Afstan: President Obama considering surge options

Juggling strategy, brigades, and Afstan vs. Iraq:

President Obama is facing a choice on whether to grant commanders’ requests for additional troops in Afghanistan before he has decided on his new strategy there [see 3) here].

While the decision is expected to be the first significant military move of his presidency, defense officials said that Mr. Obama could choose a middle ground, deploying several thousand more troops there in the coming months but postponing a more difficult judgment on a much larger increase in personnel until after the administration completes a review of Afghanistan policy.

The officials said that Mr. Obama may deploy one or two additional brigades, between 3,500 and 7,000 soldiers.

But he has other options, and several administration officials said it was also possible — though less likely — that he could postpone any deployments until after his review was complete. Such a move would not find much favor with commanders in Afghanistan, who have a standing request for an additional three brigades, or more than 10,000 soldiers.

It is also possible that Mr. Obama will fill the request for all three brigades, administration officials said.

Mr. Obama’s military commanders want additional brigades in place by late spring or early summer as part of an effort to counter growing violence and chaos in Afghanistan, particularly before presidential elections that are expected to take place there in August...

Referring to the additional brigades being sought by commanders, Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, said Mr. Obama “could make a decision about none, one, two or all of them [emphasis added].”

“There are clearly people asking, ‘Do we need to make a decision on all of them now, or can we wait until we’ve decided on our new strategy?’ ” he said. “However, there does need to be a decision made about a couple of brigades sooner rather than later if you want them on the ground in time to make a difference in the security situation for the national election in late August.”..

Defense officials say that Mr. Obama cannot satisfy the request from Gen. David D. McKiernan, the top American commander in Afghanistan, for an additional 30,000 troops there without withdrawing a substantial number of those forces directly from Iraq. But they said Mr. Obama did have the latitude to deploy to Afghanistan at least two more brigades, and possibly more, before he decided on Iraq...

Meanwhile, Haroon Siddiqui of the Toronto Star seems to be the first Canadian pundit to glom onto the, er, unilateral nature of President Obama's Afghan policy making (something pointed out at the end of this post eight days ago). But that's fine with Mr Siddiqui; simply because, one must assume, the new president is NOT GEORGE BUSH. And if there are any problems created for Canada, it's all--natch--STEPHEN HARPER'S FAULT (one still has Bush-lite to kick around, eh?):

Missing out on Obama's Afghan plan

A fundamental shift is underway in American policy on Afghanistan. And Canada should be scrambling to be part of the process.

If we don't, Barack Obama will be handing us, and all the NATO members in the Afghan mission, a fait accompli in about two months.

We saw what he did Monday at his first presidential press conference. He greased the skids under Hamid Karzai. And he committed the U.S. to a broad military, diplomatic and development strategy in a "regional approach," with Pakistan as "a stalwart ally."

That was only a hint of what's happening behind the scenes in Washington and publicly in Asia, where Obama's special envoy Richard Holbrooke is on the road.

The Harper government seems clued out. There was a touch of naïveté when Admiral Mike Mullen, chair of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, came calling Tuesday. Ottawa's reaction was: Whoopee! He didn't ask for our military commitment beyond February 2011.

In fact, the U.S. has not only given up on the allies contributing more troops, it has decided to fight the Taliban with an overwhelmingly American force rather than co-ordinate the NATO forces...

Obama's multi-pronged approach needs much non-military help, which he will be calling for in the days ahead. This should be music to Canadian ears. We should be offering help to strengthen the Afghan civil service, judiciary, election commission, community policing [emphasis added], human rights, etc., and to undertake development work in Pakistan. What we have from Ottawa instead is silence.

COMMUNITY POLICING!?!? Which has worked so well in Toronto?