Afghanistan

Following up on the “Coalition of the Bankrupt” post from last week, Jean-Dominique Merchet at Secret Défense has a series of posts (here and here, both in French) discussing whether or not French army units scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan are experiencing higher rates of absenteeism (read: desertion). The thread was begun when Merchet reported that a unit that had been training for its deployment for the past six months was “frustrated” and “disappointed” to learn that it had been replaced by another and would, in fact, be staying put as an operational reserve. Merchet noted that the unit’s reaction [...]

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 [...]

With the security situation in Iraq improved to the point where Secretary of Defense Robert Gates referred to entering the “endgame” in Congressional testimony yesterday, the question of what to do in Afghanistan is getting more and more attention every day. In the same testimony Gates, when pressed, conceded the possibility of adding three more brigades to our troop presence there next spring. That’s in addition to the additional brigade announced by President Bush for February, and would roughly meet the repeated requests of theater commanders. Meanwhile, the White House has announced an interdepartemental strategic review of Afghanistan policy to [...]