Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military solution was not enough but the buildup in US forces would be used to turn around the security situation.

"I think with the troops that we put on the ground there, that over the next 12 to 18 months, we have to dramatically change the security situation and stem the tide," he said.

"We've had an increasing level of violence in the last three years in '06, '07, and '08, and I think in '09 and '10, we have to start to turn that around," he said.

President Barack Obama has approved deployments that would double the size of the US force in Afghanistan to 68,000 by the fall.

The escalation has run into criticism from some Democrats who worry that the new administration is wading deeper into an Iraq-like quagmire without clear goals or an exit strategy.

In a sign of growing unease in the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Robert Gates earlier this month fired the top US commander in Afghanistan in hopes that his replacement, a former special operations commander, will bring fresh ideas to the fight.

Mullen said the military buildup was "absolutely necessary" to turn the security situation around.

"But the military solution is not enough. We've got to have government, governance capability increase dramatically. We've got to have development, economic development.

"We need more civilians from our government and civilians from other agencies and other countries, as well," he said.

But he said that, not unlike Iraq, security has to be brought to a point where "these other aspects can be developed much more fully, and we'll know at that point in time how far we've gone and what our next step should be."

earlier related report
Timing not right for deal with Taliban: US
The chances of a deal between the Afghan government and the Taliban are remote as long as the insurgents enjoy momentum on the battlefield, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Friday.

In an interview with NBC television's "Today" show, Gates said the time was not yet ripe for the kind of reconciliation that occurred in Iraq with armed opponents of the Baghdad government.

"I think the view of most of us is that until the momentum of the battle turns against the Taliban... that the likelihood of any kind of reconciliation on the part of the leadership of the Taliban is very small," Gates said.

Asked about a New York Times report that Taliban factions were in talks with the Kabul government and pushing for a deadline for the withdrawal of NATO-led forces, Gates said Washington would "absolutely not" accept any such idea.

The defense secretary said "the end of all such wars involves some measure of reconciliation. We've seen it in Iraq."

"And so the real issue is, will these guys reconcile on the terms of the Afghan government, or are they dictating terms to the Afghan government?"

The Taliban and associated insurgents in Afghanistan have stepped up violent attacks in the past two years despite the presence of 70,000 foreign troops.

President Barack Obama has approved the deployment of more than 21,000 additional US troops to Afghanistan to try to stem the rising violence, especially in the volatile south.

By the end of the year, US officials say the US force will reach 68,000.

The Taliban were ousted in 2001 in a US-led invasion which sent many of its fighters into Pakistan.

Coalition strike kills Afghan farmer: officials
An Afghan farmer has died after being wounded in a US-led coalition air strike, launched last week after he was wrongly suspected of planting a roadside bomb, Afghan and NATO officials said Sunday.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a statement that "an Afghan civilian died of wounds sustained in an air strike conducted by a coalition forces aircraft".

The May 20 strike in the eastern province of Paktya was called in to support ISAF troops, it said.

"A subsequent investigation has determined that the individual was not emplacing improvised explosive devices, as originally suspected," it said.

He was transferred to a hospital in Kabul where he died, the statement said, expressing regret.

Provincial government spokesman Rohullah Samoon told AFP the man was in fact a farmer, and had been shot.

President Hamid Karzai this month demanded an end to the use of air strikes in the international war against Taliban extremists in Afghanistan.

This followed the bombing of villages earlier this month in the southwestern province of Farah, where the government says 140 civilians were killed.

A US military investigation said 20-30 civilians may have died, along with 60-65 Taliban.

The US military is meanwhile investigating the May 5 killing of an Afghan civilian in Kabul by US contractors who say they opened fire on a "threatening" vehicle.

British NATO soldier killed in Afghanistan: London
A British soldier with the NATO-led alliance in Afghanistan has been killed in a bomb blast in the insurgency-hit south of the country, officials in Kabul and London said Sunday.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said the soldier was killed Saturday "as a result of an improvised explosive device in southern Afghanistan."

In London the Ministry of Defence said the incident happened near Sangin, in the violence-wracked Helmand province.

"It is with great sadness that the Ministry of Defence must confirm that a British soldier from 38 Engineer Regiment working with 2nd Battalion The Rifles, Battle Group was killed as a result of an explosion that happened whilst on patrol near Sangin," it said.

Nick Richardson, spokesman for Task Force Helmand, added: "My fellow Sapper gave his life for his country and the freedom of the Afghan people; there is no greater sacrifice than this."

ISAF includes nearly 58,000 soldiers from 40 nations deployed in Afghanistan to help fight an extremist insurgency and build the Afghan security forces.

There are more international soldiers in the country serving in a separate US-led coalition leading "Operation Enduring Freedom," the campaign that removed the Taliban regime in 2001.

The Taliban are heading an insurgency which has gained pace in recent years, leading US President Barack Obama to pledge 17,000 more combat troops to the south, around 3,000 of whom have already moved into place.

Nearly 110 international soldiers have lost their lives in Afghanistan, most of them in hostile action.

NATO soldier dies in Afghan chopper crash
A soldier with a NATO-led force in Afghanistan was killed when a helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing, the alliance said Saturday, adding that militants had not brought the chopper down.

The International Security Assistance Force soldier was killed Friday in the southern province of Uruzgan "as a result of a helicopter being forced to conduct an emergency landing," an ISAF statement said.

"The emergency landing was not caused by insurgent action," it added.

The multinational force of nearly 58,000 soldiers did not give the nationality of the trooper, leaving this to the home nation.

Many of the ISAF soldiers in Uruzgan are Australian or Dutch.

The cause of the crash was being investigated, the statement said.

It was the second ISAF fatality to be announced Saturday with the British defence ministry saying earlier that one of its soldiers was killed Friday when he was shot while on patrol in the southern province of Helmand.

Friday's deaths takes to 108 the number of international soldiers to lose their lives in Afghanistan this year, most of them in attacks, according to a toll maintained by the icasualties.org website.

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