Brussels -- NATO defense ministers meet on Thursday and Friday amid concerns that a "Vietnam Syndrome" may undermine the alliance's efforts in Afghanistan.

The talks in Budapest come just days after the departing commander of the British forces in Afghanistan, Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, warned that NATO would never defeat the Taliban.

Rather than aim for an impossible victory, the brigadier said, NATO should try to reduce the insurgency to "a manageable level" and negotiate with willing Taliban tribal leaders.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, whose country is the biggest contributor to NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, has called on allies not to be defeatist.

And while all member states agree that victory in Afghanistan will not be achieved by military means alone, Gates is expected to urge his colleagues in Budapest to boost their contributions to the mission.

The ISAF currently has a force of 50,700 soldiers, up from about 45,000 six months ago. And the German parliament has just agreed to increase its contribution by 1,000 soldiers, raising the total to 4,500.

But a bigger ISAF has so far failed to produced the desired results, with Taliban violence in the country rising to its highest level in years.

General David McKiernan, the top US commander in Afghanistan, added to the gloom by warning ahead of the meeting in Budapest that things "might get worse before they can get better."

General John Craddock, the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO forces in Europe, says one sure way of undermining the Taliban is to go after the country's flourishing opium trade, whose money finances the insurgency.

Craddock wants to use soldiers to bust heroine laboratories and go after drugs lords.

"There is a close link between drugs and the insurgency. This is something we cannot afford not to do," one NATO diplomat said Tuesday.

But some allies -- among them Germany, Spain and Italy -- remain skeptical, arguing that such a task should be left to the Afghan police forces.

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