Tuesday, March 19

Joint Subcommittee Hearing: After the Withdrawal: The Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan (Part I)

1:00 p.m. on Tuesday, March 19 in 2172 Rayburn House Office Building

Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific

Rep. Steve Chabot (R-OH), Chairman

Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Chairman

Invited witnesses include:

Seth G. Jones, Ph.D.
Associate Director
International Security and Defense Policy Center
RAND Corporation

Kimberly Kagan, Ph.D.
President
Institute for the Study of War

Mr. Peter Bergen
Director
National Security Studies Program
The New America Foundation

Daniel S. Markey, Ph.D.
Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia
Council on Foreign Relations

Chairman Chabot on the hearing: “U.S. national security interests in South Asia are both dire and immediate.  The 2014 withdrawal plan from Afghanistan is strategically risky and threatens to plunge Afghanistan into a state in which terrorists will once again thrive.  At the same time, the U.S. relationship with Pakistan has deteriorated dramatically and falters over Pakistan’s involvement with terrorist organizations and the drone war in the tribal bad lands.  While Islamabad claims U.S. and Pakistani interests can be brought into alignment, we must remain skeptical of its internal divergent interests that risk undermining U.S. interests, the relationship with India, and the chance for a stable, peaceful, and independent Afghanistan.  This hearing is an important opportunity to examine the President’s hasty withdrawal plan from Afghanistan and evaluate how events in Pakistan over the next year may affect U.S. national security interests throughout the entire region.”

Chairman Ros-Lehtinen on the hearing: With President Obama’s announcement last month that the U.S. will draw down our forces in Afghanistan by the end of this year without a clear withdrawal plan, it is necessary to have a hearing that will examine the security implications of this decision and analyze the capacity of the Afghani and Pakistan government to address crime and corruption while ensuring secured territories in their countries. This is imperative particularly in light of recent inflammatory accusations made by Afghani leader Hamid Karzai which have further strained U.S. – Afghanistan relations and put our troops at greater risk. We must do everything we can to prevent al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and other extremist militants from taking over and undoing the efforts and sacrifices made by the U.S. and our allies for over a decade.