Fresh carnage in Kabul and a rising death toll among US troops are thrusting once-forgotten Afghanistan into the thick of the intensifying White House showdown between John McCain and Barack Obama.
Democratic presumptive nominee Obama is promising to redeploy large numbers of US combat troops from Iraq to Afghanistan if he is elected president in November, in an effort to quell resurgent militant activity.
Republican candidate John McCain however maintains that Iraq is the central front of the "war on terror" adding that a US withdrawal would embolden terrorists and US enemies, and that the two wars cannot be seen in isolation.
Afghanistan moved to center stage in the campaign last week, before Monday's suicide car bombing at the Indian embassy in Kabul, which killed at least 41 people in the deadliest attack since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.
The Afghan conflict garnered new attention in the United States after more foreign troops died battling Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants in the last two months than were killed in Iraq.
The security situation in Iraq meanwhile appears to be improving, following a US troop "surge" anti-insurgent strategy launched last year.
Obama, who based his primary campaign win over Hillary Clinton on his early opposition to the invasion of Iraq, argues that the huge US troop presence there is drawing resources from the anti-terror effort in Afghanistan.
The Illinois Senator will lay out his plan for both conflicts in visits to Iraq and Afghanistan expected later this month, details of which have yet to be released for security reasons.
"It's time to refocus our attention on the war we have to win in Afghanistan," Obama said in his first joint appearance with former Democratic foe Hillary Clinton last month.
"It is time to go after the Al-Qaeda leadership where it actually exists. It is time to bring this war in Iraq to a close."
Obama's foreign policy advisor Susan Rice last week accused McCain of fully supporting Bush administration policy on Iraq, which she said had dangerously distracted attention from the anti-terror fight in Afghanistan.
"Every day, there's a new report that underscores the reality that Afghanistan is sliding toward chaos," Rice told reporters on a conference call.
Obama aides pounced on a remark last week by Admiral Michael Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that he needed more anti-insurgency troops in Afghanistan, but could not get them because they were needed in Iraq.
Obama has vowed to get most combat troops out of Iraq at the rate of one or two brigades a month, a process which he says should be complete within 16 months.
But McCain says such a plan would put imperil gains made under the surge strategy, and has called on Obama to climb down, arguing his rival's solution is too simplistic.
"To somehow think it is an either or situation, either Afghanistan or Iraq is a fundamental misreading of the situation in the Middle East," McCain told reporters last week.
"What happens in Iraq, matters in Afghanistan," McCain said.
"If we had failed in Iraq if we had pursued the policies vociferously advocated by Senator Obama, we would have risked a wider war.
"We need to succeed in Iraq, and I am confident we can succeed in Afghanistan, but it's not just a matter of more troops."
Democrats have long argued that the Bush administration took its eye off the search for Al-Qaeda kingpin Osama bin Laden, and the battle with stubborn Afghan militants, by invading Iraq in 2003.
Political synergy between the two wars has been thrown into focus by the death toll among international troops, which is rising in Afghanistan, but decreasing in Iraq.
June was deadliest month for foreign troops in Afghanistan since the 2001 fall of the Taliban, with 49 soldiers from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the separate US-led coalition killed.
Thirty-one soldiers including 29 Americans were killed in Iraq in June despite the fact that there are more than twice as many troops there as in Afghanistan.
