BERLIN, Germany - Senior US diplomat Richard Holbrooke has acknowledged that institution-building in Afghanistan would have to start "from scratch" in the ninth year of engagement, in an interview published Wednesday.

Holbrooke, special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, told Germany's daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung that international cooperation since the deployment in Afghanistan in 2001 had often been chaotic.

"The issue of responsibilities was difficult. The British were to have dealt with drugs, the Germans with training and the Italians with the justice system," he said, in remarks published in German.

"The whole thing was uncoordinated and did not get us very far. The upshot is that in the ninth year of the war we are starting from scratch."

Holbrooke said the top priority in the strife-wracked country was the training of Afghan security forces.

"That is the only way we will be able to withdraw the allied troops in a reasonable amount of time," he said.

He admitted the country had "enormous" problems including corruption, a booming drug trade and high illiteracy, even among civil servants.

Holbrooke said he had ordered reading and writing to be included in training for security forces.

He said it would be "nice" if the goal of having 160,000 trained Afghan police officers in three to four years were achieved but added: "I have had enough of programmes in which a planning group sets targets arbitrarily, without any connection to reality".

Holbrooke said the biggest civilian aid programme was for the agricultural sector, which until the late 1970s had allowed Afghanistan to export goods throughout Central Asia.

Asked whether US allies should send more troops or more agricultural consultants to the country, Holbrooke replied: "Both would be good."