war or peacekeeping?

U.S. might be dragging NATO into new Afghan war
22/ 02/ 2006
RIA Novosti, Opinion & analysis

Moscow. (RIA Novosti political commentator Pyotr Goncharov.) – The United States, in a manner that is already becoming hard to ignore, is clearly doing its best to drag the Atlantic Alliance into a new Afghan war.

Committing to build up the NATO peacekeeping force in Afghanistan to 15,000 last October, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer left an impression that the Alliance was just going to expand the area of responsibility of its International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). This deployment had been made reluctantly under intense pressure from Washington who sought to share at least part of responsibility for Afghanistan action with its European allies and was therefore encumbered with a tight ring fence of self-imposed limitations.

In the first two to three years of the broader counter-terrorist Operation Enduring Freedom, the U.S. did not doubt its future success. In a media questions session at the U.S. base in Bagram on Christmas Eve 2003, Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers and David Barno, the allied commanding general, were very optimistic about Enduring Freedom and said the U.S. presence in Afghanistan would not last longer than the situation required. Now, in fact, the situation seems to require more ISAF contingents and a larger area of responsibility.

There is a rumor in the media that the current ISAF area of responsibility, which does not go far beyond the loyal capital Kabul and northern and western provinces bordering on Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Iran, will expand into volatile southern provinces, and the Allied Command will send around 6,000 British, Canadians and Dutch there.

Southern provinces Zabol, Kandahar, and Helmand, and eastern Paktia, Paktika, and Khost, broadly known as a “Pushtu tribal area”, have long been an engine of instability for the whole country, which comes as no surprise as its Pakistani border has been porous and insecure since the early days of the Afghan statehood, whoever was in power. This area, where it is unclear at what point Afghanistan ends and Pakistan begins, is the most volatile; it is home to al-Qaeda leftovers and rebounding Taliban.

Of course the multinational force will all but reach its stated goal to ensure security and stability across Afghanistan if it builds on the “assistance from a moderate U.S. capability” to secure control over the south and east of the country, but that would require a huge military operation. Though the United States will doubtless take the lead in military action, it will be hard for the ISAF Canadian, Dutch, and British forces to stay firmly within their self-imposed police mandate.

Involvement in military action seems to be the last thing ISAF wants. Its carefully built peacekeeping image and hard-earned grass-root loyalty rely heavily on the public perception of their mission there as protecting peace, rather than spreading war.

Germany, France, and Spain have repeatedly denied their men in Afghanistan would be in any way involved in U.S.-led counter-terrorist military activities. But a decision in favor of an additional deployment in the south would signal that the U.S. pressure has worked, and NATO is being finally drawn into military action.

In fact, the U.S. has little choice but to get other Western countries equally involved in military operations in Afghanistan as a country that has so far remained largely out of U.S. control could turn into a crucial toehold if the looming prospect of an Iraq-style military attack against Iran becomes reality. If Tehran finally defies European pleas and American demands and goes on with its efforts to build a full-cycle enrichment capability – which looks highly likely – the time-pressed Washington will very soon be facing a dilemma of attacking Iran and beginning a two-front war or looking impassively at the emergence of a new nuclear power. To wage a war against Iran without a secure Afghanistan in the back would be insane.

That a NATO deployment in the southern and central parts of Afghanistan will give the Alliance and the U.S. a military edge is beyond doubt, but whether the end is worth the investment remains unclear. As the peacekeeper image evaporates, the southern NATO task force might face intense resistance and casualties (and Uruzgan province where the Dutch contingent will be deployed is no exception), which will not be welcome back home and might undermine the whole idea of bringing peace to a war-torn country.
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