President Obama will detail the numbers of troops to be withdrawn from Afghanistan -- and at what pace -- but he will also try to send several messages intonight's big speech.
Among them:
This is the beginning of the end. Obama and his aides have stressed an agreement among the U.S., NATO, and other allies to turn over all security operations to Afghanistan by the year 2014 -- the real deadline for the war.
"This is within a framework of the gradual transition of security lead to the Afghans," said White House spokesman Jay Carney. "It's begun already in some places, but it will progress over the next several years."
He knows that the war -- now nearly ten years old -- is increasingly unpopular. Obama may cite the financial costs of the war, especially at a time of economic uncertainty in the United States.
It will be interesting to see if Obama mentions another controversial aspect of the war: Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai. U.S. lawmakers have accused Karzai's government of corruption, while Karzai has criticized U.S. military action.
The war has been worth it. Obama -- a critic of the Iraq war -- has defended the action in Afghanistan, stressing that it served as a base for al Qaeda terrorists in the years before 9/11.
"The process was all about the mission that was laid out in December of 2009, the surge in forces that followed from that decision and that mission, and the evaluation of the success that we've had since that mission began," Carney said. "Having said that, we are always mindful of the fact that, as powerful and wealthy as this country is, we do not have infinite and unlimited resources."
There has been success. On Dec. 1, 2009, Obama ordered the deployment of 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan -- and added that he would begin a withdrawal process in July of 2010.
Obama is expected to say the troop surge has been a success, all but wiping out al Qaeda in Afghanistan.
The death of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is also likely to get a presidential mission.
"The successful mission against Osama bin Laden highlights the broader success that we have had in going after members of al Qaeda in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region," Carrney said.
