Obama’s Hope is All Afghanistan Has Left: Berliner Zeitung, Germany

What’s a country to do? According to Germany’s Berliner Zeitung, eight years into what by most accounts has been a badly-run invasion, Afghanistan is such a mess that it has no choice but to trust NATO – most importantly President Obama – to do the right thing.

For the Berliner Zeitung, columnist Damir Fras criticizes Germany for its woeful training of the Afghanistan police, and in somewhat of a verbal throwing-up of hands, writes in part:

“As early as 2011, the first American troops are scheduled to return home from Afghanistan. In order to make this possible, Obama is first sending another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan – into a war that cannot be won militarily, but that might at least be brought to an end with more military.

“This is nothing more than a hope. Furthermore, it’s a hope that is aligned with Obama’s desire to be reelected. But hope is all that’s left in an Afghan quagmire that has lasted for eight years. All other things being equal, why shouldn’t what worked in Iraq in 2007 work in Afghanistan?

“If an additional 2,000 German troops were deployed, that wouldn’t change much. One could of course send them to fight in the south or east of the country. But first of all, the Americans do a better job with this, and second, the federal government is reluctant to take such a decision. Although logical from a military point of view, it would be a hard sell in Germany.

“What’s left, for instance, is aid to the civilian sector for training the Afghan police. This is where Germany, of all countries involved, has the most catching up to do. If the word “failure” needed a superlative, we could quickly find the appropriate phrase. It would be: police training in German hands.”

By Damir Fras

Translated By Stephanie Martin

December 4, 2009

Germany – Berliner Zeitung – Original Article (German)

Now U.S. President Barack Obama is being accused of having failed to explain the purpose of the war in Afghanistan. Of course George W. Bush, in that disagreeable manner of his, would in fact have done so. He would have ranted on about democratization; about a few more girls being able to go to school; about a few more women who would have been better off than before; et cetera, et cetera – in a tone similar to the one often struck by former German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung when he spoke of Afghanistan. But Obama is much more sympathetic and realistic for not doing so.

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