Study highlights risks in Afghanistan

Afghanistan risks sliding into a failed state and becoming the "forgotten war" because of deteriorating international support and a growing violent insurgency, an independent study said.

The assessment, co-chaired by retired US Marine Corps General James Jones and former US ambassador to the UN Thomas Pickering, serves as a warning to the administration of US President George W. Bush at a time military and congressional officials are debating how best to juggle stretched war-fighting resources.

The administration wants to re-energize anti-terror efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where al-Qaeda and the Taliban militia are regenerating. But the US still remains heavily invested in Iraq, and officials are sending strong signals that troop reductions would slow or stop altogether this summer.

"Afghanistan stands at a crossroads," said the study, an advance copy of which was obtained by the Associated Press.

"The progress achieved after six years of international engagement is under serious threat from resurgent violence, weakening international resolve, mounting regional challenges and a growing lack of confidence on the part of the Afghan people about the future direction of their country," it said.

A major issue has been trying to win the war with "too few military forces and insufficient economic aid," the study said.

Among the group's nearly three dozen recommendations: increase NATO force levels and military equipment sent to Afghanistan; decouple US management of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; establish a special envoy to coordinate all US policy on Afghanistan; and champion a unified strategy among partner nations to stabilize the country in five years.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he was not familiar with the study's findings, but he struck a more optimistic tone on Afghanistan's future.

"I would say that the security situation is good," Gates said. "We want to make sure it gets better, and I think there's still a need to coordinate civil reconstruction, the economic development side of it."

Gates said more troops are needed in Afghanistan, but "certainly not ours."

When asked how many more NATO troops might be needed, he said that number should be determined by ground commanders.

The Jones-Pickering assessment, set for public release yesterday, says the US should rethink its military and economic strategy in Afghanistan in large part because of deteriorating support among voters in NATO countries.

If international forces are pulled, the fragile Afghan government would "likely fall apart," the report warns.

The study was a voluntary effort coordinated by the Center for the Study of the Presidency, a nonpartisan organization in Washington, as a follow-on to the Iraq Study Group. That study group was a congressionally mandated blue-ribbon panel, the first major bipartisan assessment on the Iraq war since the 2003 invasion.

While the Afghanistan study has not created the same buzz as the Iraq assessment, the center's latest findings still probably will wield political clout because of those involved.

Last year, Jones led a high profile study on Iraqi security forces, which was used by lawmakers to challenge Bush's own assessments.

Most recently, the retired Marine Corps general, known for his outspoken independence, was tapped to advise US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on security aspects of the new Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Pickering was a longtime US ambassador and a former undersecretary of state.

The study's panel members include Charles Robb, a former Democratic senator who served on the Iraq Study Group, and David Abshire, who helped organize the Iraq study. Abshire is president of the Center for the Study of the Presidency.