Afstan: I guess it all depends on what the meaning of "leaving office" is (and, silly soothing phrase, "glide path")

But at least "glide path" is bit better than "off ramps". The Afghan president at his second inauguration (the headline of the Times story is misleading):

President Hamid Karzai today signalled the beginning of the end of foreign military intervention in his country, when he pledged that Afghan security forces would take the lead in combating the Taleban over the next three to five years...

Mr Karzai said: “Within the next three years, Afghanistan, with continued international support and in line with the growth of its defence capacity, wants to lead and conduct military operations in the many insecure areas of the country.

“We are determined that by the next five years, the Afghan forces are capable of taking the lead in ensuring security and stability across the country,” he said...

In conjunction with his aim to build up the Afghan security forces, Mr Karzai also pledged to try and make peace with the Taleban, whose insurgency has spread steadily across the country over the past three years.

“We invite dissatisfied compatriots who are not directly linked to international terrorism to return to the their homeland,” he said with clear reference to Taleban figures mainly residing in neighbouring Pakistan. “We will call Afghanistan’s traditional loya jirga [grand assembly] and make every possible effort to ensure peace in our country.”..

That would mean a much reduced need for foreign combat troops by the start of 2015. Now, is President Obama going to aim at having US troops basically out by 2013 or 2017 (the years when a new US president would actually assume office)? I'd bet on the former, in which case he'll be a two years ahead of President Karzai's timeline, a bit of a sticky wicket:

Barack Obama to set out 'end game' for Afghanistan
President Barack Obama has declared for the first time that his review of policy in Afghanistan will contain an exit strategy designed to avoid a "multiyear occupation" [terrible word choice that, fodder for the anti-war zealots].
...
"I am confident that when I announce my decision the American people will have a lot of clarity about what we are doing, how we are going to succeed... and most importantly what's the endgame on this thing," he told CNN.

"Unless you impose that kind of discipline it could end up leading to a multiyear occupation that won't serve the interests of the United States."

He added that he was determined to bring the war to an end before leaving office, though he was not asked if he expected that to be after 2012 or 2016.

"My preference would be not to hand off anything to the next president. One of the things I'd like is the next president to be able to come in and say I've got a clean slate," he said.

His remarks immediately raised concerns among allies that setting a limit on American military involvement would encourage the Taliban to lie low until US troops had pulled out, rather than forcing them to reconcile with the Kabul leadership.

A Western diplomat told the Daily Telegraph: "Reconciliation [see first story] is more likely to happen if the Talibs realise that they cannot simply wait you out.

"A short term surge that makes you look weak once you draw down from it is potentially an incentive to a war of attrition."...

More from the Wall St. Journal:

Debate Shifts to Afghan Exit Plan

President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown have turned the focus of Afghan war planning toward an exit strategy, publicly declaring that the U.S. and its allies can't send additional troops without a plan for getting them out.

The shift has unnerved some U.S. and foreign officials, who say that planning a pullout now -- with or without a specific timetable -- encourages the Taliban to wait out foreign forces and exacerbates fears in the region that the U.S. isn't fully committed to their security...

Mr. Obama isn't asking for the firm, publicly declared handover dates in Afghanistan that were the feature of early Iraq war plans, according to senior administration and military officials.

Instead, the officials said, the administration wants the Pentagon to identify key milestones for Afghanistan to meet, in its governance and the capability of its security forces, and then give a rough sense of when each objective is likely to be achieved. Reaching these goals would allow the U.S. role to shift away from direct combat, allowing troop levels to decline.

Mr. Obama said Wednesday in a CNN interview that he believed his new Afghan policy needed to include an "endgame" because "unless you impose that kind of discipline, [U.S. policy] could end up leading to a multiyear occupation that won't serve the interests of the United States."

Keeping the public eye on an exit strategy -- rather than on how many new troops would be deployed, the subject of much of the U.S. public debate so far -- could also help Mr. Obama sell his strategy at home.

"What the White House wants is a strategic glide path that gives a sense of the path ahead and the time it will take to meet each specific target," the defense official said. "It's not a hard-and-fast timetable for withdrawal."

However, Mr. Brown -- who faces significant, growing U.K. public opposition to the war -- has called for an international conference next year that would come up with a "process for transferring district-by-district to full Afghan control," and set a clear schedule for doing so, beginning as early as next year [more at this post].

If I were an Afghan I'd be losing confidence in the, er, occupiers.