Trump administration

Trump Pushes Advisers to Get US Troops Out of Afghanistan, Citing Coronavirus

Trump complains almost daily that U.S. troops are still in Afghanistan and are now vulnerable to the pandemic

In this photo taken on June 6, 2019, U.S. soldiers look out over hillsides in the Nerkh district of Wardak province, Afghanistan.
Thomas Watkins/AFP via Getty Images

President Donald Trump has pushed his military and national security advisers in recent days to pull all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan amid concerns about a major coronavirus outbreak in the war-torn country, according to two current and one former senior U.S. officials.

Trump complains almost daily that U.S. troops are still in Afghanistan and are now vulnerable to the pandemic, the officials said.

His renewed push to withdraw all of them has been spurred by the convergence of his concern that coronavirus poses a force protection issue for thousands of U.S. troops in Afghanistan and his impatience with the halting progress of his peace deal with the Taliban, the officials said.

For more on this story, go to NBC News.

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