Bigger Afghan operation yet to come: US

A CH53 US Marine helicopter lands in Marjah


Afghan National police


US Marines with 1/6 Charlie Company

The United States plans a major offensive this year in the Taliban bastion of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, a senior official said Friday, calling a hard-fought ongoing operation a mere prelude.

The remarks were the latest sign that President Barack Obama's administration plans to step up the fight against the Taliban as part of its strategy of pouring thousands more troops into Afghanistan.

US Marines have been leading a 15,000-strong force of US, Afghan and NATO forces in a nearly two-week assault in the southern Marjah area in what has been billed as the biggest operation since the September 11, 2001 attacks.

"I think the way to look at Marjah, it's the tactical prelude to larger, more comprehensive operations later this year in Kandahar City," said a senior administration official, who asked not to be named.

"It's a goal for 2010. If our overall goal for 2010 is to reverse the momentum and gain time and space for the Afghan capacity, we have to get to Kandahar this year," he said.

Kandahar, the second largest city in Afghanistan, is a cultural home to the Pashtun people and was the birthplace of the Taliban movement, which imposed an austere brand of Islam over the country from 1996 to 2001.

"It's their center of gravity," the administration official said of Kandahar, describing the US goal as being able to bring "comprehensive population security" to the city.

Operation Mushtarak ("Together") aims to bring government control to Marjah, a poppy-growing area of Helmand province that has effectively under Taliban rule for years.

Authorities on Thursday symbolically hoisted the Afghan flag over Marjah. But troops have faced stiff resistance from militant fighters virtually indistinguishable from the local population and NATO warned that hidden bombs remained a threat.

US General Stanley McChrystal, commander of 121,000 US and NATO troops in Afghanistan, has charted out a counter-insurgency strategy in which the military works closely with civilian authorities to neutralize militants.

"In many ways it is a model for the future: an Afghan-led operation supported by the coalition, deeply engaged with the people," McChrystal said.

US Central Command chief General David Petraeus said Sunday that Mushtarak is the initial stage of a plan McChrystal has mapped out for the coming 12-18 months.

The timeline coincides with the schedule laid out by Obama, who in December issued orders to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan.

Obama hopes to start withdrawing forces by July 2011, by which time the administration expects that Afghanistan will have 287,000 trained soldiers and police who can increasingly take charge of their country's security.

The administration official on Friday pointed to successes in a key part of the strategy -- Pakistan.

"In the last nine months we've seen a significant strategic shift in Pakistan," the official said. "That strategic shift is the decision by the Pakistani security forces to take the fight against the Pakistani Taliban."

Pakistan has launched offensives in its lawless tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, where much of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda leadership is believed to be based.

US officials have long suspected that elements in Pakistan's powerful spy agency have abetted extremists.

A recent raid in the Pakistani metropolis of Karachi led to the capture of Afghan Taliban military commander Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, although some observers believe the arrest was a fluke.