Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, vol. 51, no. 5, October–November 2009, pp. 71–90
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For the past eight years, Germany’s contribution to the stabilisation of Afghanistan has been limited by political factors in Germany and military factors in Afghanistan. Several trends in 2009 have added to the pressures on German policy, including an increase in violence in Afghanistan’s northern provinces, such as Kunduz, where Germany is active; a lack of political progress in Kabul; the destabilisation of Pakistan; and renewed efforts by the Obama administration and a couple of hardened allies to quell the Taliban insurgency. Although the greater instability in Kunduz – and across Afghanistan – increases both the need to act decisively and the risks associated with political paralysis in Berlin, the next German government is likely to adapt its policies only marginally, instead of leaping into action as the new US administration has done.
Two simultaneous developments explain this inertia, one in Germany and one in the field. Germany’s military mission in Afghanistan has become increasingly politicised in the eight years since it was launched. Political and ideological differences between parties and even between ministries are becoming more pronounced, not less. This trend narrows the room for manoeuvre and stalls the strategic debate.
At the same time, in northern Afghanistan, where new NATO supply lines have increased the operational stakes for both sides, the Bundeswehr has been engaged in increasingly aggressive combat operations against ever-bolder insurgents. This recent exposure to a new level of operational stress puts the German armed forces under added pressure to learn and adapt to a counter-insurgency environment. As in the United States and Britain, mid-level officers are bringing back valuable experiences and lessons from their tours.
The result of these two contrary but related trends is stalemate. On the one hand, an already sceptical Bundestag is under pressure from the public to scale back Germany’s contribution, pressure that is also strongly felt among senior civilian and military leaders in the ministry of defence. On the other hand, the executive branch, particularly the chancellery and the foreign office, is feeling allied pressure to pull more weight, and field commanders in Afghanistan are determined to face up to a bolder enemy just as NATO’s other fighting armies are. In the absence of strong and charismatic leadership in the field of security policy, the result is inertia: no matter the outcome of coalition negotiations, Germany’s Afghanistan policy is poised to remain on its present track, with only modest adjustments. Berlin will, by default, react to Washington’s strategic lead, though it will not necessarily do what the Obama administration wants it to. This passivity is remarkable given that Germany’s stakes in Afghanistan are potentially even higher than those of the United States: continued violence and occupation in Afghanistan will fuel Muslim radicalisation in Europe more than in America. As Afghanistan backfires, Europe will be hit harder.
Germany in Afghanistan
Germany sees itself as tightly connected to Afghanistan. The relationship between the two countries goes back at least to the First World War when, in 1915, a famed military mission under Werner Otto...
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Timo Noetzel is a Research Group Leader at the Centre of Excellence at Konstanz University and a Fellow of the Stiftung Neue Verantwortung, Berlin. Thomas Rid is a Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center and an Adjunct Professor at the School of International Service, American University.
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