Acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller has announced a major troop withdrawal in Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia. The news is being met with plenty of skepticism. “It’s time to leave Afghanistan.” That’s what the Pentagon’s new acting leader, Chris Miller, wrote in a two-page memo to Defense Department staff on Nov. 13.

The findings of a four-year military inquiry paint a brutal picture of a special forces culture of rewarding the killing of innocents and prisoners and methodically covering it up.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on a phone call with President Ghani on Wednesday evening discussed the Afghan peace process and troops level adjustment with the Afghan leader.

The Taliban captured Maymay district in the northeastern province of Badakhshan on Thursday, according to lawmakers and provincial council members, who said “several” security force members were killed in an offensive by the Taliban.