tandem with the Trump administration continuous rhetoric of a speedy withdrawal from Afghanistan. US National Security advisor Robert O Brien is also a proponent of a hasty unconditional withdrawal, contrary to the notion held by many US military officials, of condition-based troops’ withdrawal, from the said country.
The new appointee is known for his tough stance on troops withdrawal from Syria as well for his hawkish remarks on using lethal force against the illegal immigrants, to the extent of shooting them down as they cross into the US borders from neighboring countries. The record does not end here, as he had been against the US intervention in Serbia, during the 1990s’ Serbian ethnic cleansing of the Bosnian Muslims. Given such credentials, MacGregor’s appointment as senior advisor could spell bleak for Afghanistan, particularly on humanitarian grounds, as long as he retains his position under Trump administration.
The author Tooba Altaf is an International Relations graduate while working as Researcher at the Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS).
© Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) and Afghan Studies Center (ASC), Islamabad.
