President Obama's big Afghan war speech pleased almost no one in Washington but its impact will only be clear when his prime audience -- American voters -- get to weigh in in 2012.

Dismayed liberals were left wanting more when Obama announced Wednesday he would withdraw 10,000 troops this year and get 23,000 more out of Afghanistan by next summer.

Republican hawks complained Obama was going too fast and risking fragile gains in the slog against the Taliban.

Pentagon brass meanwhile smarted after their plea for slower drawdowns and more time was snubbed.

And Republican presidential candidates issued conflicting statements, reflecting the split in their party as public opinion hardens against the war and the political ground suddenly shifts under the US national security debate.

While Obama made a military case for the drawdown, saying war aims he set in 2009 had been largely met, his speech was also highly political, foreshadowing the argument he will make to voters next year.

His remarks were molded by a growing feeling that war-weary Americans can no longer afford ambitious nation building efforts abroad at a time of stifling debt, high unemployment and dragging economic recovery.

They also marked a watershed moment in US security policy, after a decade of escalating troop deployments and the idea, which has prevailed since the September 11 attacks in 2001, that America is permanently at war.

"The tide of war is receding," Obama said.

Brian Katulis, of the left-leaning Center for American Progress, said "President Obama called an end to the long war."

The speech, he said, was a signal that the US "fixation" with counterinsurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan was ending.

"We simply cannot afford (it) nor is it producing results," Katulis said.

Obama argued that recent war gains, which are open to debate, meant he could withdraw troops from a "position of strength" -- keen to fashion an exit from Afghanistan free of the sting of defeat.

"America, it is time to focus on nation-building here at home," Obama said, noting the country had spent a trillion dollars in a decade of war during tough economic times.

"Now, we must invest in America's greatest resource -- our people," Obama said, blending policy and inspiration and sounding very much like a candidate.

Democratic presidents must usually guard their right flank on military issues, as Republicans delight in branding them soft on national security.

But Wednesday's speech showed the domestic crisis and the national security credibility Obama won by ordering a special forces raid which killed Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, have given him more room for maneuver.

Bruce Riedel, who ran Obama's first review of Afghan policy and is now at the Brookings Institution, disagreed that the president was simply declaring "Mission Accomplished" in Afghanistan and getting out.

"What the president is saying is that the urgent requirements that we have at home... (high) unemployment, a housing industry that's in chaos, and a political system that doesn't seem to be able to figure out a way to deal with these problems, requires us to retrench abroad," he told AFP.

White House officials insist Obama's deliberations were based purely on military strategy -- not politics, as some of his foes, including Republican 2012 hopeful Mitt Romney, have hinted.

Yet retiring Defense Secretary Robert Gates told AFP Thursday that Obama also weighed "political sustainability here at home."

The public appears increasingly skittish about the Afghan war.

According to a new Pew Research Center survey, 56 percent of respondents -- the highest ever -- said US troops should be brought home as soon as possible, while 39 percent said they should stay until the situation had stabilized.

Obama's withdrawal decision does not come free of political risk.

Some analysts fear holes in the US footprint in Afghanistan could embolden the Taliban and mean more US troop deaths.

Conversely, nearly 70,000 American troops will remain in battle when Obama runs for reelection in November 2012, posing a possible political headache.

A senior Obama aide privately explained the case Obama will make to voters next year.

"When he says something, he does it," the aide said.

"When he said we are going to bring home 100,000 troops from Iraq... he ended our combat mission on schedule.

"He said in the campaign he would get bin Laden, with unilateral action if necessary... he did.

"Now what he is doing on Afghanistan is keeping his word to the American people."

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