Military

SHAPE News Summary & Analysis

5 February 2004

ISAF

• According to AP, diplomats said Thursday NATO allies are close to agreeing to send troops to five provincial cities in Afghanistan in an expansion of the Alliance peacekeeping in the country as it prepares for June’s landmark elections. The allies are reportedly expected to make the troop commitments Friday at a meeting of defense ministers in Munich to stem criticism that delays in finding more manpower risks undermining efforts to stabilize the country. The dispatch claims that the new NATO teams would work alongside a dozen similar units operating outside Alliance command by the U.S.-led coalition fighting Taliban and Al Qaeda remnants in the south and east of Afghanistan. It adds that it was not immediately clear which countries would provide troops for an expanded mission, or how many would be sent. A related Financial Times article writes that in Munich Friday, Pentagon and NATO military chiefs will make a big push to spread stability and security throughout Afghanistan ahead of next June’s elections. “Diplomats said Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, NATO Secretary General de Hoop Scheffer and Gen. Jones will spell out a two-pronged strategy to NATO defense ministers ahead of the annual security conference that starts on Saturday. The strategy will focus on security and political reform. Providing the resources are available, ISAF will try to take over before June more PRTs,” says the daily. Sueddeutsche Zeitung carries an interview with NATO Secretary General de Hoop Scheffer in which he says the defense ministers will discuss how the NATO deployment can be expanded in the Afghan provinces. “The Germans have put a first reconstruction team in Kunduz under NATO command. Other nations are considering whether they should send additional teams,” Mr. de Hoop is quoted saying. Asked whether the Americans were willing to put their own teams also under NATO command, he reportedly responded: “In the long term, they might well do that—we must discuss the relationship of the two missions. Some questions are still open. For this reason, I deliberately do not speak of a merger between the ISAF protective force and the anti-terrorism operation, Enduring Freedom. However, there could be a military commander wearing two hats who provides synergism.”
  
  
• Reykjavik’s Morgunbladid, Feb. 4, quoted an official at the Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs saying the Icelandic government had agreed to assist the Netherlands in transporting equipment to Afghanistan. According to the newspaper, the official said the Netherlands had contacted the Icelandic authorities and requested assistance in moving equipment belonging to the Dutch armed forces to Afghanistan. He said the transport demonstrated firm support for the activities of NATO and its member countries, adding: “The Alliance has taken on certain tasks and everyone wants to contribute. We are not exempt here; we carry our share of the load.”
  
  
• Reuters quotes a UN official saying Thursday the UN has stepped up a drive to register voters for Afghanistan’s first-ever presidential elections in June. Out of an estimated 10 million voters nationwide, only 671,000 people have registered so far, including 137,000 women, a UN spokesman said. He added, however, that people are putting in their names fast. The dispatch stresses that the UN is anxious to register as many women as possible as part of an overall campaign to raise their standards of living and give them more political power.

IRAQ

• According to AFP, a senior NATO official said Thursday NATO could take over command of a Polish-led division of the multinational troops in Iraq later this year. The official, who requested anonymity, reportedly said, however, that while there is an “emerging consensus” that NATO should play a greater role in Iraq, no decision has yet been taken, and none is expected before the spring or early summer. The dispatch also quotes U.S. Ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns saying in Brussels Thursday that there was a “very strong political will” within the Alliance to do more in Iraq. “A number of European allies have stepped forward to suggest that NATO take on a collective role of its own (in Iraq), as has the United States,” Ambassador Burns reportedly said.

CBRN

• NATO is creating a special rapid-reaction brigade in response to fears that its military units as well as civilians could be attacked by terrorists with nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, writes the Washington Times. The daily stresses that the CBRN battalion will be able to rapidly deploy mobile analysis labs that can work in contaminated areas, operate a specialized infection hospital that would carry stocks of vaccines against biological weapons for deployed forces, do reconnaissance and risk assessments, and perform light and heavy decontamination of people and vehicles. “It will enable other NATO troops to carry out missions that otherwise would be threatened by a nuclear, biological or chemical attack. The battalion will operate both independently and as part of the new NATO Response Force. Once a nation’s CBRN troops have gone through the training, they will be on call from their home country, on a rotation basis, by NATO command for quick deployment abroad. They also will be able to aid their civilian emergency crews in case of a terrorist attack at home,” adds the newspaper.

In a contribution to the Wall Street Journal, Wolfgang Schaeuble, vice chairman of the Christian Democrat Party in the German Parliament, writes that the quarreling of recent months in terms of trans-Atlantic relations has brought some clarity after all: It has shown that anyone seeking to turn Europe against America risks causing a permanent split in the continent.
Schaeuble says: “Most of the old and new European countries want a stable trans-Atlantic partnership. It is not a question of reducing America’s influence in Europe, but of fostering a better understanding of shared western responsibilities in the world. The acid test will lie in the European ability to make the NATO Response Force a powerful instrument. Here one does not have to make a choice to be an Atlanticist or Europeanist: One can and should be both.”

UNITED STATES-TROOP BASING

• AFP writes that dismissing a press report that Washington was about to slash a third of its forces in Europe, a U.S. official said in Brussels Thursday Washington had not yet taken a decision on troops redeployments in the continent. U.S. authorities are pursuing consultations, the official reportedly said, adding: “Any indication that we’re on the verge of a decision is simply not accurate.” According to the dispatch, he said that “no recommendation” had yet been made to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld.