My new piece at the Washington Independent is filled with behind-the-scenes accounts from the Obama administration’s debates on troop levels in Afghanistan. One find: McChrystal might not structure his resource request like "I want X troops," but rather like "Here are a series of options for how we might resource the mission, and the merits/drawbacks of each." That’s generally good policymaking. It’s also got the political benefit of allowing Obama to choose a more limited option for troop increases — or decide against one — without stiff-arming his chosen commander.

 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.

Pending Obama’s approval of McChrystal’s strategy review, the subsequent resource request will present “several different ways forward, with [a presentation of] the risks and benefits of each,” said one U.S. official. “It wouldn’t neccessarily be ‘here is the way to do it,’ but rather really hashing through a combination of approaches for what makes sense.”

(This, by the way, is the sort of piece I could not report without grants of anonymity. It sucks, but that’s the way it sort of has to be. I’m asking people to discuss internal deliberations.) 

To be clear: I don’t know what McChrystal will ultimately recommend, as he’s spending the week finalizing his resource request. I am certainly not saying there won’t be another troop increase. But over the last few weeks, I’ve picked up increasing signs that it’s not a foregone conclusion. My impression is that it’s more likely than not — in some form — but it faces significant internal resistance. This is a debate with a number of moving parts and a number of unconvinced or undecided players.