KABUL, Afghanistan – Afghanistan’s president has branded his U.S. allies as corrupt, wasteful and contemptuous of Afghan lives. Once he even threatened to join the Taliban. Nonetheless, Hamid Karzai signed a deal that could keep thousands of U.S. troops in his country for years.

Despite his rhetoric, Karzai needs international support if Afghanistan is to survive economically and avoid descending into civil war like it did when the Soviets left two decades ago.

Additional Photos

President Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai speak before signing a strategic partnership agreement at the presidential palace in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Wednesday. The Associated Press

The signing of the long-term strategic partnership, which will govern the relationship between the two countries from the end of 2014 until 2024, was welcomed on Wednesday by leading Afghans as a positive message that the West will not turn its back on their country.

It also gives Afghanistan much-needed military support to deal with an insurgency that shows no signs of abating. Less than two hours after President Obama left Afghanistan early Wednesday, the Taliban carried out a brazen suicide attack in the capital against a heavily fortified compound housing hundreds of foreigners, killing at least seven Afghan civilians.

“Karzai was thinking that maybe it is good for the national interest of Afghanistan, its stability, peace and security. Without the Americans, peace and stability is difficult,” said Wahid Muzhda, a leading political analyst and ethnic Pashtun – the community from which the Taliban draws most of their members.

Even neighboring Pakistan, which has been accused by the United States of not doing enough to dismantle insurgent safe havens on its territory, would benefit from a continued American presence in Afghani stan, some analysts say.

Riffat Hussain, a professor of Defense Studies at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, acknowledged that some Pakistani officials, especially in the military, are worried that the U.S.-supported Afghan government is too cozy with Pakistan’s archenemy, India. But he said that many officials are even more concerned about what will happen in Afghanistan if international forces leave.

“Many in Pakistan think continued American military and NATO presence is not necessarily a bad thing because in the absence of their presence, Afghanistan is more likely to descend into chaos,” Hussain said.

The agreement is widely expected to be approved by the 249-member Afghan parliament, possibly as early as next week.

“As long as it is good for the country and good for the Afghan people, we would like to vote in favor of it. We would like to accept that partnership with a very clear stand, a stand which will assure Afghans that Afghanistan will be a prosperous country,” said parliament member Shukria Barekzai, a Pashtun.

The partnership accord has been described as the capstone in a series of agreements that Afghanistan is signing with U.S. allies. A failure to make a deal with the United States would have endangered pacts it has already signed with America’s NATO allies, including Britain.

“The signing of strategic partnerships with European countries and especially the United States is to the benefit of Afghanistan,” said Nazir Ahmad Hanafi, a member of Afghanistan’s parliament and supreme religious council who hails from the western city of Herat.

The deal signed overnight by Obama and Karzai does not commit the United States to any specific troop presence or spending. But it does give the U.S. the option of keeping forces in Afghanistan after combat troops withdraw by 2014 for two specific purposes: training of Afghan forces and operations against al-Qaida.

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