Pentagon: Afghan Review Delayed

Pentagon Says Review Of Afghan War To Be Delayed

By Pauline Jelinek, Associated Press
August 5, 2009

WASHINGTON -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates, asking that "a few other ideas" be taken into account, has extended the deadline for an assessment of how to turn around the war in Afghanistan, an official said Wednesday.

The report had been expected next week and now may come in late August or early September, Defense Department spokesman Geoff Morrell said.

Officials said last week that a draft of ! the assessment called for changes in the way troops operate and that after the report was finished commanders were likely to ask for more U.S. forces.

Gates and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, flew Saturday to a U.S. air base in Chievres, Belgium, and met Sunday with the commander of NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, and several advisers.

"He was very impressed with the briefing he got and the assessment thus far," Morrell said of Gates. "But he wants (McChrystal) to take into consideration a few other ideas he had to address some additional issues in this review of the situation on the ground."

Gates told McChrystal to take beyond the 60 days first planned for the review, Morrell said.

Morrell told a Pentagon news conference that he didn't know what the additional ideas were.

The draft called for speeding up the training of Afghan soldiers and police and nearly doubling their numbers to ! roughly 400,000, officials said. Though more foreign trainers would be needed for that, it was unclear whether they would come from the U.S. or allied militaries.

The main recommendations in the draft for change were said to stem from the military's new counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan, which is now designed to focus less on going after Taliban strongholds and more on protecting the local population - something that affects where troops live and how and where they will fight.