President Barack Obama's July 2011 date for beginning to pull US forces from Afghanistan is not a "drop-dead deadline" but a message to Kabul about the urgency of fielding an army to defend the country, senior US officials said on Sunday.
-- Date to begin pullout sends signal of urgency: Gates
-- Republicans say timetable gives wrong message
-- Clinton says date marks transition to Afghan control
"He was balancing a demonstration of resolve with also communicating a sense of urgency to the Afghan government that they must step up to the plate in terms of recruiting their soldiers, training their soldiers and getting their soldiers into the field," Defence Secretary Robert Gates told CBS's "Face the Nation" program.
The Democratic president and his top advisors have faced sharp Republican criticism since Obama announced on Tuesday that he would send another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan but would begin bringing them home in 18 months.
Republican Senator John McCain supported the decision to boost troop levels to nearly 100,000 but denounced the July 2011 date as arbitrary and said it "sends exactly the wrong message." Senator Lindsey Graham, also a Republican, questioned whether extremists would see the date as a sign of weakness.
Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, national security adviser James Jones and General David Petraeus rejected those criticisms and defended the president's decision in interviews with Sunday morning news programs, saying the date would begin a transition to Afghan military control.
"We're not talking about an exit strategy or a drop-dead deadline," Clinton told NBC's "Meet the Press." "What we're talking about is an assessment that ... we can begin a transition, a transition to hand off responsibility to the Afghan forces."
"It's the beginning of a process," Gates added. "In July 2011, our generals are confident that they will know whether our strategy is working. And the plan is to begin transferring areas of responsibility for security over to the Afghan security forces with ... us remaining in a tactical and then strategic overwatch position."
Petraeus, commander of the US Central Command, told "Fox News Sunday" Obama's decision didn't "trigger a rush to the exits" but rather the start of a transition of responsibilities to Afghan security forces and to the government in Kabul.
Some Democrats are skeptical the surge will be enough to turn the tide against the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan. Republicans, however, have generally supported the surge while expressing concerns about the exit timetable.
"He has complicated matters by having this firm beginning of withdrawal date," Republican Senator Jon Kyl said on CNN's "State of the Union" program. "What happens the day after and how many troops come down I think is the question."
NOT ARBITRARY:
Gates said the pace of thinning US forces in Afghanistan would depend on the circumstances on the ground. He told ABC's "This Week" program the July 2011 date was not arbitrary, saying two years will have passed since the deployment of Marines, giving commanders on the ground enough time to assess whether their strategy is working.
"We will do the same thing we did in Iraq when we transition to Afghan security responsibility," he said. "We will withdraw first into tactical overwatch, and then a strategic overwatch, if you will, the cavalry over the hill in case they run into trouble."
Gates declined to say how long the United States would keep a significant military force in Afghanistan once it began to withdraw, saying "I don't want to put a deadline on it."
He noted that President Hamid Karzai said in his recent inaugural address that Afghan security forces should take over security control of important areas of the country within three years and assume total responsibility within five years. On CNN, Jones also would not give a date for the withdrawal of all US troops but indicated it would not be soon.
"We have strategic interests in South Asia that should not be measured in terms of finite times. We are going to be in the region for a long time," Jones said.
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