NATO chief wants more troops in Afghanistan

LONDON, NATO's new secretary-general made a direct call for more troops in Afghanistan on Friday and said training of Afghan forces also needed to be escalated."Honestly speaking, I think we need more troops," Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the former Danish prime minister who took over as head of NATO this month, said from Kabul."I have seen progress in the south (of Afghanistan), not least thanks to the increase in the number of troops, so definitely the number of troops matters," he told BBC radio.NATO has almost 65,000 troops in Afghanistan, with contributions from more than 40 countries, although around half of them are American. The United States has a further 36,000 troops operating outside the NATO umbrella.Washington has made clear it would like further troop contributions from major NATO states, but there is a reluctance among countries such as Germany, France and Italy to increase their numbers much above current levels.A roadside bomb killed four U.S. troops on Thursday in the southern Helmand province where Marines are conducting the biggest operation of the war. Last month, 76 foreign troops died in Afghanistan, making it by far the deadliest month of the war.The new U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, is due to issue a review of the conflict in the coming weeks, although it is not expected to make any specific request for extra troops."In a few weeks' time our commanders in the field will provide us with an updated assessment of the situation and based on that we will take the necessary decisions to proceed," Rasmussen said.One area for improvement that Rasmussen identified was the training of Afghan forces. There are around 180,000 Afghan soldiers and uniformed police operating, but their performance is patchy and they often cannot work independently."My criteria of success is that we can hand over gradually the ability for the security to the Afghans themselves," said Rasmussen, reiterating a goal set by his predecessor, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer."We have to build up a NATO training mission aiming at developing stronger capacity within the Afghan national army and the Afghan national police so we can make them capable to take lead responsibility for the security province-by-province."U.S. and British forces have conducted big security sweeps across southern Afghanistan in the past month, ahead of presidential and provincial elections on Aug. 20, but there was very little support from Afghan security forces, who are needed to hold territory once it is cleared of Taliban.

Reuters