WASHINGTON — Concerned about the faltering war in Afghanistan, President Obama plans to dispatch thousands more military and civilian trainers on top of the 17,000 fresh combat troops he's already ordered, people familiar with the forthcoming plan said yesterday.

Obama also will call for increasing aid to neighboring Pakistan as long as its leaders confront militants in the border region. The president plans to lay out his revamped strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan today.

Several sources said the strategy includes 20 recommendations for countering a persistent insurgency that spans the two countries' border, including sending 4,000 military trainers to try to increase the size of the Afghan army.

"It is an integrated military-civilian strategy," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in Monterrey, Mexico. "We are convinced that the most critical underpinning of any success we hope to achieve, along with the people and government of Afghanistan, will be looking at where civilian trainers, aid workers, technical assistance of all kinds can be best utilized."

Clinton would not go into details to avoid pre-empting Obama's announcement.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs also would not discuss specifics of the plan, but said Obama is beginning to discuss its findings with members of Congress and others. Obama's top military advisers briefed key lawmakers yesterday.

In broad terms, Obama will define U.S. objectives as eliminating the threat from al-Qaida to undermine or topple U.S.-backed elected governments or to launch attacks on the United States, its interests and allies, the sources said.

They described the recommendations on condition of anonymity because the final wording was not complete. The new plan identified al-Qaida as the target in a larger network of insurgents who threaten U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan, often from sanctuaries across the border in Pakistan.

The written outline of Obama's plan describes a "strategy for success," as opposed to an exit strategy, but the goal is the same: Stability on both sides of the border that would allow a reduction and eventual withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from Afghanistan. To do that, Obama proposes a greatly expanded commitment to improving and enlarging the Afghan army and Pakistan's frontier forces.

NOT ENOUGH ADVISERS

The additional 4,000 troops devoted to training and advising the Afghan armed forces would head to Afghanistan this spring and summer. They come on top of about 17,000 combat and support troops Obama wants in place by the end of the summer.

Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the training group is needed because there aren't enough U.S. military advisers there now.

"We've got to increase the size" of the Afghan army more quickly than contemplated, said Levin, D-Mich. "The trainers are the key to that."

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said it seemed like a viable strategy as long as the manpower is there.

"I know we need more than the 17,000," he said.

As a candidate, Obama said the Afghan war should have been the U.S. priority all along, and that the Bush administration wrongly diverted U.S. attention and resources to the war in Iraq. As president, Obama has been under pressure to say how he plans to address the sharp increase in violence in Afghanistan while prodding anti-terrorism ally Pakistan to deal with the militant threat on its soil.

"I'm comfortable that key policymakers on all levels are not minimizing the difficulties and are not missing anything," said Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash. "What I'm less confident about is that there is a solution to this problem."

He added that Congress cannot shrink from a long-term commitment, including providing money.

LOCAL, NOT CENTRAL

A pillar of the strategy for Afghanistan will be greater engagement with local and provincial leaders, as opposed to a focus on the central government, according to officials familiar with the document.

Officials said there will be a directed campaign to focus attention on tribal and provincial leaders across the expansive country. With the bulk of the population living outside urban centers in small, far-flung villages, U.S. officials believe it will be more productive to build support, foster development and break down extremist ties district by district.

The plan will not abandon the central government in Kabul, said officials, but it will also not rely on bolstering efforts to govern from the capital.

Levin said the strategy will identify benchmarks to measure success in Afghanistan. "Uncertainty is not the kind of commitment they need to succeed."

The forthcoming White House review also says the U.S. will add hundreds of civilian advisers to those already in Afghanistan. The so-called civilian surge would concentrate on improving life for ordinary Afghans, and would include experts in agriculture in a country where subsistence farming is the norm. The civilians are also meant to help extend government services and the administration of justice.

The plan notes that the top U.S. general in Afghanistan still wants some 10,000 or 11,000 additional U.S. forces next year, but does not say whether Obama intends to fulfill that request now, sources said. That decision would come by the end of this year.