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  NATO Turns Screws on Germany: The Coming Afghanistan Showdown

NATO Turns Screws on Germany The Coming Afghanistan Showdown

By Konstantin von Hammerstein and Alexander Szandar

Part 2: 'The Americans Will Continue to Exert Pressure'

In Bucharest, the chancellor is expected to resort to her established arguments and campaign for the German approach of a "networked security policy" focused on the "civilian and military reconstruction effort." The allies are familiar with Merkel's old argument and are unlikely to be completely satisfied. Once the hard-core negotiations begin, Merkel will resort to the handful of military trump cards she has tucked away.

The chancellor used a similar strategy at the November 2006 NATO summit in Riga, Latvia. There, had Bush and other partners insisted on a stronger commitment from the Germans, Merkel was planning to offer up Tornado reconnaissance jets. The US president, though, proved not to be in a demanding mood and Merkel held back her trump card -- until a formal request from the alliance arrived in Berlin many weeks after the meeting.

For weeks, government experts have been debating behind closed doors over what they should include in Merkel's arsenal this time. At the same time, the defense minister has discreetly tested the waters at the Bundestag to determine how far the members in the two coalition parties, the Social Democrats (SPD) and the Christian Democrats (CDU), would go in supporting the government.

Much has yet to be resolved, but the basic elements of the evasive maneuver seem to have been determined. They include:

• significantly enlarging the field of operations for German troops and extending it westward;

• increasing troop strength from the current level of 3,500 to a ceiling of up to 4,500 troops;

• amending the Bundeswehr's mandate within the parliament, which currently ends in October, in June -- before the parliamentary summer recess -- and extending it until early 2010.

Government strategists hope that this plan will satisfy the NATO partners, but they also expect it to achieve a domestic political purpose. An early extension of the Bundeswehr mandate, they reason, would ensure that the controversial mission in Afghanistan could be kept out of the parliamentary elections in the fall of 2009. Besides, if the mandate is extended by 15 to 18 months, a new government will have a few weeks, following the election and coalition negotiations, to mull over its future Afghanistan strategy.

Complicated Math

Berlin also hopes that an early extension would satisfy the US president, because it would signal at least a certain level of accommodation. Bush is likely to react even more positively to Germany's plan to send additional troops. That, though, might be the most difficult part to push though parliament in Berlin.

Peter Struck, parliamentary floor leader for the SPD, though, has already indicated that he would go along with the plan. Struck has said that if Bundeswehr Inspector General Wolfgang Schneiderhan can show that he needs more troops, he will receive support.

The math, though, may prove more complicated. It has already been decided that some 200 German troops will replace the withdrawing Norwegian Quick Reaction Force. But the Norwegians aren't the only ones that need to be covered for. Danish and Czech troops currently serving with the German reconstruction teams in Kunduz and Faizabad will have to be replaced. Jung had originally intended to withdraw about 170 soldiers from a company stationed in Kabul, but he relented in the face of fierce opposition from Afghan President Hamid Karzai and other NATO partners. Now Jung is at a loss as to where to find the additional soldiers without exceeding the upper limit of the current Bundestag mandate -- which allows for 3,500 German soldiers to be stationed in Afghanistan. Additional units will also be needed for the planned westward expansion of Germany's deployment region. Although NATO wants Germany to send troops to the south, Berlin prefers to expand their activities westward -- into Badghis Province and parts of Ghor Province, currently under Italian command.

The Germans are already familiar with Badghis, where they led a large-scale offensive against the Taliban in the fall that was executed jointly by Afghan units and the Norwegian Quick Reaction Force. Fourteen enemy troops were killed in the heavy fighting that ensued.

Circumventing the Mandate

The NATO supreme command in Kabul had temporarily removed the province from Italian command and added it to the German northern sector. It was a trick designed to circumvent the Bundestag mandate, under which German soldiers are only permitted to operate outside their own northern region "temporarily and to a limited extent." Now the Germans hope to turn what was a temporary solution into a permanent situation.

The German planners discarded other options. For instance, experts at the chancellery had initially proposed sending both the Tornado reconnaissance aircraft and fighter-bombers to Afghanistan. But when the Social Democrats were consulted they refused to support the plan.

The military leadership was also uninterested, arguing that there are already enough bombers in Afghanistan. Great Britain wants to test its Eurofighters in combat missions in Afghanistan soon, while France is testing its competing product, the Rafale. According to one officer, Germany, with its more than 25-year-old Tornados, would "only end up looking outdated."

German Air Force Inspector Klaus-Peter Stieglitz suggested that the reconnaissance Tornados could also be used to fire on the Taliban. But other military officials quickly dismissed the idea, arguing that the risk of killing German troops and innocent civilians was "much too high."

US Pressure Will Continue

Experts are still working out the details of the Merkel plan, but it is already clear that they will not have an easy time of convincing the NATO partners. The Americans, in particular, are not expected to be especially accommodating. The mood is already tense. In late January, Jung received a letter from hardliner Duncan Hunter, the ranking Republican on the influential Armed Services Committee in the House of Representatives.

"In the eyes of the US Congress," Hunter wrote, "it is unacceptable that the United States should continue to be forced to deploy more and more troops, while a few NATO partners are unwilling to live up to their international obligations in Afghanistan." Hunter openly threatened sanctions, arguing that the Americans could terminate military cooperation at any time. The tone of the letter was so confrontational, a member of Jung's staff said angrily, "that we have no intention of responding."

Hardly anyone in Berlin accepts the illusion that the pressure will decrease after the US presidential election. In an interview with SPIEGEL, John McCain, the presumed Republic presidential candidate, said: "I'd like to see more German troops. That's completely obvious." On a more polite note, McCain added that the decision is ultimately in the hands of the German government and the German people.

Democratic contender Barack Obama agrees. If the United States increases its commitment in Afghanistan, Obama said, the Europeans would have to pull their own weight, "without the burdensome restrictions that have hampered NATO until now." His adversary, Hillary Clinton, says: "The military efforts must be increased."

As the German government's coordinator for trans-Atlantic relations, Social Democrat Karsten Voigt is highly familiar with Washington. "The Americans will continue to exert pressure," he predicts, "regardless of who is elected."

Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan