Top US military chiefs launched a staunch defence of their campaign in Afghanistan against the Taliban before a war-weary public but warned that time was running out to make headway. Amid waning public support for the conflict as US troop deaths reach record highs, Defence Secretary Robert Gates insisted on Thursday that the war is not "slipping through the administration's fingers."
"There is a limited time for us to show that this is working," he told reporters at a Pentagon press conference. "We are mindful of that, we understand the concerns of many Americans in that area, but we think that we now have the resources and the right approach to start making some headway." Rejecting some commentators' suggestions that US troops withdraw from Afghanistan now, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen also stressed that "there is a sense of urgency" and "time is not on our side."
"There's no way to defeat al Qaeda, which is the mission, with just that approach, you can't do it remotely, you can't do it offshore," Mullen said, after conservative columnist George Will joined anti-war liberals this week in calling for a US withdrawal. "I certainly don't think it's time to leave."
Mullen's comments came after General Stanley McChrystal, the top US commander in Afghanistan, submitted on Monday his much-anticipated classified review of America's strategy that is widely expected to lead to a request for more troops. Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown is also due to defend his country's role in Afghanistan against a similar backdrop of public unease.
Gates and Mullen declined to detail the McChrystal report's findings, which have been forwarded to US President Barack Obama and are being evaluated by senior military officials. "What's more important than the number of troops he may or may not ask for is how he intends to use them. It should come as no surprise to anyone that he intends to use those forces under his command to protect the Afghan people," Mullen said.
"In my view, the numbers that count most are the numbers of Afghans we protect." McChrystal, who took over in June, has already hinted in public comments that the new strategy will place renewed focus on securing the population. Gates, who has in the past expressed reservations about the US and Nato presence becoming too large in Afghanistan, said those concerns could be "mitigated" if the foreign troops interact with the population "in a way that gives confidence to the Afghans that we're their partners and their allies."
He said he took seriously McChrystal's point that "the size of the imprint, of the footprint... depends in significant measure on the nature of the footprint and the behaviour of those troops and their attitudes and their interactions with the Afghans." The attention paid to potential troop deployments reflects declining US public support for the war in Afghanistan.
A CNN poll released Tuesday showed 57 percent of Americans now oppose the war, and 40 percent believe it is not winnable. In March, Obama pledged to refocus US attention and resources on Afghanistan, saying America's goal was to "disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda."
He has dispatched 21,000 more troops - 4,000 of them to help build Afghan forces - and an influx of civilian experts to help with development. Gates emphasised that those resources were still being deployed in Afghanistan. "So we are only now beginning to be in a position to have the assets in place and the strategy or the military approach in place to begin to implement the strategy," Gates said.
Foreign troops fighting in Afghanistan endured their deadliest month since the 2001 invasion in August when 77 soldiers died. Brown is also under pressure on Afghanistan since record numbers of his troops were killed in July and August.
He was expected to deliver a strong defence Friday of the British campaign in Afghanistan but suffered a blow on the eve of the speech when a key aide quit, hammering the government over its Afghan policy. "Each time I ask myself if we are doing the right thing by being in Afghanistan and if we can justify sending our young men and women to fight for this cause, my answer has always been yes," Brown will say, according to released excerpts. "For when the security of our country is at stake, we cannot walk away."