Many in NATO expected to wimp out on Afghan mission

Times:

Nato defence ministers meeting today are not expected to offer any more troops for Afghanistan, despite a plea from military commanders for another 7,500 soldiers, alliance sources said yesterday.

The gloomy prediction on the eve of an informal session of the defence ministers in Vilnius, capital of Lithuania, pre-empted appeals yesterday from Gordon Brown and Condoleezza Rice, the American Secretary of State, for other Nato countries to share more of the burden in Afghanistan.

Dr Rice, who met the Prime Minister and David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, said: “I do think the alliance is facing a real test here. Our populations need to understand this is not a peacekeeping mission.”

Only a small number of nations had troops in the most dangerous parts of Afghanistan, she said. “We believe very strongly there ought to be a sharing of that burden throughout the alliance.”

The main Nato players in the south are Britain with 7,800 troops, US (3,100), Canada (2,500), The Netherlands (1,600), Denmark (680), and Romania (500). Australia, not a Nato member, has 1,000 troops there.

Emphasising the focus of Taleban activity in the south, Nato sources said that 70 per cent of the insurgent incidents in Afghanistan took place in 10 per cent of the 398 districts, most of them in the south.

Mr Brown told the Commons: “We have 15 per cent of the troops in Afghanistan. We need a proper burden-sharing not only in terms of personnel but also in terms of helicopters and other equipment.”

Germany confirmed that it would send around 200 extra combat soldiers to northern Afghanistan to replace a Norwegian unit, but said that it would not move the troops to the south.

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We now know which friends we can count on and which we cannot. There will come a time when those who are not helping will seek our help and we will have to give that decision some thought at that time.

There has been a tendency to exaggerate the situation in Afghanistan in order to spur a greater effort by the reluctant members. This is a mistake that plays into the hands of our enemies and into the hands of the politicians who want to lose this war.

Secretary of Defense Gates was brutally frank in his assessment of some countries lack of participation.