Defense secretary Robert Gates issued some strong comments yesterday on the failure of the NATO coalition to win the war in Afghanistan saying some countries are willing to risk casualties while others are not. Thus, putting the mission in jeopardy. That’s interesting since it’s a war the US started, abandoned, and now only has a renewed interest in because the clean up crew is starting to get a little tired of dying in vain.
Rebuilding efforts and a sound government have not yet been achieved in Afghanistan, thus minimizing the effect of any battle-wins against the Taliban. Now we are seeing a resurgence in violence levels that almost equals that in the beginning of the war in 2001. The Taliban has also been able to regroup and mount more serious offensives further hindering any efforts of the NATO coalition to either fight or rebuild. In the midst of all that, Canadian and European troops which are doing most of the heavy lifting in Afghanistan, (after we turned our focus on Iraq) are beginning to look at drawing down troops and reworking missions as the death toll on their military rise without any clear headway or strategy outlined.
This is what lead to the remarks made yesterday by Secretary Gates and is also causing fights between the US and it’s NATO allies. Gates is calling for other NATO members to contribute more troops and to open up the rules on existing troops. Rules which often include restrictions on fighting and what type of missions they can be involved in.
Currently, Canada is calling for a single NATO country to commit at least 1000 troops although it seems unlikely that this will happen. The Dutch have been able to put together a coalition of 1000 through a smattering of small contingents but that isn’t something the Canadians are really interested in.
British Secretary David Millband and US Secretary Condi Rice have made a surprise visit to Afghanistan today to again try to get the Afghani President Karzi to accept a special international envoy to Afghanistan. Which has been rejected by Karzi so he can strengthen his position by standing up to the West. Which is a nice way to saying he’s beholden to the extremists in his country, which we’ve reported on earlier.
Further highlighting the divisions we found this:
NATO’s outgoing Senior Civilian Representative in Afghanistan, Ambassador Daan Everts also has concerns about the ISAF mission.
One of the recent mistakes in Afghanistan, he says, is there’s no common strategy for the reconstruction effort. The ambassador explained his point of view to our Brussels correspondent, Hans Andringa.
“[There is no strategy] in the sense that the activities planned and carried out in the economic area or in the reconstruction area are not linked structurally to the military efforts. So that goes at the expense of efficiency and overall effectiveness.”
Germany’s Chancellor also went on the defensive today saying Germany is making an important contribution to the NATO effort and is currently looking at expanding its troop presence there.
We’re glad to see the other NATO allies hit back at this administration which basically left them for dead when they moved on to Iraq. Afghanistan is all but absent from the news coverage here, and seemingly the radar screen of the administration. For Gates to have the audacity to say its their problem would be a surprising amount of arrogance if it wasn’t so typical for the people involved in this administration. Not that anyone but us remembers, but we actually had international support for intervention into Afghanistan in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 – even from Iran. We blew that, and treated the NATO operation like the clean up crew after the party. Its absolutely ridiculous to think that our allies should be held responsible for the way Afghanistan is going. Bush’s lackeys are just as out of touch as he is.
Further:
Gates Hits NATO Allies’ Role in Afghanistan
Few can meet Canada’s Afghan troop demand: MacKay
Rice Presses NATO for Afghanistan Help
Merkel Says Germany Making an `Important Contribution’ to NATO
