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Marines: More Afghan soldiers needed in Helmand

WASHINGTON — More Afghan soldiers with better training are needed to help clear the Taliban from a key poppy-growing province in southern Afghanistan, a top U.S. Marine commander said Wednesday.

A number of Taliban militants have fled Helmand province since the Obama administration launched its first major military operation in Afghanistan a week ago, Marines Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson told reporters at the Pentagon. But some of them are expected to try to return for the lucrative poppy crop that Nicholson called “the engine that drives the Taliban.”

About 650 Afghan soldiers and police officers have joined the estimated 4,000 Marines in the offensive.

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it. The fact of the matter is, we don’t have enough Afghan forces,” Nicholson said during a telephone briefing from Camp Leatherneck in southern Afghanistan. “And I’d like more.”

While there is a plan to send more Afghan troops to the region, Nicholson said, “they’re just not available right now.”

Nicholson said he would like to have all of his Marine battalions paired up with Afghan battalions — a process he predicted would take at least several months.

The Pentagon has long known that training Afghan soldiers would be a large part of the renewed U.S. push in the nation. Earlier this year, Defense Secretary Robert Gates ordered 21,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan — including 4,000 training forces — by the end of September.

Nicholson also said he’d like more U.S. troops in the region, but that “I don’t necessarily need more troops.”

Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen on Wednesday avoided discussing the possibility of sending more troops, telling a National Press Club audience that the new U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, was still assessing his force needs.

There were an estimated 57,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan as of Wednesday. That number is expected to rise to at least 68,000 by the end of 2009.

A Defense official said later Tuesday that the lack of trained Afghan soldiers has not hurt the Helmand operation, but that the mission would run faster and more smoothly with them. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the operation candidly.

Fighting is continuing in the province, and Nicholson estimated there had been about 20 clashes with the Taliban so far in the weeklong offensive. No civilians have been killed so far, he said.

Nicholson said he did not know where the extremists have fled, although Marines in Helmand say the Taliban relocated to the Marjaa area west of the province.

But he predicted they’ll be back to make more money off Helmand’s poppy crops.

“The enemy is not just going to stay away,” Nicholson said.

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Associated Press writers Pauline Jelinek in Washington and Robert H. Reid in Kabul contributed to this report.