So here’s a question. How long before the growing European outrage over the American financial crisis plays a role in the debate over European troop presence in Afghanistan? I’ve already written about the French army’s barely concealed resentment over the lack of equipment and preparation for their recently deployed reinforcements. Now comes news that a Dutch platoon serving in Afghanistan has been suspended for directly refusing an order, with the Dutch Defense Minsitry confirming the incident took place but withholding further comment. Now, this kind of incident might just be the result of internal tensions between a unit and its commander. But in the mutinty’s aftermath, unit commanders from two platoons stationed in the same province wrote a public letter to the Dutch military personnel union (yes, I know, who’d have thunk it) complaining of equipment shortages. And the complaints are not the first. It’s hard to see how calls for increased European defense spending and NATO troop deployments are going to go over well in the context of a global financial crisis caused by what amounts to the worst elements of American predatory capitalism.
