NATO/ISAF

Gen­er­al McK­ier­nan assumes com­mand of ISAF

Gen­er­al McK­ier­nan assumed Com­mand of ISAF from US Gen­er­al Dan McNeill dur­ing a han­dover cer­e­mo­ny held on 3 June 2008 in Kab­ul. The Pres­i­dent of the Islam­ic Repub­lic of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, the Supreme Allied Com­man­der Europe, Gen­er­al John Crad­dock and the Com­man­der of the Joint Forces Com­mand (JFC) Brun­ssum, Gen­er­al Egon Ramms, attend­ed the event.

“I am hon­ored to serve along­side our Afghan hosts and broth­ers to work toward a com­mon com­pre­hen­sive set of goals,” said Gen­er­al McK­ier­nan. “While today marks a tran­si­tion in the com­man­ders, the mis­sion must con­tin­ue with­out miss­ing a beat” he added. 

Pres­i­dent Karzai wel­comed the new ISAF Com­man­der. “Togeth­er with the Afghan offi­cers, Min­istry of Defense and the Chief of the Afghan Army you will work to pro­mote the stan­dards to the Afghan Army, you will equip them bet­ter and even­tu­al­ly enable them to serve and defend this coun­try them­selves” he stated. 

The Com­man­der of JFC Brun­ssum, Gen­er­al Ramms, who presided over the change of com­mand, stressed: “Although I rec­og­nize inse­cu­ri­ty can­not be over­come by mil­i­tary means alone, I believe ISAF is now bet­ter placed than ever to facil­i­tate the nec­es­sary sta­bil­i­ty for eco­nom­ic and social devel­op­ment and to coop­er­ate with the Gov­ern­ment of the Islam­ic Repub­lic of Afghanistan and the UNAMA with an inte­grat­ed approach.” 

Gen­er­al McNeill relieves his com­mand of the ISAF Head­quar­ters after a 16 month tour of duty. After 40 years of com­mis­sion­ing in the US Army, he is due to retire in July. “It has been my priv­i­lege to have the hon­or to serve in this alliance and to serve the peo­ple of Afghanistan,” he stat­ed. “I offer the peo­ple of Afghanistan, many of whom are my friends, my grat­i­tude for the gen­eros­i­ty and hos­pi­tal­i­ty that they have shown me. My grat­i­tude also goes to the allied sol­diers, sailors, air­men, Marines and civil­ians for what they have done and what they will con­tin­ue to do for the peo­ple of Afghanistan.” 

The new ISAF Com­man­der, Gen­er­al McK­ier­nan, has been in the US Army for 36 years and has served in every capac­i­ty from pla­toon leader to num­bered Army com­man­der in Europe, Unit­ed States, Korea and South­west Asia. His deploy­ment expe­ri­ence includes, but is not lim­it­ed to, Sara­je­vo, Bosnia-Herze­gov­ina, Alba­nia and Kosovo. 

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