and joining me now is npr's sean carberry.s the news organization's chief kabul correspondent before it closed down its permanent presence in afghanistan a few weeks ago. and welcome. i want to start where that pace ended with the troops that will remain even after this is officially declared over. what will they be doing? >> well they will have two primary missions. one is counterterrorism operations. so going after any remnants of al qaeda or affiliated groups that are still in afghanistan. the second is what the military calls a train advise and assist mission which is essentially to continue mentoring and helping the afghan forces which is really what has been going on for the better part of the last year. u.s. forces transition from running combat operations to this training advisement largely over the course of 9 year. so there is not a huge dramatic shift that is happening right now. >> that is the obvious question. what does it mean in practical terms that this end of the war ceremony? >> not that much. >> it really is