AFGHANISTAN/MILITARY/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “President Donald Trump will give a nationally televised address Monday [8-21-17] night to unveil his strategy for the long-running war in Afghanistan, the White House said, a plan expected to include sending as many as 4,000 more troops to the country.
He’ll deliver the prime-time speech from Fort Myer in Arlington, Va., using the same sort of high-profile stage that his predecessor, Barack Obama, employed in laying out a new approach to the war in 2009. Mr. Obama delivered his speech before a national television audience at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., promising at the time to ‘bring this war to a successful conclusion.’
The speech is planned for 9 p.m. EDT.
Last week, Mr. Trump met at Camp David with his top advisers, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, national security adviser H.R. McMaster and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, to discuss the way ahead in Afghanistan. Gen. Joe Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, attended by videoconferencing from overseas.
On Saturday, the president tweeted that he had settled on an approach to a war that is now in its 16th year: ‘Important day spent at Camp David with our very talented Generals and military leaders. Many decisions made, including on Afghanistan.’ “
–Peter Nicholas and Gordon Lubold, “Donald Trump to Unveil Afghanistan Strategy in Televised Address Monday,” The Wall Street Journal online, Aug. 20, 2017 06:18pm