Obama U-turn will leave 5,500 troops in Afghanistan when his term ends President Barack Obama has announced a major policy reversal on Afghanistan…

Obama U-turn will leave 5,500 troops in Afghanistan when his term ends President Barack Obama has announced a major policy reversal on Afghanistan that will see 5,500 US troops remain in the country when he leaves office in January 2017 despite his earlier pledge to pull out next year

Speaking at the White House, Mr Obama vowed to keep 9,800 troops in Afghanistan through most of 2016, before cutting numbers to the new level before the end of his eight-year

The move marks a big shift in policy for a president who campaigned for the White House on a platform of ending US operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Last year, he announced that he would withdraw US forces from Afghanistan in 2016, saying it was time to “time to turn the page” on a decade of wars

In addition to handing the Afghan war on to the next president, Mr Obama was forced to return troops to Iraq to tackle Isis extremists after he had removed US forces from the country. The president is also highly unlikely to achieve another of his top foreign policy goals — shutting Guantánamo Bay

Mr Obama said he changed strategy because the Afghan security forces were still not strong enough to fend off the Taliban. He said US forces would remain to train Afghan forces and support counter-terrorist operations. The move also comes as the US worries about Isis operating inside Afghanistan. “

“I know that many of you have grown weary of this conflict. As you are well aware, I do not support the idea of endless war,” he said. “Yet, given what’s at stake in Afghanistan?.?.?.?I am firmly convinced that we should make this extra effort.”

While Mr Obama has won two major foreign policy victories in recent months — the Iran nuclear deal and a new era in relations with Cuba after decades of hostility — he has been haunted by Afghanistan and faces a dogged threat from Isis in Iraq and Syria. He is also confronted by Russia’s intervention in Syria and an increasingly assertive China in the South China Sea

General John Campbell, the top US commander in Afghanistan, recently told Congress that the US should reconsider plans to withdraw troops in 2016 given the strength of the Taliban. That message was amplified after Taliban forces recently temporarily seized the northern city of Kunduz, in an embarrassing setback for the government