Pressure is building on the Afghanistan battleground and in Washingtonas President Obama considers whether to meet a request for tens ofthousands more troops to fight the Taliban insurgency and convinceAfghans militants are not winning.

US Soldiers in AfghanistanU.S. Marines in Afghanistan are focusing on the strongholds of the Taliban in the southern part of the country.

Monday, they worked with local Afghan villagers to gain ground in the Helmand province.

Ittook 200 Marines two days to advance just 4 kilometers to Barcha in theface of insurgent attacks and a string of roadside explosive traps.

Sergeant Thomas Whorl described part of the mission, saying "Search the area, make sure there are no caches, and look for any bad guys."
 
Pressureis also mounting in Washington, where President Obama has beenconsulting with security advisers about a request by the U.S. Afghancommander, General Stanley McChrystal, for 40,000 additional troops.

Thegeneral has told President Obama he needs the troops to push back aresurgent Taliban and convince the population that insurgents will notwin.
       
President Obama is under pressure from someDemocrats to pull back from the war, and from some prominentRepublicans to meet military requests.

"I'm very convinced that General McChrystal's analysis is not only correct but should be employed as quickly as possible," said Republican Senator John McCain.

Troopsare also needed to secure areas and allow for the work of Americancivilians sent to Afghanistan by the State Department, to help developpoor regions and gain the confidence of the Afghan people.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton explained the mission on Sunday in London. "Soour challenge has been to take what we inherited, including animmediate request for troops that the president had to act on shortlyafter taking office, understanding that we wanted to integrate ourcivilian and our military approaches," said Clinton.

Allegationsof fraud in the August 20 presidential election in Afghanistan, andthe delay in declaring the final result, have added to the complexityof the situation.

President Hamid Karzai expressed his concern Monday, saying that "as a result of the delay, Afghanistan is facing security challenges day by day."

Preliminaryresults released last month showed President Karzai winning the pollswith about 54 percent of the vote. But a recount, expected to becompleted this month, could force a runoff with the second-placefinisher Abdullah Abdullah, if Karzai's total falls short of 50percent.