WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Robert Gates said today there is too little “time, patience or money” for the United States to set unrealistic goals for war-torn Afghanistan.
He also confirmed plans that the Pentagon could send two more brigades there by late spring and a third by mid-summer in an effort to try to salvage a country besieged by corruption and increasing violence.
More troops could be sent after that, Gates told the Senate Armed Services Committee, but that would hinge on the Defense Department’s ability to build a larger infrastructure.
But Gates said there can be no mistaking the realities of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan. He said the United States must ratchet down any heightened expectations in the war — and the aim should be to eliminate terrorist bases. Gates said less lofty objectives may be unavoidable, simply because the country is so poor.
“If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of Central Asian Valhallah over there,” Gates said, referring to the mythic haven of purity, “we will lose because nobody in the world has that kind of time, patience or money, to be honest.”
Gates’ prediction comes as President Barack Obama considers his options for a drawdown of troops in Iraq. The Pentagon is preparing various scenarios for winding down the war, including a plan that would cease U.S. involvement in combat within 16 months. Gates said military planners are looking at later dates as well and are prepared to brief Obama on all his options and the their associated risks.
Obama planned to meet on Wednesday with the service chiefs.
“I believe the president will have had every opportunity to hear quite directly from his commanders about what they can accomplish and what the attendant risks are under different options,” Gates said.
Gates said he does not expect the military buildup in Afghanistan to put an additional strain on troops. By the end of September, soldiers deployed for 12 months should be allowed 15 months at home. In the 2010 budget year, that ratio will stretch further, giving troops two years at home for every one year deployed. By 2011, they should see 30 months at home, he said.
It was Gates’ first hearing since Obama took office and lawmakers were eager to hear details about how the administration plans to turn around the war in Afghanistan.
“This is a long, hard slog we’re in in Afghanistan,” said Sen. John McCain of Arizona, borrowing the phrase used frequently by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to describe the war in Iraq.
“It is complex,” added McCain, the top Republican on the Armed Services Committee. “It is challenging. And I don’t see frankly an Anbar wakening — a game changing event — in Afghanistan, such as we were able to see in Iraq.”
Security gains made in Iraq’s Anbar province are often seen as a turning point in the Iraq war.
In his prepared remarks, Gates said Afghanistan is America’s “greatest military challenge” and coordination of the fight against the insurgency has been “less than stellar.” He said it will take a long and difficult fight to rout militants and help develop a nation that rejects the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban and backs its own elected government.
When asked by McCain if terrorists are operating freely in the Helmand province in Afgahnistan and in Kandahar, Gates paused briefly and sighed before saying that he had been given conflicting reports from analysts in Washington, D.C., and ground commanders.
Troops in the field say the situation is “no worse” but “different,” he said, adding that the Taliban’s ability to cross the border so freely clearly has enabled them to have “greater freedom of action than they’ve had in the last couple of years.”
Obama has vowed to shift military resources away from Iraq and move them toward Afghanistan and Pakistan, which he says is the central front in the struggle against terrorism and extremism. In a plan initiated during the Bush administration and endorsed by Obama, the Pentagon is planning to double the 34,000 contingent of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
While lawmakers mostly support the plan to send more troops, several Democrats have expressed the need for a clearer strategy.
Without an idea of when the commitment would end, “we tend to end up staying in different places and not necessarily resolving problems in a way that fits our national interest,” said Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., a Senate Armed Services Committee member.
Lawmakers also were eager to hear details on Obama’s plans to close the military’s Guantanamo Bay prison and temporarily suspend the tribunals used to prosecute suspected terrorists.
“I believe the military commissions — after a long and difficult and arduous process — were starting to function effectively. I’m disappointed that they have been suspended,” McCain said.
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