WASHINGTON — The Obama administration sent a forceful public message Sunday that American military forces would remain in Afghanistan for a long time, seeking to blunt criticism that Mr. Obama had sent the wrong signal in his war-strategy speech last week by projecting July 2011 as the start of a withdrawal. In a flurry of coordinated television interviews by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other top administration officials, they said any troop pullout beginning in July 2011 would be slow and that the Americans would only then be starting to transfer security responsibilities to Afghan forces under Mr. Obama’s new plan. The television appearances by the senior members of Mr. Obama’s war council appeared to be part of a focused and determined effort to ease concerns about the president’s emphasis on setting a date for reducing America’s presence in Afghanistan after more than 8 years of war. “We have strategic interests in South Asia that should not be measured in terms of finite times,” said Gen. James L. Jones, the president’s national security adviser, speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We’re going to be in the region for a long time.” Continua…