Berlin – 13 December 2009
The present German minister of Defence zu Guttenberg has said that the conflict in Afghanistan will not be won by the military and has called for more development aid, before flying on an unannounced visit to troops there on Friday.
Germany presently has 4,400 soldiers stationed in Afghanistan, which makes it the 3rd largest contributor in the Nato mission.
Zu Guttenberg said NATO forces needed to find a “sensible way” to withdraw from Afghanistan, and avoid any panic or sudden departure. He said the German military was there principally to protect German civilian aid workers – who are providing development assistance -and to train Afghan security forces.
An recent appeal by the US president Obama -to boost European troop levels in Afghanistan -chancellor Merkel has said will be addressed after the London Afghanistan conference in January.
Germany’s future participation and troop levels have been eclipsed by the controversy surrounding a German-initiated air strike in Afghanistan in September which killed circa 130 people, many of them civilians.
There was a general election in Germany in the interim and it now seems that it was very much in the interest of the present government to down-play and diminish the significance of the civilian casualties.
Nearly 3 months later, this bombing and the ensuing scandal still casts a large shadow over the Berlin political scene. In November the then “new” defence minister, zu Guttenberg, told the Bundestag that the Kunduz bombing had been a legitimate target and justified the many deaths.
Having realized that the public mood was clearly swinging the other way – against the attack- he was forced to backtrack to reveal that he now thought the bombing had been “militarily inappropriate”. He said he had simply not known all the facts .
But it has now been disclosed that a full [Red Cross which called it a "human rights violation”] report on the incident had been placed on his desk prior to his earlier statement- which implies that he must have known the facts at that time and consequently has misled parliament.
The problem facing an all-party Bundestag committee to investigate the bombing in Kunduz will also have to establish “who- know -what –when”.
The position of the German Defence minister, the dashing and rising star of the Bavarian CSU, has thus come under a lot of [unwanted] scrutiny.
To use his full name, is to tell his story; take a long breath –“Baron Karl Theodor Maria Nikolaus Johann Jacob Philipp Franz Joseph Sylvester von und zu Guttenberg”.
This incident in far away Asia may yet prove to be more than just an small irritant in Berlin for both ’Baron’ zu Guttenberg and the Chancellor herself.
Tags: afghanistan, Berlin, guttenberg, minister
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