Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev says it is impossible for the coalition forces to secure victory in Afghanistan. Mr. Gorbachev, who was in charge when Soviet troops withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989 after a war lasting nearly a decade, said that the alternative to pulling out troops was another Vietnam which would not work. He backed US president Barack Obama's deadline of July 2011 for starting to withdraw troops and handing more responsibility to Afghan forces. However, he said, it would be difficult for the US to pull out of Afghanistan because the United States had previously trained militants there who were still terrorizing the region.