Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/success-worth-paying-for-in-afghanistan/2011/06/01/AGwGGZHH_print.html
By Michael O’Hanlon,
America’s political debate has turned to government spending, debt and the country’s long-term economic health. Many rightly view the military budget as an important ingredient in any deficit-reduction plan. But some have extended this logic to the war in Afghanistan, with even administration insiders telling The Post that spending has gone too high and that costs will influence President Obama’s decision about how quickly to start withdrawing troops next month. Their ranks are bolstered by outside strategists who argue that spending so much on distant, poor Afghanistan leaves us unable to invest properly in other areas.
This is an understandable but incorrect way of viewing the Afghan war. Regardless of Obama’s choices this summer, total costs of the war will exceed half a trillion dollars. Those favoring a more rapid drawdown than do most field commanders would be able to save at most 15 percent in total costs, while jeopardizing the campaign’s future. Losing the war could give al-Qaeda its largest sanctuary — an undesirable development even after the demise of Osama bin Laden — and also provide sanctuaries for groups such as the Pakistani Taliban and Lashkar i-Taiba. Moreover, we tried fighting this war on the cheap, from 2002 to 2005, and the result was a revival of the insurgency.
True, the war’s course has been extremely difficult. Many news reports focus on suicide bombings or government corruption. Even relative success, defined as a future Afghan government that can control most of its territory with little outside help, is not guaranteed. But evidence is mounting that our military strategy is working — and rapid troop drawdowns this summer and fall are not consistent with the plan.
That plan, in a nutshell: In 2011, consolidate increasingly secure areas in Afghanistan’s south while fending off an expected Taliban counteroffensive that, while likely to be hamstrung by the NATO/Afghan government progress of the past year, could still be potent. Assassination campaigns and spectacular bombings can be expected to pose particular threats even if overall battlefield dynamics are turning the way of coalition forces from Kabul to Kandahar to Helmand. In 2012, increasingly turn over responsibilities for security in the south to rapidly improving Afghan army and police forces while bolstering U.S. efforts in the east. In 2013 and 2014, accelerate foreign troop drawdowns as Afghan forces reach full capability and as the insurgency has been considerably weakened. Throughout all this, continue work on Afghan economic development and government capacity while supporting President Hamid Karzai’s efforts at realistic peace talks with the Afghan insurgency.
The strategy has weak points, especially at the political level. Washington is having a hard time motivating Pakistan to go after insurgent sanctuaries on its soil, and we lack an adequate plan for supporting Afghan political development as the country moves toward presidential elections in 2014. But the military effort increasingly shows results. In the country’s south, for instance, at least 10 percent more Afghans consider roads secure than did a year ago; most government officials in the south now travel by road rather than NATO helicopter; the number of schools open in Helmand province has increased by 50 percent since late 2009; Afghan army and police contributions to recent offensives in the south have been about half of all necessary coalition forces; and poppy production is down by half over the past three years.
To be sure, the war is not cheap. The Congressional Research Service puts U.S. costs through this summer at around $444 billion since 2001. That includes some $25 billion for Afghan security forces and $25 billion in economic development efforts. Current strategy implies another year (starting Oct. 1) of total American costs over $100 billion. It is realistic to expect that fiscal 2013 costs might be $75 billion and 2014 costs around $50 billion, as NATO prepares to hand off responsibility to the Afghan government nationwide and dramatically reduce its presence. More modest annual costs thereafter would still push the combined American investment over $700 billion, rivaling the prices of the wars in Korea and Iraq.
That’s a lot of money. But next to a national debt of $14 trillion, it hardly looks astronomical. And the costs look even more reasonable measured against the costs of defeat — defined as a Taliban takeover of at least southern Afghanistan; and associated sanctuaries for the world’s worst terrorist groups, which still want to strike American cities, gain control of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and provoke another India-Pakistan war. Measured against the likely alternative costs, at this point the incremental cost of sustaining the current strategy to its logical conclusion is within reason. We’re already committed to spending $444 billion; no big savings are feasible this summer regardless of the president’s July decision. Even adopting a “counterterrorism plus” strategy similar to what the vice president purportedly favors would keep an average of perhaps 50,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan over the coming year, 30,000 the following year and 20,000 in the country thereafter, indefinitely. By the rule of thumb that keeping an American soldier in Afghanistan for a year costs about $1 million, the cumulative expenses approach $600 billion by 2016 or so.
If a war’s failure is inevitable, we must of course focus on the people and resources that could be saved by terminating a hopeless endeavor. But after a decade of learning by American strategists and policymakers, the Afghanistan campaign is on a much better track. While no sterling success seems likely, a reasonable outcome is probably within reach: preventing that country from again being the most dangerous terrorist sanctuary on Earth, if we stay patient over the next two to three years and carry out troop drawdowns gradually.
Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, co-authors Brookings’ Afghanistan index. He is co-author of “Toughing It Out in Afghanistan” and “Toward a Political Strategy for Afghanistan.”
© The Washington Post Company
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Monday, June 13, 2011
Afghanistan choice weighs on Obama
POLITICO
By: Josh Gerstein and Mike Allen
June 7, 2011 04:42 AM EDT
As President Barack Obama prepares to make a major decision about the pace of U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan, congressional opposition to the decade-long war appears to be hardening.
But it’s unclear whether critics of the president’s Afghanistan policy can force him to accelerate the pullout, which he has promised will begin next month.
Obama must decide whether he will accept an initial withdrawal of about 5,000 troops — which many experts expect the Pentagon to recommend — or whether he will insist on a more robust downsizing, as an increasing number of lawmakers from both parties are urging.
“There has been a steady erosion of political support for a sustained engagement in Afghanistan,” said Peter Feaver, a former National Security Council official under President George W. Bush.
The most dramatic sign of that trend came May 26, when the House narrowly defeated an amendment that would have pushed Obama to speed up the promised withdrawal and broaden negotiations with the Taliban. The measure failed on a 204-215 vote, as 26 Republicans joined 178 Democrats to challenge Obama’s policy.
Despite the increasing resistance on Capitol Hill, public opposition to the war has eased somewhat since the killing of Osama bin Laden in a U.S. military raid in Pakistan last month. An ABC News-Washington Post poll taken in early June found 54 percent of respondents consider the war not worth fighting, down from a high of 64 percent in March. However, nearly three-quarters of Americans say they want to see a “substantial” U.S. withdrawal this summer.
The president was guarded about his plans during an interview Monday.
“What I’ve said is that this summer is going to be a summer of transition,” he told Cleveland TV station WEWS. “By killing bin Laden, by blunting the Taliban, we have now accomplished a lot of what we set out to accomplish 10 years ago.”
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasized Monday that the size of the withdrawal is unresolved.
“There have been no decisions made,” Clinton said during a meeting with French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe. “We’re still gathering our best assessment.” She said the plan for full withdrawal of combat troops by 2014 remains on track.
Over the weekend, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters that he favors a “modest” drawdown in July. Obama has previously said the initial pullout will be “significant.”
During a briefing Monday, White House press secretary Jay Carney declined to adopt or explain either adjective.
“It depends on how you define what ‘modest’ is or ‘significant’ is,” he said. “It will be a real drawdown, but it will depend on the conditions on the ground.”
Beyond general war fatigue, increasing attention to the debt and deficit on Capitol Hill is adding pressure to limit the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan, which costs about $2 billion a month.
“To try and get the country to function like a free democracy is going to take a lot of years,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.). “Because of our deficit, you can’t justify doing it.”
Carney said the expense of the operation will not be the driving factor in Obama’s decision on the pace of the pullout.
“Every decision is made with a mind [toward] costs, but this is a national-security decision, primarily,” Carney said.
The killing of Al Qaeda leader bin Laden by Navy SEALs last month also has emboldened lawmakers pushing for a faster drawdown of American troops.
“Bin Laden is dead. Declare victory and come home,” said North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones, a leader of the GOP anti-war coalition.
John Mueller, an Ohio State University professor who studies public opinion on U.S. wars, said some attitudes have changed since bin Laden’s death because the “only real reason for being there that had any political clout was to prevent another 9/11.”
“Bin Laden has been … built up so assiduously as a Darth Vader character,” Mueller said. “But if you go to the movies, you know that when Darth Vader dies, you know the whole thing is over.
Yet Gates, who was traveling in Afghanistan on Monday, said he has seen little immediate effects from bin Laden’s death on the war effort.
“It’s a month since bin Laden was killed. So I think it’s really just too early to know what the impact will be,” Gates told troops who raised the issue with him.
From the highest ranks of the Pentagon to ground commanders, defense and military officials are convinced the Afghanistan strategy is working but needs more time and political patience to succeed.
Gates is not blind to the political pressure from Washington but is certainly not resigned to defeat on the issue, according to advisers.
The secretary sees the situation as reminiscent of fall 2007, when the surge in Iraq produced significant U.S. progress, but the war remained unpopular, and Congress wanted to tie funding to a withdrawal date. The Pentagon stuck to its position and ultimately prevailed and hopes to do so again.
“We’ve made tremendous strides … in the last 15 to 18 months, but my view is we’ve got to keep the pressure on,” Gates said.
However, Gates signaled he isn’t sure how big a withdrawal Obama will order initially.
“The drawdown is a subject that we’re going to be talking about over the next two or three weeks,” the defense secretary told a soldier who asked about the pace.
South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a key GOP backer of Obama’s Afghanistan strategy, has warned repeatedly that anti-war liberals and conservative budget hawks could eventually join together in an “unholy alliance” to force a quick pullout. “My concern is that, for different reasons, they join forcesand we lose the ability to hold this thing together,” he said last year.
However, some analysts expressed doubts that Congress has the stomach for an all-out confrontation with Obama over Afghanistan policy, such as a serious effort to cut off funding for the war.
“You can have Gallup numbers under 50 [percent supporting the war] and still be able to have the political support to continue the current policy,” noted Feaver, a political science professor at Duke.
Some congressional aides said the continued support from key senators, such as Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), is more important than the prevailing view in the House or among the public.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who has generally endorsed Obama’s approach, said Monday she’s not particularly comfortable with public debate about the withdrawal plan.
“I’m not one to project what you’re going to do, from an intelligence point of view,” Feinstein said. “The Taliban, the Haqqani [terrorist network], Al Qaeda, none of the above are stupid. They all read. They all know. And the degree to which we telescope what we’re going to do will determine what they do. … A lot of discussion makes no sense.”
Feaver added that talk about a Senate firewall to protect the war effort is itself a sign of eroding support.
“One measure of how dire the situation is is when you’re relying on a couple of key senators to hold the thing together,” Feaver said.
Congress could start restraining Obama in more tangential ways, such as stepping up efforts to end U.S. involvement in Libya. “Congress can exact pain on other national security issues,” Feaver said. “Some of the Libya stuff is really a bank shot off of Afghanistan frustration.”
Feaver said opposition to Obama’s policy in Afghanistan is still less intense than the resistance President George W. Bush faced to the surge in Iraq.
“That was substantially more widespread and entrenched and motivated than anything Obama has faced yet,” the former Bush aide said. “Even today, I’d say we’re nowhere near the 2007 standard, but we’re inching in that direction.”
Mike Allen reported from Afghanistan. Reid Epstein and Meredith Shiner also contributed to this report.
By: Josh Gerstein and Mike Allen
June 7, 2011 04:42 AM EDT
As President Barack Obama prepares to make a major decision about the pace of U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan, congressional opposition to the decade-long war appears to be hardening.
But it’s unclear whether critics of the president’s Afghanistan policy can force him to accelerate the pullout, which he has promised will begin next month.
Obama must decide whether he will accept an initial withdrawal of about 5,000 troops — which many experts expect the Pentagon to recommend — or whether he will insist on a more robust downsizing, as an increasing number of lawmakers from both parties are urging.
“There has been a steady erosion of political support for a sustained engagement in Afghanistan,” said Peter Feaver, a former National Security Council official under President George W. Bush.
The most dramatic sign of that trend came May 26, when the House narrowly defeated an amendment that would have pushed Obama to speed up the promised withdrawal and broaden negotiations with the Taliban. The measure failed on a 204-215 vote, as 26 Republicans joined 178 Democrats to challenge Obama’s policy.
Despite the increasing resistance on Capitol Hill, public opposition to the war has eased somewhat since the killing of Osama bin Laden in a U.S. military raid in Pakistan last month. An ABC News-Washington Post poll taken in early June found 54 percent of respondents consider the war not worth fighting, down from a high of 64 percent in March. However, nearly three-quarters of Americans say they want to see a “substantial” U.S. withdrawal this summer.
The president was guarded about his plans during an interview Monday.
“What I’ve said is that this summer is going to be a summer of transition,” he told Cleveland TV station WEWS. “By killing bin Laden, by blunting the Taliban, we have now accomplished a lot of what we set out to accomplish 10 years ago.”
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasized Monday that the size of the withdrawal is unresolved.
“There have been no decisions made,” Clinton said during a meeting with French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe. “We’re still gathering our best assessment.” She said the plan for full withdrawal of combat troops by 2014 remains on track.
Over the weekend, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters that he favors a “modest” drawdown in July. Obama has previously said the initial pullout will be “significant.”
During a briefing Monday, White House press secretary Jay Carney declined to adopt or explain either adjective.
“It depends on how you define what ‘modest’ is or ‘significant’ is,” he said. “It will be a real drawdown, but it will depend on the conditions on the ground.”
Beyond general war fatigue, increasing attention to the debt and deficit on Capitol Hill is adding pressure to limit the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan, which costs about $2 billion a month.
“To try and get the country to function like a free democracy is going to take a lot of years,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.). “Because of our deficit, you can’t justify doing it.”
Carney said the expense of the operation will not be the driving factor in Obama’s decision on the pace of the pullout.
“Every decision is made with a mind [toward] costs, but this is a national-security decision, primarily,” Carney said.
The killing of Al Qaeda leader bin Laden by Navy SEALs last month also has emboldened lawmakers pushing for a faster drawdown of American troops.
“Bin Laden is dead. Declare victory and come home,” said North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones, a leader of the GOP anti-war coalition.
John Mueller, an Ohio State University professor who studies public opinion on U.S. wars, said some attitudes have changed since bin Laden’s death because the “only real reason for being there that had any political clout was to prevent another 9/11.”
“Bin Laden has been … built up so assiduously as a Darth Vader character,” Mueller said. “But if you go to the movies, you know that when Darth Vader dies, you know the whole thing is over.
Yet Gates, who was traveling in Afghanistan on Monday, said he has seen little immediate effects from bin Laden’s death on the war effort.
“It’s a month since bin Laden was killed. So I think it’s really just too early to know what the impact will be,” Gates told troops who raised the issue with him.
From the highest ranks of the Pentagon to ground commanders, defense and military officials are convinced the Afghanistan strategy is working but needs more time and political patience to succeed.
Gates is not blind to the political pressure from Washington but is certainly not resigned to defeat on the issue, according to advisers.
The secretary sees the situation as reminiscent of fall 2007, when the surge in Iraq produced significant U.S. progress, but the war remained unpopular, and Congress wanted to tie funding to a withdrawal date. The Pentagon stuck to its position and ultimately prevailed and hopes to do so again.
“We’ve made tremendous strides … in the last 15 to 18 months, but my view is we’ve got to keep the pressure on,” Gates said.
However, Gates signaled he isn’t sure how big a withdrawal Obama will order initially.
“The drawdown is a subject that we’re going to be talking about over the next two or three weeks,” the defense secretary told a soldier who asked about the pace.
South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a key GOP backer of Obama’s Afghanistan strategy, has warned repeatedly that anti-war liberals and conservative budget hawks could eventually join together in an “unholy alliance” to force a quick pullout. “My concern is that, for different reasons, they join forcesand we lose the ability to hold this thing together,” he said last year.
However, some analysts expressed doubts that Congress has the stomach for an all-out confrontation with Obama over Afghanistan policy, such as a serious effort to cut off funding for the war.
“You can have Gallup numbers under 50 [percent supporting the war] and still be able to have the political support to continue the current policy,” noted Feaver, a political science professor at Duke.
Some congressional aides said the continued support from key senators, such as Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), is more important than the prevailing view in the House or among the public.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who has generally endorsed Obama’s approach, said Monday she’s not particularly comfortable with public debate about the withdrawal plan.
“I’m not one to project what you’re going to do, from an intelligence point of view,” Feinstein said. “The Taliban, the Haqqani [terrorist network], Al Qaeda, none of the above are stupid. They all read. They all know. And the degree to which we telescope what we’re going to do will determine what they do. … A lot of discussion makes no sense.”
Feaver added that talk about a Senate firewall to protect the war effort is itself a sign of eroding support.
“One measure of how dire the situation is is when you’re relying on a couple of key senators to hold the thing together,” Feaver said.
Congress could start restraining Obama in more tangential ways, such as stepping up efforts to end U.S. involvement in Libya. “Congress can exact pain on other national security issues,” Feaver said. “Some of the Libya stuff is really a bank shot off of Afghanistan frustration.”
Feaver said opposition to Obama’s policy in Afghanistan is still less intense than the resistance President George W. Bush faced to the surge in Iraq.
“That was substantially more widespread and entrenched and motivated than anything Obama has faced yet,” the former Bush aide said. “Even today, I’d say we’re nowhere near the 2007 standard, but we’re inching in that direction.”
Mike Allen reported from Afghanistan. Reid Epstein and Meredith Shiner also contributed to this report.
Gates insists it's too early to end combat in Afghanistan
latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-afghan-gates-20110607,0,2534142.story
latimes.com
Touring bases as he prepares to retire, the Pentagon chief is asked repeatedly by troops whether Osama bin Laden's death means the U.S. can end the war in Afghanistan. Not yet, is his response.
By David S. Cloud, Los Angeles Times
June 7, 2011
Reporting from Forward Operating Base Shank,
advertisement
Over and over again, soldiers and Marines on the punishing front lines across Afghanistan had the same question for Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates: Does Osama bin Laden's death mean the U.S. can finally wind down a nearly decade-long war?
Not yet, Gates replied.
The persistent question also is being asked increasingly in Washington, as debate intensifies over when and how to start bringing home the 100,000 U.S. troops deployed in a conflict that is increasingly unpopular in America.
Enlisted men and women in grueling war zones typically ask visiting brass about equipment and benefits, not strategy or policy. But Gates fielded inquiries about the future of America's painful involvement in Afghanistan at four of his five stops in the south and east at far-flung Army fire bases and a dusty Marine camp on Sunday and Monday. The questions were polite, respectful and insistent.
"Sir, since the death of Osama bin Laden, has the military strategy changed at all?" a young female soldier in the 101st Airborne Division's 4th Brigade asked Gates after he thanked several hundred soldiers at their headquarters in rugged southeast Paktika province, near the border with Pakistan.
Older veterans, especially those serving their second or third combat tours, also wonder how long they must stay now, after U.S. Navy SEALs killed the founder of Al Qaeda on May 2, said Sgt. Theodore Martell, an Army medic, at this remote helicopter base in rural Lowgar province.
On a three-day visit to Afghanistan, Gates appeared to lay out his thinking on the military drawdown ahead of White House deliberations, in an effort to preempt those who favor steep troop cuts. The discussions are expected to start next week after he returns to Washington. For Gates, making his 12th and final visit as Defense secretary to thank troops before he retires this month, the answer was simple.
"We've made a lot of headway but we have a ways to go," he told soldiers with the 1st Infantry Division stationed at Combat Outpost Andar, a heavily fortified base in eastern Afghanistan's battle-scarred Ghazni province.
Over time, Gates said, the U.S. mission would become "less and less" counterinsurgency against Taliban fighters and "more and more counter-terrorism" against Al Qaeda and its allies. "But I don't think we are ready to do that."
Yet the growing questions about the necessity of continued combat in Afghanistan have made the size and pace of the drawdown much less certain, said senior officials in Washington and Afghanistan.
Until recently, Gates and Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, appeared to hold the upper hand in arguing to maintain a maximum number of troops in the field for as long as possible. But Gates and Petraeus are retiring; Petraeus has been nominated to run the CIA.
Now White House aides and others who long have been skeptical of a troop-heavy strategy see opportunity to force a reassessment. They contend that steep withdrawals are possible because military pressure in Afghanistan and CIA drone strikes in neighboring Pakistan are reducing the threat from Bin Laden's terrorist network — one of President Obama's main objectives.
"It has strengthened those who say we can accomplish what we need to and still bring out the surge forces more quickly," said a U.S. official. The official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak about internal deliberations, was referring to the 30,000 additional troops that Obama ordered to Afghanistan in late 2009.
Obama has pledged to begin a "significant" drawdown of U.S. forces starting next month, but the size of the withdrawals and the pace of those to follow over the next two years will be the subject of closed-door deliberations in coming weeks.
Obama has not indicated whether he thinks killing Bin Laden gives him more latitude to make deep troop cuts. Nor has he said whether he will be swayed by the growing costs of the war, now totaling close to $12 billion a month.
Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, said Monday that the decision would not boil down to dollars and cents. "Obviously every decision is made with a mind toward cost," he said. "But this is a decision about U.S. national security interests."
Advisors to Obama said Monday that the troop drawdown would not be a token one.
"We're not debating the policy questions anymore," said a senior administration official, who requested anonymity while discussing internal deliberations. "The only relevant inquiry now is, 'What are the conditions on the ground?'"
Obama's national security team discussed the war and prospects for a strategic partnership with the Afghan government in a two-hour meeting in the White House situation room Monday. Gates took part via a secure video line.
The group did not discuss a troop withdrawal number, said people familiar with the discussion.
In Afghanistan, each time Gates was asked by troops about the fallout of Bin Laden's death, he reiterated that it was important to keep the military pressure on the Taliban.
Asked about the repeated questions to Gates, Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, second ranking U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said that rank-and-file troops "see the news and everything else." But, he insisted, "they believe the strategy is sound."
Gates received at least two other memorable questions as he prepares to leave the Pentagon job he has held for five years under two presidents.
One soldier asked whether he and his buddies could persuade him "to extend your deployment."
"No," Gates answered.
And in the dusty helicopter base in Lowgar province, a sergeant asked for career advice. "One of my soldiers has aspirations to be secretary of Defense," he said. "What advice would you give him?"
Gates replied, "Don't."
latimes.com
Touring bases as he prepares to retire, the Pentagon chief is asked repeatedly by troops whether Osama bin Laden's death means the U.S. can end the war in Afghanistan. Not yet, is his response.
By David S. Cloud, Los Angeles Times
June 7, 2011
Reporting from Forward Operating Base Shank,
advertisement
Over and over again, soldiers and Marines on the punishing front lines across Afghanistan had the same question for Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates: Does Osama bin Laden's death mean the U.S. can finally wind down a nearly decade-long war?
Not yet, Gates replied.
The persistent question also is being asked increasingly in Washington, as debate intensifies over when and how to start bringing home the 100,000 U.S. troops deployed in a conflict that is increasingly unpopular in America.
Enlisted men and women in grueling war zones typically ask visiting brass about equipment and benefits, not strategy or policy. But Gates fielded inquiries about the future of America's painful involvement in Afghanistan at four of his five stops in the south and east at far-flung Army fire bases and a dusty Marine camp on Sunday and Monday. The questions were polite, respectful and insistent.
"Sir, since the death of Osama bin Laden, has the military strategy changed at all?" a young female soldier in the 101st Airborne Division's 4th Brigade asked Gates after he thanked several hundred soldiers at their headquarters in rugged southeast Paktika province, near the border with Pakistan.
Older veterans, especially those serving their second or third combat tours, also wonder how long they must stay now, after U.S. Navy SEALs killed the founder of Al Qaeda on May 2, said Sgt. Theodore Martell, an Army medic, at this remote helicopter base in rural Lowgar province.
On a three-day visit to Afghanistan, Gates appeared to lay out his thinking on the military drawdown ahead of White House deliberations, in an effort to preempt those who favor steep troop cuts. The discussions are expected to start next week after he returns to Washington. For Gates, making his 12th and final visit as Defense secretary to thank troops before he retires this month, the answer was simple.
"We've made a lot of headway but we have a ways to go," he told soldiers with the 1st Infantry Division stationed at Combat Outpost Andar, a heavily fortified base in eastern Afghanistan's battle-scarred Ghazni province.
Over time, Gates said, the U.S. mission would become "less and less" counterinsurgency against Taliban fighters and "more and more counter-terrorism" against Al Qaeda and its allies. "But I don't think we are ready to do that."
Yet the growing questions about the necessity of continued combat in Afghanistan have made the size and pace of the drawdown much less certain, said senior officials in Washington and Afghanistan.
Until recently, Gates and Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, appeared to hold the upper hand in arguing to maintain a maximum number of troops in the field for as long as possible. But Gates and Petraeus are retiring; Petraeus has been nominated to run the CIA.
Now White House aides and others who long have been skeptical of a troop-heavy strategy see opportunity to force a reassessment. They contend that steep withdrawals are possible because military pressure in Afghanistan and CIA drone strikes in neighboring Pakistan are reducing the threat from Bin Laden's terrorist network — one of President Obama's main objectives.
"It has strengthened those who say we can accomplish what we need to and still bring out the surge forces more quickly," said a U.S. official. The official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak about internal deliberations, was referring to the 30,000 additional troops that Obama ordered to Afghanistan in late 2009.
Obama has pledged to begin a "significant" drawdown of U.S. forces starting next month, but the size of the withdrawals and the pace of those to follow over the next two years will be the subject of closed-door deliberations in coming weeks.
Obama has not indicated whether he thinks killing Bin Laden gives him more latitude to make deep troop cuts. Nor has he said whether he will be swayed by the growing costs of the war, now totaling close to $12 billion a month.
Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, said Monday that the decision would not boil down to dollars and cents. "Obviously every decision is made with a mind toward cost," he said. "But this is a decision about U.S. national security interests."
Advisors to Obama said Monday that the troop drawdown would not be a token one.
"We're not debating the policy questions anymore," said a senior administration official, who requested anonymity while discussing internal deliberations. "The only relevant inquiry now is, 'What are the conditions on the ground?'"
Obama's national security team discussed the war and prospects for a strategic partnership with the Afghan government in a two-hour meeting in the White House situation room Monday. Gates took part via a secure video line.
The group did not discuss a troop withdrawal number, said people familiar with the discussion.
In Afghanistan, each time Gates was asked by troops about the fallout of Bin Laden's death, he reiterated that it was important to keep the military pressure on the Taliban.
Asked about the repeated questions to Gates, Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, second ranking U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said that rank-and-file troops "see the news and everything else." But, he insisted, "they believe the strategy is sound."
Gates received at least two other memorable questions as he prepares to leave the Pentagon job he has held for five years under two presidents.
One soldier asked whether he and his buddies could persuade him "to extend your deployment."
"No," Gates answered.
And in the dusty helicopter base in Lowgar province, a sergeant asked for career advice. "One of my soldiers has aspirations to be secretary of Defense," he said. "What advice would you give him?"
Gates replied, "Don't."
Military Seeks to Make Case Against Too-Hasty Reduction of Troops in Afghanistan
NYtimes
June 6, 2011 by xmlbot
WASHINGTON — With a major internal debate gathering inside the White House over how quickly to reduce the size of the American fighting force in Afghanistan, the military pushed back on Monday against the prospect of a substantial withdrawal, arguing that to leave too early would imperil hard-fought gains.
Finishing his final trip to Afghanistan as defense secretary on Monday, Robert M. Gates told troops there, “I think we shouldn’t let up on the gas too much, at least for the next few months.”
Mr. Gates met over the weekend with the American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, who is hammering out a suggested schedule for the troop reduction. The Pentagon knows the White House will be deeply skeptical that keeping troops around for another fighting season next spring would make strategic or political sense.
In Washington, senior military officials say the withdrawal of United States forces depends in large part on the ability of the Afghans to defend themselves, an effort they concede is still a work in progress and makes them reluctant to remove troops too quickly.
Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, the American in charge of the NATO effort to train Afghan forces, said Monday that although NATO was on track to reach its goal of training 305,000 army and police forces by October, attrition remained a significant problem. Those forces currently total 296,000.
General Caldwell said that about 30 percent of Afghan soldiers leave the Army every year before their terms of service are up, particularly in areas of heavy combat where they are needed most. In addition, he said that only one in 10 recruits can read and write, meaning NATO must first provide literacy training so that soldiers are able to write their names and read serial numbers on their weapons. So far, he said, NATO has trained 90,000 men in basic literacy.
As military officials made their case for caution in reducing American troop strength, President Obama met with his senior national security advisers in the White House Situation Room to review progress in Afghanistan. That meeting was not intended to debate the withdrawal, which will happen in a separate process over the next few weeks.
Aides said Mr. Obama had not received any recommendations on troop reductions. Still, the meeting on Monday was likely to inform that debate, because it was one of the last moments for the military to make its case about the progress it was making, including in training Afghan troops.
Mr. Obama will hold a video teleconference with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan on Wednesday to discuss the war, the White House spokesman, Jay Carney, said Monday.
At issue is where Mr. Obama sets the “bookends,” in Mr. Gates’s phrase, of how quickly American troops begin to depart, and when all 30,000 reinforcements sent to Afghanistan in the surge last year will be out of the country. Most officials expect the latter date to be next summer.
Mr. Gates’s comments, made to troops at Combat Outpost Andar in eastern Afghanistan’s Ghazni Province, demonstrated that while the secretary is to retire from his Pentagon post at the end of the month, he intends to remain a prominent advocate for the counterinsurgency strategy even as voices in the White House express doubts on sustaining the large commitment of troops and money.
“We’ve made a lot of headway, but we have a ways to go,” he said.
He made the case that success in Afghanistan required a combination of counterinsurgency efforts and counterterrorism strikes, and stressed that counterinsurgency — COIN in military jargon — produces benefits required for the more precise counterterrorism strikes to be carried out.
“It is a mix of COIN and counterterrorism,” Mr. Gates said, arguing that valuable information on insurgents and terrorists will be offered only by a population that feels secure and has bonds to the local government.
David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller and Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington.
“I think over time our mission will be less and less COIN and more and more counterterrorism, so there will be a transition,” he said. “But I don’t think we are ready to do that yet.”
Even so, Mr. Gates said the United States should be cautious that its counterinsurgency efforts — which call for protecting the population, establishing credible government institutions and rebuilding the economy — should not become a lengthy and expensive commitment to nation-building.
In his comments, at the Brookings Institution in Washington, General Caldwell also voiced caution, saying that corruption in the Afghan security forces “constitutes a very complex problem with no real easy solutions.”
On a positive note, he said the quality of the Afghan security forces had improved. As evidence, he said Afghans must now be certified in proper use of their weapons before they can join the army, a requirement that did not exist in 2009.
Earlier in his visit to Afghanistan, Mr. Gates said he expected that the administration would conduct a review of American troop levels in Afghanistan that would go far beyond simply arriving at a single number for how many troops would return home starting in July, as Mr. Obama has pledged.
To order a number home in July “in complete isolation from anything else has no strategic meaning,” Mr. Gates said. “And so part of that has to be: What’s the bookend? Where are we headed? What’s the ramp look like? When does the surge come out? Over what period of time?”
A separate timetable would manage the departure of all foreign troops, including the rest of the American combat force besides the surge units, by the end of 2014 as agreed by NATO and the Afghan government. General Caldwell said that NATO training of Afghan security forces would not end until 2017.
The expected decisions on Afghan forces could mirror how Mr. Obama managed the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. While a status of forces agreement between Washington and Baghdad requires American combat forces to leave by the end of this year, Mr. Obama unilaterally set an earlier date by which time the military first reduced its presence to 50,000.
Senior Pentagon officials said that after Mr. Obama set a deadline for dropping to 50,000 troops in Iraq, he let his commanders in Baghdad manage the specifics of which units to order home, and when, so long as they met the president’s ultimate timeline.
David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller and Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington.
June 6, 2011 by xmlbot
WASHINGTON — With a major internal debate gathering inside the White House over how quickly to reduce the size of the American fighting force in Afghanistan, the military pushed back on Monday against the prospect of a substantial withdrawal, arguing that to leave too early would imperil hard-fought gains.
Finishing his final trip to Afghanistan as defense secretary on Monday, Robert M. Gates told troops there, “I think we shouldn’t let up on the gas too much, at least for the next few months.”
Mr. Gates met over the weekend with the American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, who is hammering out a suggested schedule for the troop reduction. The Pentagon knows the White House will be deeply skeptical that keeping troops around for another fighting season next spring would make strategic or political sense.
In Washington, senior military officials say the withdrawal of United States forces depends in large part on the ability of the Afghans to defend themselves, an effort they concede is still a work in progress and makes them reluctant to remove troops too quickly.
Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, the American in charge of the NATO effort to train Afghan forces, said Monday that although NATO was on track to reach its goal of training 305,000 army and police forces by October, attrition remained a significant problem. Those forces currently total 296,000.
General Caldwell said that about 30 percent of Afghan soldiers leave the Army every year before their terms of service are up, particularly in areas of heavy combat where they are needed most. In addition, he said that only one in 10 recruits can read and write, meaning NATO must first provide literacy training so that soldiers are able to write their names and read serial numbers on their weapons. So far, he said, NATO has trained 90,000 men in basic literacy.
As military officials made their case for caution in reducing American troop strength, President Obama met with his senior national security advisers in the White House Situation Room to review progress in Afghanistan. That meeting was not intended to debate the withdrawal, which will happen in a separate process over the next few weeks.
Aides said Mr. Obama had not received any recommendations on troop reductions. Still, the meeting on Monday was likely to inform that debate, because it was one of the last moments for the military to make its case about the progress it was making, including in training Afghan troops.
Mr. Obama will hold a video teleconference with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan on Wednesday to discuss the war, the White House spokesman, Jay Carney, said Monday.
At issue is where Mr. Obama sets the “bookends,” in Mr. Gates’s phrase, of how quickly American troops begin to depart, and when all 30,000 reinforcements sent to Afghanistan in the surge last year will be out of the country. Most officials expect the latter date to be next summer.
Mr. Gates’s comments, made to troops at Combat Outpost Andar in eastern Afghanistan’s Ghazni Province, demonstrated that while the secretary is to retire from his Pentagon post at the end of the month, he intends to remain a prominent advocate for the counterinsurgency strategy even as voices in the White House express doubts on sustaining the large commitment of troops and money.
“We’ve made a lot of headway, but we have a ways to go,” he said.
He made the case that success in Afghanistan required a combination of counterinsurgency efforts and counterterrorism strikes, and stressed that counterinsurgency — COIN in military jargon — produces benefits required for the more precise counterterrorism strikes to be carried out.
“It is a mix of COIN and counterterrorism,” Mr. Gates said, arguing that valuable information on insurgents and terrorists will be offered only by a population that feels secure and has bonds to the local government.
David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller and Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington.
“I think over time our mission will be less and less COIN and more and more counterterrorism, so there will be a transition,” he said. “But I don’t think we are ready to do that yet.”
Even so, Mr. Gates said the United States should be cautious that its counterinsurgency efforts — which call for protecting the population, establishing credible government institutions and rebuilding the economy — should not become a lengthy and expensive commitment to nation-building.
In his comments, at the Brookings Institution in Washington, General Caldwell also voiced caution, saying that corruption in the Afghan security forces “constitutes a very complex problem with no real easy solutions.”
On a positive note, he said the quality of the Afghan security forces had improved. As evidence, he said Afghans must now be certified in proper use of their weapons before they can join the army, a requirement that did not exist in 2009.
Earlier in his visit to Afghanistan, Mr. Gates said he expected that the administration would conduct a review of American troop levels in Afghanistan that would go far beyond simply arriving at a single number for how many troops would return home starting in July, as Mr. Obama has pledged.
To order a number home in July “in complete isolation from anything else has no strategic meaning,” Mr. Gates said. “And so part of that has to be: What’s the bookend? Where are we headed? What’s the ramp look like? When does the surge come out? Over what period of time?”
A separate timetable would manage the departure of all foreign troops, including the rest of the American combat force besides the surge units, by the end of 2014 as agreed by NATO and the Afghan government. General Caldwell said that NATO training of Afghan security forces would not end until 2017.
The expected decisions on Afghan forces could mirror how Mr. Obama managed the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. While a status of forces agreement between Washington and Baghdad requires American combat forces to leave by the end of this year, Mr. Obama unilaterally set an earlier date by which time the military first reduced its presence to 50,000.
Senior Pentagon officials said that after Mr. Obama set a deadline for dropping to 50,000 troops in Iraq, he let his commanders in Baghdad manage the specifics of which units to order home, and when, so long as they met the president’s ultimate timeline.
David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller and Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington.
Support for Afghan war rises, poll shows
Washington POst
By Scott Wilson and Jon Cohen,
The number of Americans who say the war in Afghanistan is worth fighting has increased for the first time since President Obama announced at the end of 2009 that he would boost troop levels, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The finding may give Obama slightly more political breathing room as he decides how many troops to withdraw from Afghanistan in July, the deadline he set 18 months ago to begin bringing home the additional U.S. forces.
In the Post-ABC News poll conducted last week, 43 percent of Americans say the war is worth fighting, compared with 31 percent in March. A significant amount of the fresh support came from the independent voters Obama is courting as he campaigns for reelection next year.
But a majority of Americans still say the war, which is in its 10th year, is not worth fighting, despite the killing last month of Osama bin Laden by U.S. forces in Pakistan.
The 16-point bump in support that Obama received for his handling of the war immediately after bin Laden’s death has been cut in half, the poll found.
In addition, nearly three in four Americans say the administration should remove a “substantial number” of troops from Afghanistan this summer, although fewer than half of those polled think the government will do so.
The findings frame the national debate as Obama, who met Monday with his national security team to discuss Afghanistan, nears a decision on how many of the roughly 100,000 U.S. troops to withdraw next month.
He is doing so amid an increase in U.S. combat deaths in Afghanistan that has coincided with the start of the spring fighting season. Seventy six American service members were killed in Afghanistan in April and May; 54 combat deaths were recorded over the same two months the previous year.
Obama has said that the initial troop withdrawal will be “significant,” with estimates in the 3,000 to 5,000 range. Bin Laden’s death has given new impetus to those within the administration, primarily Obama’s civilian advisers, who favor a more aggressive drawdown than some military officers. He will probably have several options from which to choose.
“It’s rare that only one alternative would be on the table,” Jay Carney, Obama’s press secretary, told reporters Monday, adding that the president will decide on a number “relatively soon” even though he has not received a recommendation from his combat commanders.
But some administration officials say more important than the first withdrawal is setting the deadline for when all 30,000 troops that Obama deployed to Afghanistan at the end of 2009 will be brought home.
Several senior administration officials would like all those forces withdrawn by the end of the year, allowing Obama to tell his skeptical Democratic base in an election year that he is winding down the war. To date, he has relied largely on Republican support in Congress to execute his Afghanistan policy.
But Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates came out Monday against a swift shift to a smaller counterterrorism-focused mission, telling troops in Afghanistan that the United States should keep the military pressure high throughout the year to force the Taliban to negotiate.
On the third day of a trip to Afghanistan, his last visit to the war zone as defense secretary, Gates praised the military progress against the Taliban and al-Qaeda but said, “We’ve still got a ways to go, and I think we shouldn’t let up on the gas too much, at least for the next few months.”
“If we keep the military pressure on through this winter, and we are able to hang on to what we’ve taken away from these guys over the last year to 18 months . . . then it may be that some time around the end of this year these guys decide, ‘Maybe we ought to start talking seriously about reconciliation,’ ” Gates said at Combat Outpost Andar in the Ghazni province of eastern Afghanistan. “That certainly is my hope.”
The new Post-ABC News poll found that opposition to the war within the Democratic Party fell from 79 percent in March to 63 percent.
Obama is also enjoying more support for his war policy from independent voters. In March, just over a quarter of independents said the war was worth fighting. That number jumped to 45 percent in the most recent poll.
The telephone poll was conducted this past Thursday to Sunday, among a random national sample of 1,002 adults. The results from the full survey have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Correspondent Josh Partlow at Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan, and staff writer Rajiv Chandrasekaran and staff researcher Julie Tate in Washington contributed to this report.
By Scott Wilson and Jon Cohen,
The number of Americans who say the war in Afghanistan is worth fighting has increased for the first time since President Obama announced at the end of 2009 that he would boost troop levels, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The finding may give Obama slightly more political breathing room as he decides how many troops to withdraw from Afghanistan in July, the deadline he set 18 months ago to begin bringing home the additional U.S. forces.
In the Post-ABC News poll conducted last week, 43 percent of Americans say the war is worth fighting, compared with 31 percent in March. A significant amount of the fresh support came from the independent voters Obama is courting as he campaigns for reelection next year.
But a majority of Americans still say the war, which is in its 10th year, is not worth fighting, despite the killing last month of Osama bin Laden by U.S. forces in Pakistan.
The 16-point bump in support that Obama received for his handling of the war immediately after bin Laden’s death has been cut in half, the poll found.
In addition, nearly three in four Americans say the administration should remove a “substantial number” of troops from Afghanistan this summer, although fewer than half of those polled think the government will do so.
The findings frame the national debate as Obama, who met Monday with his national security team to discuss Afghanistan, nears a decision on how many of the roughly 100,000 U.S. troops to withdraw next month.
He is doing so amid an increase in U.S. combat deaths in Afghanistan that has coincided with the start of the spring fighting season. Seventy six American service members were killed in Afghanistan in April and May; 54 combat deaths were recorded over the same two months the previous year.
Obama has said that the initial troop withdrawal will be “significant,” with estimates in the 3,000 to 5,000 range. Bin Laden’s death has given new impetus to those within the administration, primarily Obama’s civilian advisers, who favor a more aggressive drawdown than some military officers. He will probably have several options from which to choose.
“It’s rare that only one alternative would be on the table,” Jay Carney, Obama’s press secretary, told reporters Monday, adding that the president will decide on a number “relatively soon” even though he has not received a recommendation from his combat commanders.
But some administration officials say more important than the first withdrawal is setting the deadline for when all 30,000 troops that Obama deployed to Afghanistan at the end of 2009 will be brought home.
Several senior administration officials would like all those forces withdrawn by the end of the year, allowing Obama to tell his skeptical Democratic base in an election year that he is winding down the war. To date, he has relied largely on Republican support in Congress to execute his Afghanistan policy.
But Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates came out Monday against a swift shift to a smaller counterterrorism-focused mission, telling troops in Afghanistan that the United States should keep the military pressure high throughout the year to force the Taliban to negotiate.
On the third day of a trip to Afghanistan, his last visit to the war zone as defense secretary, Gates praised the military progress against the Taliban and al-Qaeda but said, “We’ve still got a ways to go, and I think we shouldn’t let up on the gas too much, at least for the next few months.”
“If we keep the military pressure on through this winter, and we are able to hang on to what we’ve taken away from these guys over the last year to 18 months . . . then it may be that some time around the end of this year these guys decide, ‘Maybe we ought to start talking seriously about reconciliation,’ ” Gates said at Combat Outpost Andar in the Ghazni province of eastern Afghanistan. “That certainly is my hope.”
The new Post-ABC News poll found that opposition to the war within the Democratic Party fell from 79 percent in March to 63 percent.
Obama is also enjoying more support for his war policy from independent voters. In March, just over a quarter of independents said the war was worth fighting. That number jumped to 45 percent in the most recent poll.
The telephone poll was conducted this past Thursday to Sunday, among a random national sample of 1,002 adults. The results from the full survey have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Correspondent Josh Partlow at Combat Outpost Andar, Afghanistan, and staff writer Rajiv Chandrasekaran and staff researcher Julie Tate in Washington contributed to this report.
Steeper Pullout Is Raised as Option for Afghanistan
NYtimes
June 5, 2011
By DAVID E. SANGER, ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s national security team is contemplating troop reductions in Afghanistan that would be steeper than those discussed even a few weeks ago, with some officials arguing that such a change is justified by the rising cost of the war and the death of Osama bin Laden, which they called new “strategic considerations.”
These new considerations, along with a desire to find new ways to press the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, to get more of his forces to take the lead, are combining to create a counterweight to an approach favored by the departing secretary of defense, Robert M. Gates, and top military commanders in the field. They want gradual cuts that would keep American forces at a much higher combat strength well into next year, senior administration officials said.
The cost of the war and Mr. Karzai’s uneven progress in getting his forces prepared have been latent issues since Mr. Obama took office. But in recent weeks they have gained greater political potency as Mr. Obama’s newly refashioned national security team takes up the crucial decision of the size and the pace of American troop cuts, administration and military officials said. Mr. Obama is expected to address these decisions in a speech to the nation this month, they said.
A sharp drawdown of troops is one of many options Mr. Obama is considering. The National Security Council is convening its monthly meeting on Afghanistan and Pakistan on Monday, and although the debate over troop levels is operating on a separate track, the assessments from that meeting are likely to inform the decisions about the size of the force.
In a range of interviews in the past few days, several senior Pentagon, military and administration officials said that many of these pivotal questions were still in flux and would be debated intensely over the next two weeks. They would not be quoted by name about an issue that Mr. Obama had yet to decide on.
Before the new thinking, American officials were anticipating an initial drawdown of 3,000 to 5,000 troops. Those advocating steeper troop reductions did not propose a withdrawal schedule.
Mr. Gates, on his 12th and final visit to Afghanistan as defense secretary, argued repeatedly on Sunday that pulling out too fast would threaten the gains the American-led coalition had made in the 18 months since Mr. Obama agreed to a “surge” of 30,000 troops.
“I would try to maximize my combat capability as long as this process goes on — I think that’s a no-brainer,” Mr. Gates told troops at Forward Operating Base Dwyer. “I’d opt to keep the shooters and take the support out first.”
But the latest strategy review is about far more than how many troops to take out in July, Mr. Gates and other senior officials said over the weekend. It is also about setting a final date by which all of the 30,000 surge troops will be withdrawn from Afghanistan.
A separate timetable would dictate the departure of all foreign troops by 2014, including about 70,000 troops who were there before the surge, as agreed to by NATO and the Afghan government.
Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Afghanistan, sounded a cautious note about the state of the war in a telephone interview on Sunday. Although General Petraeus said there was “no question” that the Americans and the Afghans had made military progress in the crucial provinces of Helmand and Kandahar in the south, he said the Taliban were moving to reconstitute after the beating they took this past fall and winter.
“We’ve always said they would be compelled to try to come back,” General Petraeus said, adding that the Taliban would be trying to “regain the momentum they had a year ago.”
General Petraeus declined to discuss the withdrawal of American forces in July or the number he might recommend to the president. Late last week Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that General Petraeus had not yet submitted his recommended withdrawal number.
The decisions on force levels in Afghanistan could mirror how Mr. Obama handled the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. Senior Pentagon officials noted that after Mr. Obama set a firm deadline for dropping to 50,000 troops in Iraq, he then let his commanders in Baghdad manage the specifics of which units to order home and when. The argument over where to set those “bookends” promises to be one of the most consequential and contentious of Mr. Obama’s presidency. It also has major implications for his re-election bid.
At one end of the debate is Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and, presumably, a range of Mr. Obama’s political advisers, who opposed the surge in 2009 and want a rapid exit, keeping in place a force focused on counterterrorism and training.
At the other end is Mr. Gates, who leaves office at the end of the month and who won the 2009 debate over the troop surge along with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and senior commanders on the ground.
It is not clear what Mrs. Clinton’s position is now as the internal debate is rejoined, and Mr. Obama’s team has changed considerably in the past 18 months. Thomas E. Donilon, appointed national security adviser last fall, was leery of the surge and is likely to lean toward a speedier withdrawal, colleagues say.
Leon E. Panetta, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, supports greater use of unmanned drone technology and will have a voice as Mr. Gates’s nominated successor. General Petraeus is leaving his post in Afghanistan shortly to head the C.I.A., assuming he is confirmed by the Senate this summer.
In the past, when administration officials were asked about the pace of withdrawal, they often said it would depend on “conditions on the ground” — in other words, assessments of the strength of the Taliban, the pace at which Afghan troops and police are prepared to take over and the progress of the economic and political rebuilding of the country. “Most of those would weigh in favor of staying longer,” one senior official said.
But the growing list of so-called strategic considerations amounts to countervailing factors, senior officials said. Mr. Obama has said his goal is to dismantle Al Qaeda so that it can never use Afghanistan again to initiate a Sept. 11-style attack.
With the killing of Bin Laden, and with other members of the terrorist group on the run as American officials pick up clues from data seized at the Bin Laden compound, Mr. Obama can argue that Al Qaeda is much diminished.
The pressure to show Democrats that the cost of the war is declining is intense — so intense that Mr. Gates, during his travels, warned against undercutting a decade-long investment by cutting budgets too rapidly.
The Penatagon says the war in Afghanistan costs about $2 billion a week.
David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Forward Operating Base Dwyer, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller contributed reporting from Washington.
June 5, 2011
By DAVID E. SANGER, ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s national security team is contemplating troop reductions in Afghanistan that would be steeper than those discussed even a few weeks ago, with some officials arguing that such a change is justified by the rising cost of the war and the death of Osama bin Laden, which they called new “strategic considerations.”
These new considerations, along with a desire to find new ways to press the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, to get more of his forces to take the lead, are combining to create a counterweight to an approach favored by the departing secretary of defense, Robert M. Gates, and top military commanders in the field. They want gradual cuts that would keep American forces at a much higher combat strength well into next year, senior administration officials said.
The cost of the war and Mr. Karzai’s uneven progress in getting his forces prepared have been latent issues since Mr. Obama took office. But in recent weeks they have gained greater political potency as Mr. Obama’s newly refashioned national security team takes up the crucial decision of the size and the pace of American troop cuts, administration and military officials said. Mr. Obama is expected to address these decisions in a speech to the nation this month, they said.
A sharp drawdown of troops is one of many options Mr. Obama is considering. The National Security Council is convening its monthly meeting on Afghanistan and Pakistan on Monday, and although the debate over troop levels is operating on a separate track, the assessments from that meeting are likely to inform the decisions about the size of the force.
In a range of interviews in the past few days, several senior Pentagon, military and administration officials said that many of these pivotal questions were still in flux and would be debated intensely over the next two weeks. They would not be quoted by name about an issue that Mr. Obama had yet to decide on.
Before the new thinking, American officials were anticipating an initial drawdown of 3,000 to 5,000 troops. Those advocating steeper troop reductions did not propose a withdrawal schedule.
Mr. Gates, on his 12th and final visit to Afghanistan as defense secretary, argued repeatedly on Sunday that pulling out too fast would threaten the gains the American-led coalition had made in the 18 months since Mr. Obama agreed to a “surge” of 30,000 troops.
“I would try to maximize my combat capability as long as this process goes on — I think that’s a no-brainer,” Mr. Gates told troops at Forward Operating Base Dwyer. “I’d opt to keep the shooters and take the support out first.”
But the latest strategy review is about far more than how many troops to take out in July, Mr. Gates and other senior officials said over the weekend. It is also about setting a final date by which all of the 30,000 surge troops will be withdrawn from Afghanistan.
A separate timetable would dictate the departure of all foreign troops by 2014, including about 70,000 troops who were there before the surge, as agreed to by NATO and the Afghan government.
Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Afghanistan, sounded a cautious note about the state of the war in a telephone interview on Sunday. Although General Petraeus said there was “no question” that the Americans and the Afghans had made military progress in the crucial provinces of Helmand and Kandahar in the south, he said the Taliban were moving to reconstitute after the beating they took this past fall and winter.
“We’ve always said they would be compelled to try to come back,” General Petraeus said, adding that the Taliban would be trying to “regain the momentum they had a year ago.”
General Petraeus declined to discuss the withdrawal of American forces in July or the number he might recommend to the president. Late last week Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that General Petraeus had not yet submitted his recommended withdrawal number.
The decisions on force levels in Afghanistan could mirror how Mr. Obama handled the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. Senior Pentagon officials noted that after Mr. Obama set a firm deadline for dropping to 50,000 troops in Iraq, he then let his commanders in Baghdad manage the specifics of which units to order home and when. The argument over where to set those “bookends” promises to be one of the most consequential and contentious of Mr. Obama’s presidency. It also has major implications for his re-election bid.
At one end of the debate is Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and, presumably, a range of Mr. Obama’s political advisers, who opposed the surge in 2009 and want a rapid exit, keeping in place a force focused on counterterrorism and training.
At the other end is Mr. Gates, who leaves office at the end of the month and who won the 2009 debate over the troop surge along with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and senior commanders on the ground.
It is not clear what Mrs. Clinton’s position is now as the internal debate is rejoined, and Mr. Obama’s team has changed considerably in the past 18 months. Thomas E. Donilon, appointed national security adviser last fall, was leery of the surge and is likely to lean toward a speedier withdrawal, colleagues say.
Leon E. Panetta, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, supports greater use of unmanned drone technology and will have a voice as Mr. Gates’s nominated successor. General Petraeus is leaving his post in Afghanistan shortly to head the C.I.A., assuming he is confirmed by the Senate this summer.
In the past, when administration officials were asked about the pace of withdrawal, they often said it would depend on “conditions on the ground” — in other words, assessments of the strength of the Taliban, the pace at which Afghan troops and police are prepared to take over and the progress of the economic and political rebuilding of the country. “Most of those would weigh in favor of staying longer,” one senior official said.
But the growing list of so-called strategic considerations amounts to countervailing factors, senior officials said. Mr. Obama has said his goal is to dismantle Al Qaeda so that it can never use Afghanistan again to initiate a Sept. 11-style attack.
With the killing of Bin Laden, and with other members of the terrorist group on the run as American officials pick up clues from data seized at the Bin Laden compound, Mr. Obama can argue that Al Qaeda is much diminished.
The pressure to show Democrats that the cost of the war is declining is intense — so intense that Mr. Gates, during his travels, warned against undercutting a decade-long investment by cutting budgets too rapidly.
The Penatagon says the war in Afghanistan costs about $2 billion a week.
David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt reported from Washington, and Thom Shanker from Forward Operating Base Dwyer, Afghanistan. Elisabeth Bumiller contributed reporting from Washington.
U.S. Sending Training Agents to Afghanistan to Stem Infiltration of Local Forces
NYtimes
June 10, 2011
By RAY RIVERA and ERIC SCHMITT
KABUL, Afghanistan — Concerned over the growing pattern of Afghan soldiers and police officers attacking their coalition counterparts, the American military is sending 80 counterintelligence agents to Afghanistan to help stem the threat of Taliban infiltration in the Afghan National Security Forces, military officials said Friday.
These intelligence specialists will enhance the vetting of recruits, review profiles of soldiers who are being trained and generally tighten up the procedures to identify individuals who might be vulnerable to extremists’ appeals, officials said.
Some of the agents have already arrived, and the rest are expected soon, said Lt. Col. David C. Simons, a spokesman for the NATO Training Mission in Afghanistan.
Since March 2009, at least 57 people, including 32 American troops, have been killed in at least 19 attacks in which Afghan service members have turned their weapons on coalition forces. Another 64 were wounded. The totals do not include the attackers, many of whom were killed in shootouts or in suicide blasts.
More than half of the casualties occurred in the first five months of this year, signaling an escalation in the number and intensity of the attacks. But while the Taliban often takes credit for these attacks, NATO officials say the majority of the episodes stem from disagreements and arguments that escalate into violence.
“These incidents are exacerbated by austere battlefield conditions, combat stress, fatigue and cultural misunderstandings,” Colonel Simons said.
Nonetheless, he added, “the threat of infiltration is real.”
The attacks are increasing as NATO forces are racing to train and build up the Afghan Army and the police to a force of 395,000 by 2014. The buildup is critical to American and NATO exit strategies, which include turning over all combat and security duties to the Afghan forces over the next three years. But the pace is also putting strains on Afghan agents to screen the flood of recruits.
One of the worst attacks occurred in April, when an Afghan Army pilot shot and killed eight American service members and a contractor during a meeting of foreign and Afghan officers on the military side of Kabul International Airport. At least three NATO soldiers have been killed in two attacks since then.
The attacks have continued despite efforts to improve screening of recruits and crack down on the illegal sales of police and army uniforms.
The Taliban frequently take credit for the attacks, and say they have recruited young people across the country to join the national security forces as sleeper agents. NATO officials say that they have no evidence that infiltration is widespread or that any insurgents have successfully joined the service with the intent of attacking coalition forces.
Whether the infiltration is widespread, the claims are hard to contest, and serve to shake popular confidence in the growing army and police forces.
Adding to that distrust is the problem of Afghan soldiers and police officers — and impostors dressed like them — attacking military installations and government compounds.
Afghan intelligence officials on Friday could not say how many of these attacks have happened. But the list is lengthy and growing, said Lutfullah Mashal, a spokesman for the National Directorate of Security, the main intelligence agency.
Many of the attacks involved insurgents using army or police uniforms and fake government identifications, he said. “But there were also those types of attacks in which enemies had infiltrated our national forces and then carried out the attacks, and we are seeing an increase in these attacks,” Mr. Mashal said.
Last month, an Afghan soldier with eight months on the force helped a suicide bomber obtain an army uniform and identification needed to carry out an attack inside the national military hospital, one of the worst attacks in the capital this year. The attack killed six people who were training to be medics and wounded more than 20 other people, including several medical students.
In April, a police officer who had recently joined the force entered the tightly secured police headquarters in the city of Kandahar, killing the police chief, a widely admired figure from his days as an anti-Soviet fighter.
The Security Directorate arrested nearly a dozen people this week in connection with an April suicide attack on the Defense Ministry that killed two Afghan soldiers, an Afghan intelligence officer said. The people arrested included “high-ranking” officials with the Defense Ministry and the Interior Ministry, which oversees the Afghan National Police, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the case.
Coalition forces sharply escalated the training of the Afghan counterintelligence agents in November, after a well-regarded Afghan border policeman opened fire on American soldiers in Nangarhar Province, killing six. The Taliban quickly claimed responsibility for the attack, but investigators now believe that the soldier acted out of personal distress, including his father’s insistence that he accept a marriage contract with a young girl.
The new American agents will presumably work with their Afghan counterparts, whose job is to identify possible insurgents among Afghan forces and to look for signs of service members who, acting either out of financial or personal stress or because of threats to their families, might fall under Taliban influence. Nearly 200 Afghan agents were in the field as of April, and that number is expected to more than double by year’s end.
June 10, 2011
By RAY RIVERA and ERIC SCHMITT
KABUL, Afghanistan — Concerned over the growing pattern of Afghan soldiers and police officers attacking their coalition counterparts, the American military is sending 80 counterintelligence agents to Afghanistan to help stem the threat of Taliban infiltration in the Afghan National Security Forces, military officials said Friday.
These intelligence specialists will enhance the vetting of recruits, review profiles of soldiers who are being trained and generally tighten up the procedures to identify individuals who might be vulnerable to extremists’ appeals, officials said.
Some of the agents have already arrived, and the rest are expected soon, said Lt. Col. David C. Simons, a spokesman for the NATO Training Mission in Afghanistan.
Since March 2009, at least 57 people, including 32 American troops, have been killed in at least 19 attacks in which Afghan service members have turned their weapons on coalition forces. Another 64 were wounded. The totals do not include the attackers, many of whom were killed in shootouts or in suicide blasts.
More than half of the casualties occurred in the first five months of this year, signaling an escalation in the number and intensity of the attacks. But while the Taliban often takes credit for these attacks, NATO officials say the majority of the episodes stem from disagreements and arguments that escalate into violence.
“These incidents are exacerbated by austere battlefield conditions, combat stress, fatigue and cultural misunderstandings,” Colonel Simons said.
Nonetheless, he added, “the threat of infiltration is real.”
The attacks are increasing as NATO forces are racing to train and build up the Afghan Army and the police to a force of 395,000 by 2014. The buildup is critical to American and NATO exit strategies, which include turning over all combat and security duties to the Afghan forces over the next three years. But the pace is also putting strains on Afghan agents to screen the flood of recruits.
One of the worst attacks occurred in April, when an Afghan Army pilot shot and killed eight American service members and a contractor during a meeting of foreign and Afghan officers on the military side of Kabul International Airport. At least three NATO soldiers have been killed in two attacks since then.
The attacks have continued despite efforts to improve screening of recruits and crack down on the illegal sales of police and army uniforms.
The Taliban frequently take credit for the attacks, and say they have recruited young people across the country to join the national security forces as sleeper agents. NATO officials say that they have no evidence that infiltration is widespread or that any insurgents have successfully joined the service with the intent of attacking coalition forces.
Whether the infiltration is widespread, the claims are hard to contest, and serve to shake popular confidence in the growing army and police forces.
Adding to that distrust is the problem of Afghan soldiers and police officers — and impostors dressed like them — attacking military installations and government compounds.
Afghan intelligence officials on Friday could not say how many of these attacks have happened. But the list is lengthy and growing, said Lutfullah Mashal, a spokesman for the National Directorate of Security, the main intelligence agency.
Many of the attacks involved insurgents using army or police uniforms and fake government identifications, he said. “But there were also those types of attacks in which enemies had infiltrated our national forces and then carried out the attacks, and we are seeing an increase in these attacks,” Mr. Mashal said.
Last month, an Afghan soldier with eight months on the force helped a suicide bomber obtain an army uniform and identification needed to carry out an attack inside the national military hospital, one of the worst attacks in the capital this year. The attack killed six people who were training to be medics and wounded more than 20 other people, including several medical students.
In April, a police officer who had recently joined the force entered the tightly secured police headquarters in the city of Kandahar, killing the police chief, a widely admired figure from his days as an anti-Soviet fighter.
The Security Directorate arrested nearly a dozen people this week in connection with an April suicide attack on the Defense Ministry that killed two Afghan soldiers, an Afghan intelligence officer said. The people arrested included “high-ranking” officials with the Defense Ministry and the Interior Ministry, which oversees the Afghan National Police, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the case.
Coalition forces sharply escalated the training of the Afghan counterintelligence agents in November, after a well-regarded Afghan border policeman opened fire on American soldiers in Nangarhar Province, killing six. The Taliban quickly claimed responsibility for the attack, but investigators now believe that the soldier acted out of personal distress, including his father’s insistence that he accept a marriage contract with a young girl.
The new American agents will presumably work with their Afghan counterparts, whose job is to identify possible insurgents among Afghan forces and to look for signs of service members who, acting either out of financial or personal stress or because of threats to their families, might fall under Taliban influence. Nearly 200 Afghan agents were in the field as of April, and that number is expected to more than double by year’s end.
Panetta backs significant Afghan withdrawal
By Olivier Knox (AFP) – 1 day ago
WASHINGTON — US defense secretary nominee Leon Panetta said Thursday he backed pulling a significant number of troops from Afghanistan next month, in a break with outgoing Pentagon chief Robert Gates.
"I agree with the president's statement," Panetta told Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, a Democrat who had asked his view on President Barack Obama's pledge to announce a "significant" draw-down next month.
While Panetta, the current CIA chief, repeatedly praised Gates and sought to assure the panel that he would follow in his footsteps, the answer seemed to put the two at odds as Washington works to put Afghans in charge of their own security by 2014.
"We ought to do nothing that jeopardizes that path," said Panetta, who did not give a precise number of troops that should go and insisted troop levels would depend on the ebb and flow of a war now in its tenth year.
"This has to be a conditions-based withdrawal," he said. "I think based on what changes take place, then obviously the president and the secretary would have to make adjustments."
Panetta, 72, worked to reassure some lawmakers worried a hasty pullout could spell defeat in Afghanistan and others upset by what Republican Senator Susan Collins called "a never-ending mission" to stabilize the strife-torn country.
"If we lose in Afghanistan, we not only create another safe haven for Al-Qaeda and for their militant allies, but I think the world becomes a much more threatened place," he said.
"I can't agree with you more. I think that's absolutely dead-on," said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who has repeatedly warned against a hasty withdrawal.
"To me, that seems to be a never-ending mission: I don't see how we get to a stable state in Afghanistan," Collins pressed Panetta. "So tell me how this ends. I just don't see how it ends."
Panetta acknowledged that there were "major questions" about whether Afghanistan would ever develop the resources, revenues and good governance needed to be stable, take over their own security, and quell Al-Qaeda.
"But I think if we stick with it, if we continue to provide help and assistance to them then I think there is going to be a point where Afghanistan can control its own future. We have to operate on that hope," he said.
Obama is due to announce soon how many troops will leave Afghanistan next month, while Panetta is on track to replace Gates July 1, and be succeeded as CIA chief by General David Petraeus, now the US commander in Afghanistan.
Gates, who has publicly called for a modest withdrawal from Afghanistan, told a NATO meeting in Brussels Thursday as part of a pre-retirement farewell tour that "there will be no rush to the exits on our part."
At the White House, spokesman Jay Carney played down the rift, saying "this is the president's decision" and underlining that Obama "has not made a decision. When he does, he will announce it."
The hearing came amid stiff and mounting US public opposition to the war in Afghanistan, where the United States has some 100,000 troops ten years after invading the country to capture or kill Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
Support for withdrawing US forces has spiked since elite US commandos killed bin Laden in his Pakistan hideout last month, with two out of five Americans favoring a complete pullout, according to a new survey by CNN and the Opinion Research Corporation.
Obama promised to enact a considerable withdrawal after ordering another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan in December 2009 in a bid to duplicate the "surge" credited in Washington with helping to claw Iraq from the brink of civil war.
Some lawmakers have redoubled their calls for drawing down US forces levels in the face of cash-strapped Washington's home-front struggle with its sky-high deficit and ballooning national debt.
Moments before the hearing began, protestors from the anti-war group "Code Pink" urged Levin to commit to bringing home US troops and complained that people in his home state "are eating cat food while you fight a champagne war."
Later, Democratic Senator Ben Nelson said he was introducing legislation calling on Obama to set formal benchmarks for progress in the conflict and make regular reports.
WASHINGTON — US defense secretary nominee Leon Panetta said Thursday he backed pulling a significant number of troops from Afghanistan next month, in a break with outgoing Pentagon chief Robert Gates.
"I agree with the president's statement," Panetta told Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, a Democrat who had asked his view on President Barack Obama's pledge to announce a "significant" draw-down next month.
While Panetta, the current CIA chief, repeatedly praised Gates and sought to assure the panel that he would follow in his footsteps, the answer seemed to put the two at odds as Washington works to put Afghans in charge of their own security by 2014.
"We ought to do nothing that jeopardizes that path," said Panetta, who did not give a precise number of troops that should go and insisted troop levels would depend on the ebb and flow of a war now in its tenth year.
"This has to be a conditions-based withdrawal," he said. "I think based on what changes take place, then obviously the president and the secretary would have to make adjustments."
Panetta, 72, worked to reassure some lawmakers worried a hasty pullout could spell defeat in Afghanistan and others upset by what Republican Senator Susan Collins called "a never-ending mission" to stabilize the strife-torn country.
"If we lose in Afghanistan, we not only create another safe haven for Al-Qaeda and for their militant allies, but I think the world becomes a much more threatened place," he said.
"I can't agree with you more. I think that's absolutely dead-on," said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who has repeatedly warned against a hasty withdrawal.
"To me, that seems to be a never-ending mission: I don't see how we get to a stable state in Afghanistan," Collins pressed Panetta. "So tell me how this ends. I just don't see how it ends."
Panetta acknowledged that there were "major questions" about whether Afghanistan would ever develop the resources, revenues and good governance needed to be stable, take over their own security, and quell Al-Qaeda.
"But I think if we stick with it, if we continue to provide help and assistance to them then I think there is going to be a point where Afghanistan can control its own future. We have to operate on that hope," he said.
Obama is due to announce soon how many troops will leave Afghanistan next month, while Panetta is on track to replace Gates July 1, and be succeeded as CIA chief by General David Petraeus, now the US commander in Afghanistan.
Gates, who has publicly called for a modest withdrawal from Afghanistan, told a NATO meeting in Brussels Thursday as part of a pre-retirement farewell tour that "there will be no rush to the exits on our part."
At the White House, spokesman Jay Carney played down the rift, saying "this is the president's decision" and underlining that Obama "has not made a decision. When he does, he will announce it."
The hearing came amid stiff and mounting US public opposition to the war in Afghanistan, where the United States has some 100,000 troops ten years after invading the country to capture or kill Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
Support for withdrawing US forces has spiked since elite US commandos killed bin Laden in his Pakistan hideout last month, with two out of five Americans favoring a complete pullout, according to a new survey by CNN and the Opinion Research Corporation.
Obama promised to enact a considerable withdrawal after ordering another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan in December 2009 in a bid to duplicate the "surge" credited in Washington with helping to claw Iraq from the brink of civil war.
Some lawmakers have redoubled their calls for drawing down US forces levels in the face of cash-strapped Washington's home-front struggle with its sky-high deficit and ballooning national debt.
Moments before the hearing began, protestors from the anti-war group "Code Pink" urged Levin to commit to bringing home US troops and complained that people in his home state "are eating cat food while you fight a champagne war."
Later, Democratic Senator Ben Nelson said he was introducing legislation calling on Obama to set formal benchmarks for progress in the conflict and make regular reports.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Gates Says U.S. Is in Position to Start Afghan Pullout
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
KABUL, Afghanistan — Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Monday that the United States was “well positioned” to begin withdrawing some American troops from Afghanistan in July, but he said that a substantial force would remain and that the United States was starting talks with the Afghans about keeping a security presence in the country beyond 2014.At a joint news conference in the Afghan capital with President Hamid Karzai, Mr. Gates said that no decisions had been made about the number of troops to go home. His remarks were tempered with enough caveats, however, to suggest that the July drawdown promised by President Obama could be minor.
“As I have said time and again, we are not leaving Afghanistan this summer,” Mr. Gates said.
Currently about 100,000 American troops are in the country.
Mr. Gates also used the news conference to offer an extended apology to Mr. Karzai for the killings by mistake last week of nine Afghan boys. Mr. Karzai accepted the apology.
On Sunday, Mr. Karzai had rejected an apology for the killings from Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Afghanistan.
“This breaks our heart,” Mr. Gates said as he stood beside Mr. Karzai in the Afghan presidential palace. “Not only is their loss a tragedy for their families, it is a setback for our relationship with the Afghan people.”
One boy who was wounded but survived described a helicopter gunship that hunted down the children as they gathered wood outside their village. The gunners apparently mistook the children for insurgents who hours earlier had fired on an American base. The boys were 9 to 15 years old.
Mr. Karzai, after responding that civilian casualties were at the heart of tensions between the United States and Afghanistan, said of Mr. Gates that “I trust him fully when he says he’s sorry.”
Mr. Gates, who was on an unannounced two-day trip to Afghanistan, spoke more positively than he had in recent months about what he cited as progress in the nearly decade-old war.
“The gains we are seeing across the country are significant,” he said, citing improvements in security in Helmand and Kandahar Provinces in the south, as well as some progress on Afghanistan’s eastern border with Pakistan.
Mr. Gates made similar remarks to American troops at Bagram Air Base earlier in the day, when he told them that “you’re having success, there’s just no question about it.”
He added, “I know you’ve had a tough winter, it’s going to be a tougher spring and summer, but you’ve made a lot of headway, and I think you’ve proven with your Afghan partners that this thing is going to work.”
Despite the optimism in Mr. Gates’s remarks, American commanders in the east and north have seen continued violence in 2011 and two of the most lethal suicide bomb attacks in nearly two years occurred in the last four weeks. One in the eastern city of Jalalabad killed 40 people and another in Kunduz Province in the north killed 32.
On Monday, a bomb blast in Jalalabad killed two more people and injured 19.
Although fewer American troops are dying this year than last, commanders say it is hard to tell whether that is because of a weakening in the Taliban offensive or the traditional winter hiatus in fighting. But if Afghan troops prove able to keep the violence under control, that could signal a growing ability to protect difficult patches on their own.
Training Afghan troops well enough to defend their own country is the long-term goal of the United States and Mr. Obama’s strategy for ending the war.
Maj. Gen. John F. Campbell, the top American commander in eastern Afghanistan, told reporters traveling with Mr. Gates that violence in his region on the border with Pakistan was up from a year ago and that it had also increased in the last 30 days.
“I think the enemy is trying to get an early start on what they call their spring campaign,” General Campbell said.
In recent weeks American forces have withdrawn from remote parts of the Pech Valley, which is part of General Campbell’s command, to concentrate more forces in the border area.
General Campbell refused to call the thinning of forces in the valley, once deemed vital to American interests, a retreat, although the fighting there had dragged on for years with no clear result. “When somebody says you’ve abandoned the Pech, that’s absolutely false,” he said.
Despite the rise in violence in the east, the general said the attacks by insurgents were less effective than a year ago. His office produced statistics stating that American and coalition forces had killed 2,448 insurgents in his region between June 2010 and February 2011 and had captured 2,870 in the same time period.
As for an American military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2014, Mr. Gates said an American team would be in Kabul next week to begin negotiations on what he called a security partnership, which he predicted would require a “small fraction” of the American forces in Afghanistan today.
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