McChrystal ... not insisting on troop increase

The Cable's new guy, Josh Rogin, here

General Stanley McChrystal will offer President Obama a series of different "options" for the way forward in Afghanistan, only one of which is to increase overall U.S. troops levels there, Spencer Ackerman reveals today:

Administration officials said that the widespread expectation within the administration was that Gen. Stanley McChrystal would present Obama with a series of options for how to resource the U.S. effort to combat the deterioration of security in Afghanistan, along with a discussion of the merits and drawbacks of each. Among the options anticipated by the officials: an accelerated increase in Afghan security forces; the transference of U.S. or Afghan troops to relatively volatile parts of the country; substituting U.S. support troops for U.S. combat troops while holding overall troop levels static; or increasing U.S. troops in total. The officials would not speak for attribution, citing the sensitivity of the internal Afghanistan debate.

McChrystal, according to an aide, is finalizing his resource request this week, and the aide cautioned that it was unclear what precise format the resource request will take. During this same week, Obama will decide whether he agrees with the scope of a still-secret strategy review that McChrystal submitted to the administration earlier this month. A Pentagon official said that an ultimate decision on sending McChrystal additional resources will be completed within a month's time.......

If McChrystal presents these options as reported, it could benefit Obama politically in two ways: If the President ultimately decides not to increase troop levels, Republicans will have a much harder time arguing that went against the advice of the "commanders on the ground." Conversely, if Obama does increase troop levels, the administration can use the downside assessments of McChrystal's other options to defend their decision to senior Democratic lawmakers who have come out recently against such increases.