There Goes the Neighborhood: Pentagon Widens US Occupation in Kabul

In an attempt to counter deadly ongoing terror attacks in Kabul, the US plans to expand its so-called Green Zone, a restricted area in the middle of the ancient city, which will now include most Western embassies and a number of military facilities.

Access to the US Embassy in Kabul may no longer require a Chinook helicopter ride to reach Pentagon assets across the street, less than 100 feet away, according to a report by New York Times. The US plans to expand its Green Zone, an area of extremely tight security intended to keep western officials safe from terror attacks.

Following a deadly truck attack in May that destroyed most of the German embassy, the US announced it would re-draw Green Zone boundaries to include most Western embassies and several government ministries, as well as NATO and American military headquarters inside the protected area.

The expansion will take six to twelve months and will more than double the size of the enclosed zone.

According to the New York Times, the expansion is seen as a "stark acknowledgment that even the city's central districts have become too difficult to defend against persisting bombings by resurgent Taliban fighters."

US forces have been in Kabul for over 16 years.

The move also indicates that the US military mission in Afghanistan has abandoned an Obama-era withdrawal plan and now intends to dig deeper and stay longer, despite the unpopularity of the expensive Afghan operations among the US public.

Military strategists estimate that the US could stay in Afghanistan for another decade, well past US President Donald Trump's term.

"I would guess the US has to plan on being inside Afghanistan for a decade or more in order for there to be any type of resolution," the article quotes Bill Roggio, editor of the Long War Journal, saying.

According to the new Pentagon strategy, a US withdrawal from Afghanistan would be condition-based, but the conditions have not been clarified.

"Until [Trump] says what the conditions are, all that means is we'll be there as long as we want, for whatever reason we want," detailed Barnett Rubin, an Afghanistan expert who advised the Obama administration.

"And they don't have to lie to do that, because the conditions will never be good enough to say we're absolutely not needed," he added.

While Trump has expressed the views of some his military advisors that US forces will stay in the country until an undefined victory is achieved, it is unlikely that a victory over the Taliban will ever be realized. The armed movement is again gaining popularity, and, as such, are unwilling to negotiate.

The official position of the Taliban remains that negotiations with the US cannot begin until not one US soldier is on Afghan soil.

So far, the Green Zone in Kabul has had little impact on the locals, to whom the worst thing might be an occasional search of their person. The Zone restricts all car traffic, save for that of official entities. The new expanded restricted area will cut two major transport arteries within the city, and a new ring road is planned to be built to mitigate some of the footprint.

Another US Green Zone, this in Baghdad, Iraq, is a secluded fortress, with massive blast walls and biometric security scans. Experts say Baghdad's Green Zone has resulted in an out-of-touch ruling class embedded within a Western-style community. Despite that terror attacks rarely, if ever, occur inside the Baghdad Zone, they frequently happen elsewhere in the city, and people outside the safe haven continue to suffer.

Under Trump, the US has indicated that it will increase its military presence in Afghanistan to a minimum of 15,000 soldiers, from current the 11,000.