The surprise visit comes in the middle of a review of the administration's war strategy. | REUTERS Obama to troops: 'On the offense'

BAGRAM AIR BASE, Afghanistan — President Barack Obama made an unannounced pre-holiday visit to U.S. troops here Friday, telling them that they are “on the offense” in Afghanistan now, and making progress against the Taliban.

After a 13-hour flight from Washington, Obama spent only about three hours at the sprawling base, meeting with Gen. David Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces, and U.S. ambassador Karl Eikenberry, and visiting wounded soldiers at the base hospital before addressing troops gathered in a hangar.


He also talked to Afghan president Hamid Karzai by phone for 15 minutes after bad weather made it impossible for him to meet Karzai in Kabul.

“On behalf of Americans, we are here to say thank you. We are here to say thank you for everything that you do,” Obama, dressed in a brown leather bomber jacket and dark slacks, told the troops, many of them from the 101st Airborne Division.

Introducing the president, Petraeus joked that Obama had recently been injured playing basketball and that the opposing player who elbowed him in the lip must have forgotten who he was playing against. A couple of members of the military then presented Obama with a pair of T-shirts.

“No one will mess with you if you wear this, Mr. President," Petraeus said of the second shirt, which was emblazoned with the insignia of the 101st Airborne.

The surprise visit came almost a year to the day that Obama announced a troop surge in Afghanistan in a speech at West Point.

"All of those troops are now in place, and thanks to your service, we are making important progress," he said in his remarks. "You are protecting your country. You are achieving your objective. You will succeed in your mission."

Obama pledged that Afghanistan would never again be a "safe haven for terrorists" who want to attack the United States and told the troops that they should be proud that because of their efforts, there are far fewer areas under Taliban now control. But he said there is a still a difficult road ahead.

“Progress comes slow,” he said. “There are going to be difficult days ahead. Progress comes at a high price.”

Obama and his national security advisers are in the middle of a review of the administration’s war strategy But the White House stressed that the main point of Obama’s trip was for him to thank the troops for their service, particularly during the holiday season.

“We started planning this over a month ago," said deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes, who is traveling with Obama. "And the reason was to go during the holiday season. The president wanted to find a time in between Thanksgiving and Christmas when he could go out to spend some time with the troops, in particular, and our civilians in Afghanistan," basically to wish them happy holidays. "It's a particularly tough time of year."

Air Force One touched down at the sprawling air base at 8:35 p.m. local time after departing from Andrews Air Force base shortly before 10 p.m. Washington time. The trip was carried out in strict secrecy, with the White House last night releasing Obama’s schedule indicating Friday would be a day of routine meetings in Washington.

Obama is scheduled to return to Washington on Saturday after a refueling stop at Ramstein Air Base in Germany.

Speaking to reporters on the trip from Washington, Rhodes said Obama met with Karzai only two weeks ago in Lisbon and that Karzai understood the nature of this trip was mainly to support the troops.

Rhodes described the policy review now in progress as “diagnostic in nature” and not as comprehensive as the one last year that resulted in the surge.

“We have a strategy in place. This is a process that will assess that strategy and review the need for any adjustments. But these adjustments again won't be of the nature of a policy overhaul," Rhodes said.

He said the review will be complete by mid-December, before Obama leaves for Hawaii for vacation.

Obama’s last trip to Afghanistan, his first as president, was in March, just months after the West Point speech in which he ordered the deployment of an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan and set a July 2011 deadline for beginning a withdrawal.

Obama has so far tried to present a positive assessment of the war, making the case that his new strategy has shown progress in helping stabilize the country and preparing Afghans to take control of security over the next four years.

At a recent meeting of NATO in Lisbon, Obama said he is “confident” that U.S. forces will be able to begin drawing down as planned in July 2011. He also said for the first time that he wants American troops out of major combat in Afghanistan by the end of 2014 — the same date he and NATO leaders set for Afghan forces to take the lead on security.

"As Afghans stand up and take the lead,” Obama said at the end of the NATO summit, “they will not stand alone."

When Obama visited Afghanistan in March, tensions between his administration and Karzai were at an all-time high. And just before the summit in Lisbon, Karzai criticized U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and demanded that NATO cut back its military operations.

Obama had sharp words for Karzai then, saying at said at a news conference at the end of the summit: “We have to listen and learn, but he’s got to listen to us, as well.”

And relations have not been helped by the recent disclosure — in documents obtained by WikiLeaks — that U.S. officials are gravely concerned by corruption in the Karzai government.

"We've had ups and downs in terms of the kind of public revelations," Rhodes said on the flight here. "What we're focused on is making sure that the two governments are aligned.”