Obama Advisers Split On Afghanistan, Complicating His Decision
WASHINGTON — The Senate voted Thursday to delay a face-to-face briefing from the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, who hours earlier had warned that al-Qaida terrorists could regain ground there if a new war plan isn't adopted soon.
Democrats rejected the call by one of the Senate's most hawkish Republicans to force Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal to personally explain his war strategy by Nov. 15.
Without McChrystal's testimony, "We don't have any input into the decision-making process," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., complained before the 59-40 party-line vote. "I mean, this is bizarre."
The Senate vote came as the Obama administration debates how best to fight the eight-year war in Afghanistan that McChrystal on Thursday termed "serious and deteriorating."
Last week, McChrystal gave the Pentagon a secret request for more U.S. troops to fight the war – a request that officials have said asks for as many as 40,000 additional military forces.
Top White House officials who long have resisted sending more troops to fight the terror-allied Taliban in Afghanistan instead are eyeing a new strategy to directly target al-Qaida with attacks from unmanned spy planes and covert forces in Pakistan.
Senate Democrats said President Barack Obama should be allowed to settle on a strategy before forcing McChrystal to testify. Defense Secretary Robert Gates agreed in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., calling it "inappropriate" for McChrystal to explain his request before it's even considered.
On Wednesday, Obama chaired a meeting of his top military and national security advisers, pressing them for their views on how to proceed in Afghanistan. The talks revealed the emerging fault lines within the administration, with military commanders supporting the current strategy of targeting the Taliban and other key officials divided.
While senators Thursday debated whether to order McChrystal to Washington, the general was warning a London audience that Afghan insurgents are gathering strength.
He said more troops would "buy time" as Afghan military and police forces prepare for taking control of their nation's security by 2013. But without more troops, NATO's military mission is far from assured, he said.
McChrystal is commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.
"A strategy that does not leave Afghanistan in a stable position is probably a shortsighted strategy," McChrystal told British academics and security specialists at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think-tank.
He added: "We went there to destroy al-Qaida, and to a great degree that has happened. Now we are preventing its return."
Obama and his national security team will meet twice again next week for three-hour meetings to consider the best strategy, said McChrystal's immediate boss, Gen. David Petraeus, head of the U.S. Central Command.
Petraeus, who is participating in the meetings, on Thursday said he has not endorsed McChrystal's request for more troops or other resources, and did not signal whether he ultimately would. Petraeus was speaking at an Atlantic Council forum in Washington.
He indicated it would not be a long wait, as the troops request would be considered "in short order."
Pentagon officials say the final strategy could be a hybrid plan of defeating the Taliban and targeting al-Qaida instead of an either-or choice.
Talking to reporters Thursday about what worked in Iraq, Gen. Ray Odierno said that securing and winning over the local population was a necessary part of fighting al-Qaida. The first part is known by the military as a counterinsurgency strategy, while the second is called counterterrorism.
"You have to have both, combined," Odierno, top U.S. commander in Iraq, told a Pentagon news conference.
He did not mention Afghanistan.
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LARA JAKES and ANDREW TAYLOR | 10/ 1/09 07:09 PM |