Obama Afghan decision to come after Thanksgiving

US President Barack Obama has put off a decision on whether to send reinforcements to Afghanistan until after next week's Thanksgiving holiday amid resistance to a troop buildup among key Democrats and criticism from the right. After months of ruminating over the way forward in the eight-year war, Obama will not announce the biggest strategic decision of his young administration until after the holiday, his spokesman Robert Gibbs said Friday. Thanksgiving is November 26 and Americans traditionally observe a Thursday-to-Sunday break. Obama had earlier indicated he would end months of deliberations over possible deployment of thousands more troops to the battle-scarred nation "in the coming weeks." He has held a series of closed-door meetings with top advisers -- including General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of the more than 100,000 US and NATO troops already in the country -- to discuss the campaign in Afghanistan and how to achieve US goals there. McChrystal has asked for up to 40,000 more US troops, warning that Afghanistan could be lost if he does not get them within a year to put down an intensifying Taliban insurgency. Currently, there are 68,000 US troops in Afghanistan.