"Unrelenting weakness": Trump on Taliban
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President Trump said the Taliban showed weakness, not strength, addressing the cancellation of the surprise peace talks with the Taliban during a memorial ceremony at the Pentagon.
About one month after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, U.S. special forces were photographed riding horses into Afghanistan, launching 18 years of military operations.
President Trump says he cancelled the talks because the Taliban killed an American soldier, a Romanian and 10 others just days before the Camp David negotiations were supposed to begin.
Fighting has picked up in several areas of northern Afghanistan, officials said on Wednesday, days after the collapse of talks between the United States and the Taliban aimed at agreeing the withdrawal of thousands of U.S. troops.
The latest fighting underscored expectations of an escalation in violence following U.S. President Donald Trump's abrupt cancellation of talks with the Taliban aimed at withdrawing U.S. troops and opening the way to an end to 18 years of war in Afghanistan.
The Taliban said this week the decision, which Trump said was caused by the insurgents' refusal to agree a ceasefire and continued attacks that killed a U.S. serviceman last week, would lead to further American deaths.
In response, a senior U.S. general said that the U.S. military was likely to accelerate the pace of its operations in Afghanistan to counter an increase in Taliban attacks.
