Defense Secretary Leon Panetta says the U.S. plans to end its combat role in Afghanistan in 2013, according to a New York Times breaking news alert.
The Times reports:
Mr. Panetta cast the decision as an orderly step in a withdrawal process long planned by the United States and its allies, but his comments were the first time that the United States had put a date on stepping back from its central role in the war. The defense secretary’s words reflected the Obama administration’s eagerness to bring to a close the second of two grinding ground wars it inherited from the Bush administration.
