Barack Obama, the US president, is deliberating over what strategy to take in the ongoing war in Afghanistan.
General Stanley McChrystal, the head of US and Nato forces in Afghanistan, is reported to have called for 40,000 extra troops to be deployed in an effort to stabilse the country.
But others in the US administration have argued for ambitions to be scaled back and military operations to shift from nation-building to simply targeting the Taliban and al-Qaeda leadership.
Mike Honda, a US Democratic congressman and chair of the Afghanistan Task Force in the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told Al Jazeera that there was a possible third way, with a focus on local initiatives such as the National Solidarity Programme.
It is run by the Afghan government and local co-operatives and is successfully building schools, health clinics and irrigation facilities across the country.
