North tells GOP more Afghan troops needed

WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 (UPI) -- Former U.S. National Security Council aide Oliver North has told Republican lawmakers the United States needs to send more troops to Afghanistan, witnesses say.

Attendees at a House Republican Conference meeting held Tuesday told the Washington publication Politico North addressed the meeting on the topic of Afghanistan, telling lawmakers that Gen. Stanley McChrystal is correct in his assessment that more troops need to be sent or the insurgents will win.

"Basically, his point was unless we put the troops in there, it's lost," Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky., told the newspaper.

North, now a political commentator and author, was an aide to former President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s who was convicted of three counts of trying to cover up an administration scheme to sell arms to Iran and divert the profits to the Nicaraguan counter-revolutionaries known as the Contras. Such aid had been banned by Congress. North's convictions were later overturned.

"Colonel North is someone who enjoys the very broad respect of the House Republican Conference," Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence of Indiana told Politico.