U.S. looks to increase troops in Afghan war

U.S. commanders in Afghanistan want more troops now, the Joint Chiefs chairman said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pentagon leaders said Wednesday they are looking for ways to send additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan this year, signaling an acceleration in what had been plans to shift forces there early next year.

Faced with an increasingly sophisticated insurgency, particularly along the Pakistan border, defense officials said sending more troops would have a significant impact on the violence.

“I think that we are clearly working very hard to see if there are opportunities to send additional forces sooner rather than later,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Pentagon reporters. But, he added that no final decisions or recommendations have been made.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who recently returned from meetings with commanders in Afghanistan, said they clearly want more troops now.

“It’s a tougher fight, it’s a more complex fight, and they need more troops to have the long-term impact that we all want to have there,” said Mullen, who also met last week with Pakistani leaders.

The Pentagon has been wrestling with how to provide what they say is a much-needed military buildup in Afghanistan, while they still have 150,000 troops in Iraq. Gates and Mullen have repeatedly said they would have to reduce troop levels in Iraq before they could dedicate more forces to Afghanistan.

But Tuesday they spoke more aggressively about meeting the Afghan needs more quickly. While they would not detail any of the options, Gates said they are also looking at moving forces around to take advantage of a small boost in French troops expected in Afghanistan.

He also ruled out rolling back some of the promises the Pentagon made to soldiers limiting their deployments to 12 months.

“I think we’re looking at a variety of options on how to respond here,” Gates said. “I will tell you that I have sought assurances that there will be no return to longer-than-12-month deployments, so that’s not something we’re considering.”

Also, he said he is not aware of any plans to extend the deployments of any U.S. troops currently there.

Gates and Mullen also had strong words for Pakistan, saying Islamabad must do a better job preventing Taliban and other insurgents from crossing the border into Afghanistan to wage attacks.

The absence of pressure from the Pakistanis, Gates said, is giving militants a greater opportunity to penetrate the porous mountain border. He said the key is to further convince the Pakistani government that their country is also at great risk from the insurgents.

Gates said it is an exaggeration to say that the border problems have escalated into a war between Pakistan and Afghanistan. And he also dismissed as untrue suggestions that the U.S. is massing troops along the border preparing to launch attacks into Pakistan.