Military

SHAPE News Summary & Analysis

14 June 2004

AFGHANISTAN

• According to Reuters, the U.S. military vowed Monday to keep up operations against resurgent militants in Afghanistan to ensure elections are held in September as planned. The dispatch notes that critics have questioned whether elections are viable in September, given widespread militancy in the provinces that has hampered voter registration and raised fears about the safety of poll workers. It quotes a U.S. military spokesman saying, however: “Right now, we believe that the elections will be able to go in September. The coalition stands firmly behind the decision to hold those elections in September and we continue to take action to make sure that’s possible.” The dispatch adds that Sunday, Afghanistan’s UN-backed Election Management Body dismissed as “speculation” reports that the poll would have to be delayed.
  
  
• ISAF Commander Canadian Gen. Hillier has warned of serious failings in the effort to rebuild Afghanistan, accusing western governments of being too tolerant of the warlords and their flourishing narcotics trade, reports the Financial Times. According to the newspaper, Gen. Hillier said the security environment was deteriorating as local warlords and militia groups stepped up their attacks on civilian targets, including aid workers, adding: “Perhaps some day Afghanistan will become self-sustaining. But there are speed bumps in the road. If they are not handled properly they could derail the process of creating a state.” The newspaper notes that NATO has agreed to help increase security outside Kabul for voter registration and the elections by creating new PRTs. It adds that speaking after a meeting with NATO ambassadors in Brussels, Gen. Hillier admitted that progress had been slow. “If I had the assets to do more, we would be doing it. With the assets I have now, I can’t take on more areas,” he reportedly said. Claiming that “Gen. Hillier said parliamentary elections due in September might have to be postponed again,” the newspaper quotes unnamed diplomats saying that if the elections were postponed, it would be an acute embarrassment to NATO and western governments. Gen. Hillier is further quoted saying Al Qaeda, warlords, criminal gangs and militia groups, “all determined to protect their fiefdoms,” wanted to disrupt the elections. “They will go after soft targets,” such as aid workers. These groups, he reportedly added, had weapons financed by the expanding drug trade—made possible because a new Afghan policy or army did not exist to curb it, and poppy growers had not been given an alternative livelihood. The newspaper adds that he was particularly critical of the slow pace of the reform inside the Afghan defense ministry, which has often turned a blind eye to the activities of the warlord and militia groups. The reforms are supposed to include the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) of all the militia groups active during the civil war, stresses the newspaper, quoting Gen. Hillier saying, however, that “the DDR process is coming to a spluttering end” and adding that Defense Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim bore chief responsibility for that.

NATO

• Athens’ Ethnos tis Kiriakis, June 13, reported that a Greek team has completed NBC training in the Czech Republic and is ready to serve in view of the Olympic Games. It quoted Lt. Gen. Yiannopoulos, director of the Security branch for the Olympic Games, stressing that it was the first time a Greek unit had experienced conditions of chemical and biological warfare. The article stressed that the training center in the Czech Republic is unique in Europe. “Currently, a NATO unit has formed a special battalion to face chemical and biological wars, and it is scheduled to come to Greece during the Olympic Games,” it continued.
  
  
• AP quotes officials saying Monday that Britain, France and Norway have placed an order with Rolls Royce for a high-tech international rescue system to help crews escape from sunken submarines. The dispatch adds that the three-nation initiative--the NATO Submarine Rescue System (NSRS)--will be based around a 32-foot, 27-ton submarine operated by a crew of three which can dive to a stricken boat and dock with it to rescue the crew. Roll Royse will reportedly also supply an unnamed craft which will locate sunken submarines, decompression chambers, medical facilities and other support equipment. The contract also covers support and operation of the system for the first 10 years of its life. The NSRS will go into service at the end of 2006 and run for 25 years.

UNITED STATES-TROOP BASING

• An editorial in the New York Times notes that the Pentagon is proposing sharp cuts in U.S. forces in Germany, which for more than half a century has been America’s biggest military outpost in Europe. Stressing that “it’s a bad idea, particularly at a time when the United States is struggling to rebuild its relations with its NATO allies,” the newspaper remarks that the large U.S. military presence in Germany has long symbolized the understanding at the heart of NATO—Washington’s commitment to remain permanently engaged in Europe’s security and to integrate its military operations with those of its major European allies. “Recent history has only reinforced how important that relationship is to the United States. NATO is the only alliance capable of sharing some of the global military burdens that have now overstretched America’s ground forces…. There is nothing sacrosanct about maintaining particular divisions in Germany. The role of American military forces there has evolved considerably over the decades…. Along the way, the size of the American presence has evolved as well…. But the Pentagon’s current plans are unduly drastic, unfortunately timed and suspiciously motivated,” adds the editorial.