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| Afghanistan |
| German troops face pitched battles in Afghanistan as insurgency spreads |
| 2010-05-03 |
| German troops are fighting the first pitched battles witnessed by the Bundeswehr since 1945 in the face of a growing Taleban insurgency in the north of Afghanistan. Security has deteriorated in areas such as Badghis province in the northwest, Kunduz, Baghlan and some parts of Takhar and Badakhshan provinces. In April there was heavy fighting in Kunduz province during Operation Towheed, in which seven German soldiers were killed. Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, the German Defence Minister, gave a warning last week of “new and greater risks' that German forces must bear. Recent opinion polls have put German public opposition to the country's 5,000-strong Afghan deployment at 62 per cent. A spokesman for the German forces in Kunduz told The Times this weekend: “It was intensive fighting in April. The situation is not stable and not secure. It has been deteriorating for more than a year.' Since the Bundeswehr entered Afghanistan in 2002, 39 soldiers have been killed. The contingent is the third-biggest after the US and British forces. In a speech last month the Chancellor, Angela Merkel, tried to drum up support for the military mission in Afghanistan in an uphill battle against growing public resistance. She told the Bundestag that German troops will try to start handing over some responsibility to Afghan authorities in 2011 but added that the country's soldiers will stay as long as necessary. When German troops first deployed in Afghanistan in 2002 the north was seen as the safest part of the country and Berlin has resisted Nato's requests to send its soldiers to more volatile regions. What is alarming for Western commanders and the Afghan Government are signs that the northern insurgency is gaining a hold outside the Pashtun ethnic community. Pashtuns are a minority in the Tajik-dominated north. General Stanley McChrystal, the Nato commander, is to send 5,000 extra US troops under German command to the north by September and announced last week that 56 helicopters would be sent to the area. Speaking in Germany, General McChrystal warned ten days ago: “The situation in the north will become dangerous, in parts very dangerous.' Kunduz has become a key battleground since Nato said that it would open a resupply route running from Latvia via Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to the northern border. At the end of 2009, with government authority in Kunduz on the verge of collapse, the Afghan Government armed local militias who have, in some areas, pushed back the Taleban. On a tree-lined road in Khanabad, bordering the Taleban-held Chardara district, The Times found a group of armed local men. Their commander said that his force had cleared their area but after five months had yet to be paid. “The provincial governor is a liar,' he said. “He sits in his chair and says he controls the province.' Nizamuddin Nashir, the district governor of Khanabad, warned that the militias were beginning to turn to crime, extracting a 10 per cent tithe on local goods and patting down road users for bribes. “If it continues like this, people will hate the militias,' he said. Many of the militias are the same ones that were disarmed at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars by the UN disarmament scheme after 2001. The insurgency in Kunduz followed the classic model for a Taleban takeover. Pro-Taleban preachers arrived in the province in 2008. Unarmed commanders followed to reconnect dormant networks of fighters. In June 2008 assassinations of pro-government figures began and videos of the killings were circulated. In the face of government weakness and corruption Taleban groups quickly achieved local dominance in several districts before any concerted response was mounted. Local officials report that the insurgents have made some inroads with non-Pashtun groups — Uzbeks, Turkomans, Afghan Arabs and even Tajiks. Several officials claimed that Uzbek fighters from the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) were working among the Uzbek and Turkoman communities. Several hundred IMU fighters took refuge in Pakistan after the collapse of the Taleban in 2001, and have moved back. “They are sending Pashtun Taleban to the Pashtun districts,' Engineer Mohammad Omar, the provincial governor, said. “Al-Qaeda has sent Uzbeks to the districts with Uzbeks and Turkomans.' However, in Kunduz the Taleban have suffered setbacks. In a succession of US special forces night raids, local officials and even the Taleban admit that about nine middle and senior-level Taleban commanders have been killed, including the new Kunduz “shadow governor', Mullah Khan Mohammad. |
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| #11 On a tree-lined road in Khanabad, bordering the Taleban-held Chardara district, The Times found a group of armed local men. Their commander said that his force had cleared their area but after five months had yet to be paid. "The provincial governor is a liar," he said. "He sits in his chair and says he controls the province." This is not helping. The governor is probably keeping the money. |
| Posted by: gorb 2010-05-03 22:37 |
| #10 It looks like someone is throwing around alot of cash up north These provinces border Tajikistan where a lot of Saudi money has gone in recent years. There was also a brutal civil war in Tadjikistan post independence. The losing islamicist elements likely fled to Afghanistan. My guess is the 'deteriorating situation' is due to NATO forces taking a leading role in anti-insurgency ops and as a result curbing the rather more direct and salutary response of the Afghan forces. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2010-05-03 20:56 |
| #9 It looks like someone is throwing around alot of cash up north Either Arab money via the ISI or US/Western money funding the taliban just Like the Soviet days but this time not intentionally! |
| Posted by: Paul D 2010-05-03 14:59 |
| #8 I know lots of U.S. soldiers that wouldn't have a problem fighting Germans in the defensive mode again. |
| Posted by: Percy Glinens2222 2010-05-03 11:27 |
| #7 Afghan intelligence sources have been screaming for some time about ISI involvement in the North (including helicopters dropping off advisors with bags full of cash). The US has officially poo-pooed it. However, I find it believable. Especially now that non-pashtun are joining the fight. Non-Pashtun will fight for the Taliban, but only for money (lots of money). It looks like someone it throwing around alot of cash up north. Al |
| Posted by: Frozen Al 2010-05-03 11:22 |
| #6 German troops are fighting the first pitched battles witnessed by the Bundeswehr since 1945 The Bundeswehr didn't witness anything in 1945. It was the Wehrmacht fighting back then. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2010-05-03 11:18 |
| #5 Forgot it: After the recapture of Nehmensdorf and the massive airing the German information services gave to what was found there those German soldiers trying to desert couldn't argue ignorance. They knew what would happeng to the civilians they were abandonnng to their fate. While we are at it: the much maligned 1940 French soldiers didn't have this incentive to fight since the German Army surprised everyone by its behavior with civilians. Given the importance Hitler gives in Mein Kampf not to merely defeat France but to obtain its surrender for the deleterious effects it would have on future generations I think this (initial) good behavior was part of the plan. |
| Posted by: JFM 2010-05-03 11:11 |
| #4 Hopefully the Germans remember the incredible ferocity of their forebears fighting in the defense. About as well as the 1940 French remembered Napoleon's soldiers martial virtues. BTW when you take a close look at German soldiers performance in 1945 their behaviour is quite unimpressive: given what the Red Army was doing to German civilians and specially women (not merely rapes but sadistic ones followed by equally sadistic murders) I for one wpuld expect better from the self-appointed best soldiers in the universe than having tens of thousands of them deserting and having to be brought back to the front at gun point. And I am speaking about the East Front not the West one. |
| Posted by: JFM 2010-05-03 10:55 |
| #3 Are the Germans allowed to shoot? only after someone 3-4 calls up the chain of command is sufficiently convinced that the incoming fire might cause more paperwork through the death of a friendly than the discharge of a weapon would. an actual killing of a hostile would likely still be prohibited without a proper round of 'mother may I' |
| Posted by: abu do you love 2010-05-03 10:54 |
| #2 Are the Germans allowed to shoot? |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2010-05-03 10:31 |
| #1 Hopefully the Germans remember the incredible ferocity of their forebears fighting in the defense. Many US and Russian soldiers, after the fact, concluded that they would really rather not fight Germans in the defensive mode again. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2010-05-03 10:12 |