Measuring success in Afghanistan

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration is preparing a set of about 50 benchmarks for Afghanistan, senior officials said yesterday, redefining how to measure success in a war now widely assessed as a stalemate.

The benchmarks will test how well the U.S. military and civilian "surges" ordered by President Obama are working.

The new measures, ordered by Congress, are due Sept. 24 amid creeping skepticism among many Democrats about the war's prognosis and costs.

"The deterioration of the security situation in Afghanistan is conspicuous," the Senate Foreign Relations Committee wrote in a report to be released this week. The report notes a record number of U.S. soldiers and Marines died in Afghanistan in July.

"The coming months will test the administration's deepening involvement, its new strategy on counternarcotics specifically and its counterinsurgency effort in general," the senators wrote. "Some observers fear that the moment for reversing the tide in Afghanistan has passed and even a narrow victory will remain out of reach, despite the larger American footprint."

The Afghanistan benchmarks will be more detailed than the Iraq war scorecard used by the Bush administration, a senior official said yesterday. The White House is circulating a classified version among key lawmakers, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the unreleased document.

The old Iraq yardsticks had an all-or-nothing quality - either the Iraqi government passed a law governing oil resources or it did not. Many tests remain unmet, even as the war there has subsided and U.S. forces prepare to leave.

In writing the Afghan version, Obama advisers say they want to look more broadly, measuring not only what gets done but how well and on what schedule. The benchmarks will include short- and long-term goals.

The reports will be submitted quarterly, with three or four due ahead of the unofficial deadline for measurable progress - 12 to 18 months - outlined by Obama and his top defense advisers.

Separately, the newly installed top U.S. general in Afghanistan is preparing an interim assessment that is expected to be a sober accounting of the difficulties of fighting an entrenched and technically capable insurgency eight years into the war.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal is expected to identify shortfalls that should be filled by more forces - perhaps a mix of Afghan, NATO, and United States. Any recommendations for more U.S. forces would come through McChrystal's boss, Gen. David Petraeus.

Estimates of the additions McChrystal might recommend range from a few thousand to more than 20,000. McChrystal's predecessor had already asked for an additional 10,000 for next year, but Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and other top officials made it known they were skeptical.

White House national security adviser James Jones, making the rounds of the Sunday talk shows, did not rule out more American forces, although he said he had warned top brass in June that Obama might be startled by a new request so soon after he committed 21,000 additional forces this year.

In an interview yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, McChrystal said the Taliban was gaining momentum as it moved beyond traditional strongholds in southern Afghanistan.

"It's a very aggressive enemy right now," he said.

He said the United States would change its strategy and increase the troop presence in heavily populated areas.

With 74 troops killed - including 43 Americans - July was the deadliest month for international forces since the start of the war in 2001.