Extra U.S. troops aim for Afghan "tipping point"

By Jon Hemming

KABUL (Reuters) - The British army once tried to drive the Taliban from Garmsir in southern Afghanistan with just 17 British, 10 Estonian and 200 Afghan troops. Now the U.S. army wants to pour troops into the area to make lasting gains.

For two years after the British attack, Garmsir went back and forth between Taliban and government control, thousands fled and it was only when more than 2,000 U.S. Marines launched a major operation in April this year that the town was fully captured and relative calm restored.

That is the kind of difference the U.S. army wants to make by sending up to 30,000 extra troops to Afghanistan by summer.

After an initial reinforcement of some 3,000 U.S. troops to the south of Kabul in January, most of the extra deployment will be to the south to bolster British, Canadian and Dutch forces that U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said recently are just "holding their own" in the fight with the resurgent Taliban.

"That's where the toughest fight is," said Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, announcing the planned reinforcements in the Afghan capital on Saturday.

Garmsir is a good example of what the extra U.S. troops may achieve, NATO officials said.

"When we put Marines out there earlier this year ... they found themselves in a pretty tough fight pretty quickly," Mullen said. Fierce clashes ensued for more than a month and hundreds of Taliban were killed before the Marines pulled out and handed security to British forces and the Afghan National Army (ANA).

"As the Marines left down there, there was concern about whether or not we would hold. The Brits and the ANA have held Garmsir," Mullen said.

Garmsir bazaar is now open again, life is returning to the dusty, battle-scarred town and more than $3 million has been earmarked for development.

The operation illustrates the "clear, hold and build" strategy employed by U.S. Gen. David Petraeus with success in Iraq.

Petraeus is now in overall command of operations in Afghanistan as well and his ideas are likely to form the core of a review of strategy in Afghanistan to be presented to President-elect Barack Obama.

"TIPPING POINT"

U.S. General David McKiernan, the commander of international troops in Afghanistan, has said he wants the extra forces to reach a "tipping point" against the Taliban.

He no longer wants to launch operations to clear an area unless he has the forces, preferably Afghan, to hold onto it and bring in aid and development.

The trouble is there are not yet enough fully trained and equipped Afghan soldiers and police to provide that sort of security to all of Afghanistan's nearly 400 districts.