Trump: Taliban deal close, US troops to drop to 8,600
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President Donald Trump said Thursday the U.S. plans to withdraw more than 5,000 American troops from Afghanistan and then will determine further drawdowns in the longest war in American history.
Trump's comment comes as a U.S. envoy is in his ninth round of talks with the Taliban to find a resolution to the nearly 18-year-old war. The president, who campaigned on ending the war, said the U.S. was "getting close" to making a deal, but that the outcome of the U.S.-Taliban talks remained uncertain.
"Who knows if it's going to happen," Trump told Fox News Radio's "The Brian Kilmeade Show."
Trump did not offer a timeline for withdrawing troops. The Pentagon has been developing plans to withdraw as many as half of the 14,000 U.S. troops still there, but the Taliban want all U.S. and NATO forces withdrawn.
