Pentagon Used War Game to Test Strategies for Afghanistan

Top Pentagon officials spent the last month overseeing a classified war game that tested two major strategies being considered in the Afghanistan conflict, the Washington Post reported Monday. The two options were Gen. Stanley McChrystal's recommended plan for a full-scale counterinsurgency, which would require 44,000 additional American troops, and a second option, known as "counterterrorism plus," that would only require about 15,000. The game was led by Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Both scenarios originated in the detailed analysis of the Afghan conflict that McChrystal submitted several weeks ago and that President Obama has been reviewing. The war game exercises did not endorse either, but tried to determine how the Taliban, the Afghan and Pakistani governments, and NATO allies would react to each strategy. It came as the administration has been pressured from all sides to make a decision on Afghanistan, and as a major strategy review has stretched from weeks into more than a month.

War games are military simulations that may have varying degrees of realism, and are usually conducted to preview operations and develop strategies.

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