Nato says it has cornered a large group of Taliban fighters and killed about 300 but needs more troops and aircraft to finish the job.
More than 20 Taliban guerrillas were killed in Operation Medusa in the southern province of Kandahar yesterday, Nato said in a statement, adding that the remaining rebels had dug into fixed positions.
Nato is a week into its biggest offensive against the Taliban. "We are steadily putting pressure on insurgent fighters," a Nato spokesman said today.
But the body says it needs more soldiers, helicopters and planes to crush the Taliban in their southern stronghold before the alliance also takes over in the east, bordering Pakistan, from US forces by the end of the year.
The alliance has around 18,500 troops in Afghanistan. Nato Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said in Brussels that he had been promised more troops and is was now time for the commitment to be honoured.
"Those allies who perhaps are doing less in Afghanistan should think: Shouldn't we do more? . . . There are certainly a number of allies who can do more," he said.
He did not single out any nation, but diplomats say Germany is under pressure to offer reinforcements for the south.
Germany, which leads the Nato mission, has its soldiers in the relatively calm north, where troops have no need even to patrol highways, British, Canadian and Dutch forces are providing the backbone of the operations in the south and taking heavy casualties.
Analysts say the Taliban and their allies are the strongest they have been since they were ousted by a US-led coalition in 2001 in the wake of the September 11th attacks.
More than 2,300 people have died this year, and some officials say the fighting in Afghanistan is now worse than in Iraq.
The guerrillas have moved beyond small-scale hit-and-run operations to pitched battles and larger strikes, sheltering and training in Pakistan despite Islamabad's efforts to stop them.
They are in part being bolstered by drug lords, who are expected to reap a record crop this year worth about $3 billion and who are keen to keep the army and police at bay.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, criticised by some Afghan leaders for doing too little to stop militants operating from largely lawless borderlands, visited Kabul this week and pledged to join President Hamid Karzai in crushing the Taliban.