International Ripple Effects of US Military Drawdown in Afghanistan
On Wednesday June 22nd, President Barack Obama promised the nation that he was ready to bring home 10,000 US troops stationed in Afghanistan. In a year’s time, the president hopes to extend that number to 33,000 troops. At home and abroad, not everybody believes that the mission has made enough progress to end its military engagements in the region. Veteran BBC reporter Hugh Sykes has been spending his time in Afghanistan, Pakistan investigating Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the ISI, providing safe havens to the Haqqani Taliban, a group most likely responsible for the Hotel siege in Kabul last Tuesday night. In this conversation Sykes tells us about his international reporting and why his project has brought him here to the states.
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