US warns Nato is at risk if Afghan fight lost

AFGHANISTAN:  The US administration warned yesterday that Nato could be destroyed if European allied troops were not prepared to fight and die in Afghanistan and argued that, unlike the Americans, Europeans were failing to grasp how much was at stake for western security in Afghanistan.

US defence secretary Robert Gates also pointed to the dangers of a western alliance divided between US forces who do the fighting and Europeans who follow later to conduct the civilian clean-up operations.

Following weeks of recrimination between Washington and European capitals, particularly Berlin, over troop contributions and fighting capacity in Nato's troubled Afghan mission, Mr Gates told a conference of defence policymakers and security experts in Munich that Nato's future was on the line in the war against the Taliban in southern and eastern Afghanistan.

"Some allies ought not to have the luxury of opting only for stability and civilian operations, thus forcing other allies to bear a disproportionate share of the fighting and dying," he said.

Nato had no future as an "alliance of those who are willing to fight and those who are not. Such a development, with all its implications for collective security, would effectively destroy the alliance."

Officials from Germany, whose troops are confined to non-combat duties in relatively stable northern Afghanistan, put up a robust defence of their policy despite pressure from Washington to send more forces and to help the British, Canadians, and Dutch on the frontlines in the south. They rejected Gates's "finger pointing", saying the Bush administration failed to understand how unpopular the mission was, and that the German parliament would not support sending more than the 3,500 troops currently deployed.

"It seems to be a debate about casualties," said one. "If there were 100 more German dead, would they be happier?"

Mr Gates said the Germans were "a little sensitive" on the issue and conceded that the US had made mistakes in Afghanistan and Iraq. "There's no effort to cast aspersions on Germany at all," he added.

Behind the persistent bickering, senior officials said, lies a fundamental gulf in perception over what the mission is for.

"The Americans talk about the war on terror," said a European policymaker. "People don't use those words on this side of the Atlantic. There's a lack of clarity about the real strategic objective. It's a big muddle." Another official said there was no "strategic unity" between the Americans and the Europeans.

A Nato summit in April is to come up with a strategy paper on Afghanistan, defining the aim and how to achieve it over the next three to five years. Critics say that, more than six years after the fall of the Taliban, the Nato blueprint is more than overdue.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, the Nato secretary general, denied that Nato was losing in Afghanistan. But Lindsey Graham, a Republican senator tipped as a possible running-mate for John McCain's attempt on the White House, responded: "The question is, are we winning? I'm not sure we're winning." He acknowledged that "our mistakes in Iraq make it harder to make the case for Afghanistan".

Mr Gates said he wanted to appeal directly to "the people of Europe" to persuade them that the campaign against Islamist extremism in Afghanistan was vital for western security. "Many people on this Continent may not comprehend the magnitude of the direct threat to European security. Many Europeans question the relevance of our actions and doubt whether the mission is worth the lives of their sons and daughters," he said. "European public support for it is weak."

He likened the Bush administration's war against "al-Qaeda-ism" to the cold war and the West's struggle against communism. The challenge was to crush Islamist extremism in its infancy.

© 2008 Guardian Service

This article appears in the print edition of the Irish Times