WASHINGTON (AFP) - Americans are evenly divided on the question of whether to send more troops to Afghanistan, but most believe President Barack Obama does not have a clear plan for the conflict, according to a new poll. The Washington Post-ABC News poll released Wednesday found 49pc of Americans oppose the dispatch of more troops, but 47pc support sending more soldiers. Just 31pc of Americans agree that the Obama administration has a clear plan for handling the situation in Afghanistan, compared to 63pc who disagree. And approval for the way Obama is handling the conflict has fallen from 55pc a month ago to 45pc today, according to the poll of 1,004 Americans between October 15-18. Some members of the Obama administration have said it would be irresponsible to commit more US troops to the Afghanistan before analysing any new Kabul government, but US military commanders and some Republican lawmakers are pushing the White House to quickly agree to McChrystals troop request. The white House said that Obama would decide whether to send thousands more US troops to Afghanistan before the runoff election on November 7. I know when the election is, I dont know when the decision is going to be, so its certainly possible, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said, when asked whether the troop decision could come before the second election. Australia, meanwhile, said it wanted to bring its military involvement in Afghanistan to a quick end, despite US and Nato calls for more troops to shore up the campaign against a resurgent Taliban. Australian Defence Minister John Faulkner said his country was studying how to complete the mission in the shortest time-frame possible. Australia has about 1,550 troops in Afghanistan with no date set for their withdrawal. Ive certainly asked the Australian Defence Force for any recommendations they have about ensuring we do complete that important role and responsibility both effectively, but in the shortest time-frame possible, he told ABC radio. Faulkner admitted Australias move would affect the push by Gen Stanley McChrystal, the top US and Nato commander in Afghanistan, for an Iraq-style troop surge against the increasingly powerful Taliban militia. Ive been discussing these issues with the chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, and obviously its a critically important matter for me, he said. Im not going to talk specifically about the approaches well take but I do acknowledge that there will be impacts on the approach that Nato and Isaf partners will be taking as a result of General McChrystals 60-day assessment. Meanwhile, Finland will next week bring home some 80 soldiers who were sent to Afghanistan in July as part of a Nato-led peacekeeping operation to oversee elections, the government said Wednesday. The government and president decided in the spring that Finland would send additional (peacekeepers) to Afghanistan due to the elections. Later it was decided that they would stay for four months and that period is now coming to an end, Defence Minister Jyri Haekaemies told reporters in Helsinki. Meanwhile, tribal leaders and ordinary people across Afghanistan said they would cast aside dismay over the fraud that marred their presidential election to participate in a second round run-off. Karzai, who took 49.67 per cent of the vote in the first round after nearly 1.3 million ballots from 210 polling stations were discounted, will face his former foreign minister, Abdullah Abdullah, who took 30.59 per cent. Tribal elders said they were angry that the risks taken to vote in the first round, in the midst of a vicious Taliban intimidation campaign, had been wasted. Nevertheless, the elders in Kandahar - traditional stronghold of the Taliban and Karzais mainly-Pashtun power base - said they would vote again to make the risks worthwhile. We did vote, risking rocket attacks, threats and intimidation, and now that the election is going to a second round for whatever reason, we the elders of Kandahar, have decided to vote again, Shah Aka told AFP. After the presidents appeal to the nation and the announcement of the IEC (Independent Election Commission) we will go and vote in the run-off and will support Karzai. We will strongly back him. Tribal elder Nor Wali Khan Shinwari added: The run-off showed there is no fraud-free and transparent phenomenon in Afghanistan and now we see fraud even in a national process to determine the nations fate and future. Shinwari, from eastern Nangarhar province, said democracy was still in its infancy in the war-ravaged country and democratic values were being played with. Indeed we will go and vote again but who is going to guarantee that no fraud will take place again? People did vote but it was the election commission officials who committed the fraud, not the people, he added. Mohammad Sharif, 45, believed the run-off would strengthen new democratic practices. It also shows our politicians believe in democracy and are ready to accept the results of the election even if it is not the result of their choice, Sharif said. The second-round announcement has changed the belief among many Afghans who think Western powers - with billions of dollars and their own credibility at stake here - will decide who takes office in Afghanistan, he said. The announcement of the run-off puts an end to the belief that the future president is already chosen by foreigners and the election is only a practice to deceive us. But a Karzai campaigner in northern Kunduz province said his supporters would comply with the presidents call to vote. Now that our own leader, our own candidate, has accepted a run-off and called on us to vote, we will indeed get out and vote and show our candidate was and is the winner, said Malim Akbar.