President Barack Obama is leaning towards a compromise strategy on troops to Afghanistan, officials said, amid a fierce debate over whether more soldiers should be sent to back up Kabul's flawed government.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday that Obama was seeking to show a strong US commitment to Afghanistan while also conveying to President Hamid Karzai's corruption-tainted government that the US military presence had a time limit.

"How do you signal resolve and at the same time signal you are not going to be there forever?" asked Gates, adding that it was a challenge to "get that balance right."

Obama is said to have been presented with a series of options on Afghanistan, three of which envisage reinforcements ranging from 20,000 to 40,000 troops and a fourth that has an undisclosed military element.

He was examining how to "combine some of the best features of several of the options to maximum good effect," Gates said.

Obama, who departed Thursday on an eight-day trip to Asia, spoke to US troops during a stopover in Alaska, pledging "I will not risk your life unless it is necessary to our vital interests."

"We'll give you the strategy and the clear mission you deserve, we'll give you the equipment and support that you need to get the job done, and that includes public support back home," he said.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said no announcement would be made until Obama returns from Asia on November 19, adding that he expected more meetings with the military top brass before the president reached a decision.

"What the president wants to ensure is that we take into account... our time commitment and ensure that we have the strongest partner in the Afghan government," Gibbs told journalists aboard Air Force One.

"It's important to fully examine not just how we're going to get folks in but how we're going to get folks out," he added.

Leaked cables from the US ambassador in Kabul underlined Thursday the perceived failings of Karzai and his government that have emerged as a key problem holding up Obama's troop decision.

Karzai, long supported internationally despite the fact his administration is widely viewed as corrupt, has seen ties with the West sour dramatically since being re-elected in a flawed poll in August.

Ambassador to Kabul Karl Eikenberry, a retired army general who commanded US forces in Afghanistan from 2005 to 2007, detailed serious concerns in classified cables leaked to The Washington Post and The New York Times.

He reportedly expressed reservations about Karzai's erratic behavior and warned against sending more American troops to Afghanistan until the Afghan leader gets a grip on the corruption and incompetence in his administration.

The ambassador's position puts him at odds with Afghan war commander General Stanley McChrystal, who wants more than 40,000 additional US troops over the next year and has warned that without them the mission is likely to fail.

Gibbs played down the differences between Eikenberry and McChrystal, suggesting everyone believed it was important for Karzai to turn around the tarnished image of his government.

"You've heard General McChrystal say, and you've heard Ambassador Eikenberry say, and you've quite frankly heard the president say that it's time to start a new chapter in Afghanistan when it comes to governance. And that's obviously going to play a big part in the decision that he makes."

Huge fraud that marred the August 20 presidential election highlighted the scale of corruption in Afghanistan's government and has led to enormous international pressure on Karzai's new administration to clean up.

Karzai was only declared the winner by election officials, whom he appointed, after his challenger, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, abandoned a run-off saying there was no chance of a fair poll.

In a recent US television interview, Karzai dismissed allegations against top officials, including his brother Wali, who is widely accused of involvement in the opium trade.

The president has also faced widespread criticism for his alliances with warlords and one of his two picks for vice president, Mohammad Qasim Fahim, is widely accused of rights abuses.

The Afghan presidency hit back Thursday at the mounting Western concern over corruption, urging the international community to do its part by battling graft in aid contracts.

Obama said to want revised Afghanistan options

By Ben Feller And Anne Gearan, Associated Press Writers –

Thu Nov 12, 2009, 4:34 pm ET

WASHINGTON –

President Barack Obama rejected the Afghanistan war options before him and asked for revisions, his defense secretary said Thursday, after the U.S. ambassador in Kabul argued that a significant U.S. troop increase would only prop up a weak, corruption-tainted government.

Obama's ambassador, Karl Eikenberry, who is also a former commander in Afghanistan, twice in the last week voiced strong dissent against sending large numbers of new forces, according to an administration official. That puts him at odds with the current war commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who is seeking thousands more troops.

Eikenberry's misgivings, expressed in classified cables to Washington, highlight administration concerns that bolstering the American presence in Afghanistan could make the country more reliant on the U.S., not less. He expressed his objections just ahead of Obama's latest war meeting Wednesday.

At the war council meeting, Obama asked for changes in the four options he was given that could alter the dynamic of both how many additional troops are sent to Afghanistan and their timeline in the war zone.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the discussion turned on "how can we combine some of the best features of several of the options to maximum good effect." He added: "There is a little more work to do. I do think that we're getting toward the end of this process."

One issue in the discussions, Gates said, has been "How do we signal resolve and at the same time signal to the Afghans and the American people that this isn't an open-ended commitment."

The president wants to clarify how and when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government, said another official, who spoke on condition of anonymity discuss administration deliberations.

Meanwhile, Richard C. Holbrooke, Obama's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, left late Wednesday for consultations with allies in Berlin, Paris and Moscow. British officials also are expected at some point to join the talks, part of a continuing effort to coordinate with allies, brief them on Obama's strategy review and discuss what more they might contribute in Afghanistan.

The developments underscore U.S. skepticism about the leadership of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, whose government has been dogged by corruption. The emerging administration message is that Obama will not do anything to lock in an open-ended U.S. commitment.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday voiced a list of concerns about Afghanistan: "corruption, lack of transparency, poor governance, absence of the rule of law."

"We're looking to President Karzai as he forms a new government to take action that will demonstrate — not just to the international community but first and foremost to his own people — that his second term will respond the needs that are so manifest," Clinton said during a news conference in Manila with Philippine Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo.

Obama is still expected to send in more troops to bolster a deteriorating war effort.

He remains close to announcing his revamped war strategy — troops are just one component — and probably will do so shortly after he returns from a trip to Asia that ends Nov. 19.

Yet in Wednesday's pivotal war council meeting, Obama wasn't satisfied with any of the Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, one official said.

Military officials said Obama has asked for a rewrite before and resisted what one official called a one-way highway toward commander McChrystal's recommendations for more troops. The sense that he was being rushed and railroaded has stiffened Obama's resolve to seek information and options beyond military planning, officials said, though a substantial troop increase is still likely.

The president is considering options that include adding 30,000 or more U.S. forces to take on the Taliban in key areas of Afghanistan and to buy time for the Afghan government's inadequate and ill-equipped fighting forces to prepare to take over. The other three options on the table are ranges of troop increases, from a relatively small addition of forces to the roughly 40,000 that McChrystal prefers, according to military and other officials.

The war is now in its ninth year and is claiming U.S. lives at a record pace as military leaders say the Taliban has the upper hand in many parts of the country.

Ambassador Eikenberry, who was the top U.S. military commander in Afghanistan for two years ending in 2007, is a prominent voice among those advising Obama, and his sharp dissent is sure to affect the equation.

The options given to Obama will now be altered, although not overhauled.

Military officials say one approach is a compromise battle plan that would add 30,000 or more U.S. forces atop a record 68,000 in the country now. They described it as "half and half," meaning half fighting and half training and holding ground so the Afghans can regroup.

"The government of Afghanistan has to accept greater responsibility for its own defense," Clinton said Thursday. She had no comment on the Eikenberry memos.

Among the options for Obama would be ways to phase in additional troops, perhaps eventually equaling McChrystal's full request, based on security or other conditions in Afghanistan and troop levels by U.S. allies there.

The White House has chafed under criticism from Republicans and some outside critics that Obama is dragging his feet to make a decision.

Obama's top military advisers have said they are comfortable with the pace of the process, and senior military officials have pointed out that the president still has time since no additional forces could begin flowing into Afghanistan until early next year.

Under the scenario featuring about 30,000 more troops, that number most likely would be assembled from three Army brigades and a Marine Corps contingent, plus a new headquarters operation that would be staffed by 7,000 or more troops, a senior military official said. There would be a heavy emphasis on the training of Afghan forces, and the reinforcements Obama sends could include thousands of U.S. military trainers.

___

Associated Press writers Matthew Lee in Manila, Philippines, and Pamela Hess and Barry Schweid in Washington contributed to this report.

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