He said the key to long-term success was clearly building up Afghanistan's army and police.

Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon last week announced a 70-strong Australian training team would work with an Afghan army battalion and on Sunday it was announced it also would assist in training Afghan police.

Australia has just over 1,000 troops in Afghanistan, operating in Oruzgan province in what was once the Taliban's heartland. Three Australian soldiers died in action late last year.

"What we are likely to see is more killing of school teachers, local officials, things like that, the use of IEDs (improvised explosive devices) to try and sap the will of coalition partners as well as the Afghans and to bring discredit to the Afghan government because of its seeming inability to bring security to the rural areas."

"The way to deal with that long-term is clearly the Afghan National Army and Afghan National police to be able to hold while economic development provides local security. It has to be a partnership between ourselves and the Afghans, with more and more of the effort gradually shifting to the Afghans."

Mr Rudd said plainly there was a need for better police training in Afghanistan.

"We have been reviewing the need for that into the future," he told reporters in Sydney.

"Whatever commitment we make will be modest and within our own resources and won't detract from our capabilities elsewhere.

"It is quite plain there are gaps with the Afghan National Police. Together with other countries we will be looking to making sure that those training needs are met on the basis of everyone pitching in. Our own contribution will be modest."

Mr Smith said the training would be performed by the Australian Federal Police (AFP). Current there are four AFP officers in Afghanistan in a liaison and counter-narcotics role.

"We are looking at a greater compliment of Australian Federal Police to go to Afghanistan," Mr Smith told the Nine Network.

"They'll be part of, if you like, the capacity-building aspects that we are doing in Afghanistan, training the Afghan police."