Downing Street Says » Afghanistan

» Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Afghanistan

Put that the Prime Minister said in PMQs that he expected President Obama to make his plans known within days, whereas the White House had said it would come in the next couple of weeks, the PMS said that there was the decision that needed to be made by President Obama, but also when that would be communicated.

There had been a lot of speculation that the decision was imminent and we hoped it would come shortly.

Asked if it was safe to assume that the Prime Minister was close to meeting his conditions he had set out for sending extra troops to Afghanistan, the PMS replied that the Prime Minister had said that we were the first major country in the world to have made the commitment of additional troops. The first condition was the proper resourcing of troops, the second involved the allies and burden sharing, which had not been met yet, and the third involved the level of governance in Afghanistan.

In terms of the third condition, we were closer to meeting that, but we had not had the inauguration and we did not know how the unity programme would progress, but clearly the situation was moving in the right direction. So he would not characterise that as two out of the three conditions being fully met.

Asked if there wouldn’t be a formal announcement of 500 more British troops going out until the NATO meeting later this month, the PMS said that the most significant decision was for President Obama and that was not necessarily driven by the NATO meeting.

Asked if the Government would expect to be told about the Obama decision in advance, the PMS said that the Prime Minister and the President as well as officials on both sides were in close touch and the PMS imagined that there might be a small amount of advanced notice.

Asked if imminent meant that it would be next week, the PMS said that he could not answer that.

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