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Photo President Trump arriving at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Friday after a day trip to Miami. He has given Jim Mattis, the defense secretary, the authority to send several thousand additional troops to Afghanistan. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times

To the Editor:

Re President Cedes Afghan Strategy to the Pentagon (front page, June 19):

I read with shock and dismay that President Trump has in effect given over the planning and implementation for the war in Afghanistan to the military, which argued to expand the military effort even though Afghanistan is an unstable country with endemic corruption. Even though Afghanistan is far from the American mainland. Even though the 3,000 to 5,000 troops are being asked to deploy without an overall strategy, let alone an endgame.

Has President Trump no feeling at all about the extreme danger to which he is subjecting these troops with apparently no interest in providing a rationale for their deployment? Is there no end to ill-conceived military exploits in a faraway land we know nothing about?

Have we not learned anything since Vietnam?

BRUCE CHADWICK, BROOKLYN

A version of this letter appears in print on June 22, 2017, on Page A26 of the New York edition with the headline: Handing Off Afghanistan.

Read more from the original source:
Handing Off Afghanistan - New York Times