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14.09.06, 01:42
Poland is best hope for Afghan force
By Daniel Dombey and Stephen Fidler in London and Jan Cienski in Warsaw
Published: September 13 2006 19:47 | Last updated: September 13 2006 19:47
Poland emerged on Wednesday as Nato’s best hope of more troops for
Afghanistan, after a formal meeting of the alliance failed to meet an urgent
military request for hundreds of extra soldiers.
The Polish defence ministry said Warsaw, which has announced plans to
withdraw its 900 soldiers from Iraq, was in talks with its Nato allies about
where and when they would be deployed in Afghanistan. Poland, which has about
100 troops in Afghanistan, has already announced it will send about 900 extra
soldiers to the country from 2007.
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Diplomats said it might be possible to speed up the Polish deployment. One
Nato official said: “We are close to getting substantial contributions from
at least two European countries not currently in the south [of Afghanistan].”
He declined to name them. At present, the fight in the south is being led by
troops from Canada, Britain and the Netherlands.
The push for reinforcements, preferably to arrive before the hard Afghan
winter sets in, has put the spotlight both on Nato’s struggle to help
establish a stable government in Afghanistan and on its long-term prospects
as a military alliance.
At an emergency meeting yesterday, Nato’s 26 member countries came up with no
commitments for any new soldiers – in spite of a call last week by General
James Jones, Nato’s supreme commander, for up to 2,500 troops. But officials
believe that the likely offers from the two European countries should meet
Gen Jones’ most important demand – for a 800-1,000 strong reserve battalion
to aid Nato’s fight against the Taliban-led insurgency in south Afghanistan.
Nato said: “We have had indications in terms of force generation to fill the
outstanding requirement . . . the operation commanders, including Gen Jones, are
confident that they have sufficient forces in the theatre to be able to
complete the operation successfully.” The alliance said it had managed to
clear Taliban insurgents from 55 per cent of the area surrounding their
former stronghold of Kandahar.
Lord Garden, a former senior air force officer who acts as a defence
spokesman for Britain’s Liberal Democratic party, said: “Part of the problem .
. . is Nato funding. If you volunteer, not only do you provide the troops, you
have to provide the money to fund them.”
Diplomats sought to emphasise that the Nato mission was a long way from
failure. Victoria Nuland, US ambassador to Nato, said: “One of the things
that is getting lost here is that the operation against the Taliban is a huge
success. The extra troops will allow us to win faster and more decisively and
to continue reconstruction at the same time.”
However, casualties taken by British troops in the southern province of
Helmand have increased controversy over the mission.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2006