The Heritage Foundation
by Sally McNamara
Backgrounder #2347

Abstract: President Barack Obama recently announced a new strategy to lead the 43-nation NATO International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan to victory. Upon the request of General Stanley McChrystal, President Obama has ordered the deployment of 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan in the coming months. He also announced the drawdown of U.S. troops beginning in July 2011. It is vital that America’s NATO partners also step up to the plate by providing additional combat troops, equipment, and political support for General McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy. For too long, ISAF has been short-changed militarily and politically by Continental Europe. The United States and the United Kingdom have been forced to shoulder an unfair share of the burden for the mission in Afghanistan, losing disproportionate amounts of blood and treasure.

At the end of August, U.S. General Stanley McChrystal, the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, advised the Obama Administration that the mission in Afghanistan “will likely result in failure”[1] unless the U.S. and NATO implement a new counterinsurgency strategy backed by a significant surge of up to 80,000 additional U.S. troops.[2] Importantly, he noted that, given the right strategy, success in Afghanistan is achievable.[3] Having taken three months to reach a decision, President Barack Obama has announced a surge of 30,000 U.S. troops and has appealed to the NATO allies to contribute additional troops and resources.[4]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will travel to Brussels on December 3 to meet with NATO foreign ministers to discuss Europe’s contribution to the new strategy for Afghanistan. A surge of 40,000 troops will give General McChrystal’s strategy a greater chance of succeeding with less risk to the deployed troops. Therefore, it is critical that NATO’s European members send at least 10,000 additional troops together with critical enablers and other resources that General McChrystal identified by as necessary for victory.

With a few honorable exceptions, NATO’s European members–especially France, Germany, Italy, and Spain–have underresourced the U.N.-mandated International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan from the start. They have provided too few troops with too many national caveats on their deployments. Furthermore, their support for the civilian component of the comprehensive strategy approved at NATO’s Bucharest summit in 2008 has been woeful, despite a stated eagerness to forgo combat missions in favor of aid and development projects.

At the Bratislava defense ministers’ summit in October, two European NATO members stated that Europe was waiting to see President Obama’s direction before deciding whether to provide additional resources for Afghanistan.[5] President Obama’s limited resourcing of General McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy means that additional European contributions will likely be decisive to the war effort. The European commitment to Afghanistan must be increased in several ways if General McChrystal is to have a realistic chance of succeeding. These contributions will need to include additional combat troops, police trainers, embedded training teams, and helicopters.

The Gap Between NATO’s Talk and Actions

President Obama came to power pledging that his cooperation and consultation with America’s allies would be greater than his predecessor’s.[6] However, he has quickly found that President George W. Bush’s inability to secure greater Continental European contributions to the mission in Afghanistan was not because of his supposed “unilateralism,” but because of Europe’s lack of political will to fight long wars abroad. In spite of President Obama’s high personal approval ratings among Europeans, he did not receive the much-needed additional commitment of combat troops at the Strasbourg-Kehl summit in April, and he did not unify the alliance around his “spring surge” strategy for Afghanistan.[7]

Stung and frustrated by NATO’s lack of commitment, President Obama has excluded the NATO allies almost entirely from his decision on General McChrystal’s strategy for Afghanistan. British Defense Secretary Bob Ainsworth recently took the unusual step of publicly criticizing the President for his lack of decisiveness on this matter.[8]

Despite the change in tone and style from his predecessor, President Obama has experienced exactly the same conspiracy of reluctance that President Bush faced in seeking more equitable burden sharing for the Afghanistan mission. Since October 2006, when NATO assumed full responsibility for Afghanistan’s security, the U.S. has repeatedly attempted to secure greater European input for both military and civilian operations in Afghanistan. The contributing nations have had ample opportunity to make their voices heard through the countless NATO summits, ministerial meetings, bilateral discussions, strategy sessions, speeches, conferences, and compacts.

It is therefore disingenuous to attribute the problems that ISAF is experiencing in Afghanistan to too few opportunities for the allies to consult. Rather, NATO has repeatedly agreed to strategies for Afghanistan but then failed to provide adequate resources. The comprehensive approach, which was endorsed at the heads-of-state level in Bucharest in April 2008, is a striking example of this disconnect.[9] The alliance endorsed a strategy for a greater civilian-military footprint in Afghanistan, but after a short-term surge of largely American and British troops to combat the Taliban’s spring offensive, ISAF’s overall strength was almost the same in October as it had been in April. No additional Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) have been created since April 2008.[10]

At the October 2009 defense ministerial summit in Slovakia, NATO endorsed General McChrystal’s assessment of the mission but specifically refused to commit resources toward his recommendations. However, NATO did adopt four priorities that fully underscore General McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy:

1.Protection of the Afghan population;
2.Increasing the size and capacity of the Afghan security forces;
3.Coordinating international and Afghan efforts to improve governance in Afghanistan; and
4.Taking a regional approach to the mission by engaging Afghanistan’s neighbors, particularly Pakistan.[11]
The alliance also stressed the need to better coordinate and fully resource the training of Afghanistan’s security forces through the NATO Training Mission for Afghanistan (NTM-A).[12] However, as with previous tactics and strategies endorsed by NATO, the alliance seems to have adopted the plan without acknowledging the vast resources needed to implement it.

Location of NATO Forces

At present, ISAF’s total strength of 71,030 personnel is split unevenly among regional command centers in Kabul (the capital), Kandahar in the South, Herat in the West, Mazar-e-Sharif in the North, and Bagram in the East.[13] By a large margin, the South and East are the most volatile areas of Afghanistan, accounting for the vast majority of insurgent attacks. Helmand, Kandahar, Pakitka, Ghazni, Zabol, Uruzgan, and Khost average the greatest number of daily insurgent attacks.[14]

The Dutch, British, and Canadians rotate lead nation status for the 36,500-man deployment in southern Afghanistan, supported by American, Australian, Bulgarian, Polish, Estonian, Danish, Romanian, and Slovakian deployments. The United States acts as the lead nation for the 18,300-man deployment in eastern Afghanistan, supported by the Czechs and New Zealanders.

By contrast, the North and the capital have been largely stabilized, accounting for the fewest security incidents, although instability has started to creep into some areas in these regions, such as Kunduz and Wardak. Western Afghanistan experiences greater numbers of insurgent-initiated attacks than the North, but far fewer than the South.[15]

Germany leads the 5,700-man Mazar-e-Sharif deployment in the North, supported by Swedish, Hungarian, and Norwegian troops. Italy leads the 4,400-man Herat deployment, supported by Spanish, American, and Lithuanian troops, and France rotates leadership of the 6,130-man Kabul deployment with Turkey and Italy.

The 43,800 troops from the U.S. and U.K. comprise more than 60 percent of the total ISAF contingent. By year’s end, the U.S. will have 68,000 troops deployed, operating either under ISAF command or as part of the U.S.-led Operation Enduring Freedom.[16] The additional 30,000 troops announced by President Obama will further increase the American military footprint in Afghanistan as they steadily insert into theater through 2010.

In contrast, the “big four” Continental powers– France, Germany, Italy, and Spain–provide just 11,255 troops combined. Excluding the U.K., the remaining 20 NATO-EU members provide 20,083 troops.

Troop Losses. The location tends to determine the nature of a nation’s deployment. For example, British, Canadian, and Dutch troops in Helmand and Kandahar have faced some of the fiercest fighting of the entire campaign, while German troops in the northern provinces undertake a largely peacekeeping role. This is reflected in the wildly uneven troop losses among the ISAF nations.

The U.K. has lost more men–235 soldiers killed, almost exclusively in Helmand–than all other NATO-EU members combined. In comparison, 210 Czech, Danish, Estonian, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Dutch, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, and Spanish servicemen have died in Afghanistan. In Helmand and Kandahar alone, 547 troops have died, primarily British (209), Americans (194), Canadians (104), and Danes (24).[17] (See Table 1.)

Caveats. Although NATO closely guards the comprehensive list of national caveats on deployments, the operational and maneuverability limits placed on troops and equipment is a significant problem for ISAF commanders. These limits on ground forces and what they can do adversely affect operations in Afghanistan.

In a press conference in 2006, former Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) General James Jones said that there were 102 national restrictions on the deployments in Afghanistan.[18] Testifying before the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee in June 2009, current SACEUR Admiral James Stavridis stated that there are 69 caveats.[19] Troops from countries with few or no national caveats–including Denmark, Poland, the U.K., and the U.S.–are largely based in the South. Germany, Italy, Spain, and Turkey are reportedly among the worst offenders.[20] Notable caveats include the following:

•German troops are restricted to conducting operations in northern Afghanistan before nighttime and never more than two hours away from a well-equipped hospital;[21]
•Turkish troops are restricted to Kabul;[22]
•Southern European troops are barred from fighting in snow;
•Troops of one unidentified member country are required to consult their national government before deploying within one kilometer of the Pakistani border; and
•One unidentified member country prohibits troops from other nations from flying in its aircraft.[23]
A further problem with caveats is that they are occasionally unofficial, unwritten, and not declared until an operation is underway.[24]

What Europe Can and Should Do

In his report to President Obama and to NATO three months ago, General McChrystal stipulated that the U.S. and NATO have a 12-month window of opportunity to turn around the worsening situation in Afghanistan and defeat the insurgencies.[25] In a special address to the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) in London in October, he stated: “We need to reverse the current trends and time does matter. Waiting does not prolong a favorable outcome. This effort will not remain winnable indefinitely.”[26]

One of the primary reasons for the lack of progress since 2001 is the underresourcing of operations.[27]

With just nine months remaining on General McChrystal’s timetable, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen will be a key player in ensuring additional European commitments for the mission in Afghanistan. As President Obama stated in outlining his strategy for Afghanistan, “this burden is not ours alone to bear. This is not just America’s war.”[28]

Secretary General Rasmussen needs to continue his informal “direct diplomacy” tour of the allies. He has already visited Budapest, Ljubljana, London, Berlin, Oslo, and Bratislava in recent weeks, pressing individual nations on what resources they can and will deploy to Afghanistan. As the former prime minister of a geographically small country who committed combat troops to both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, Secretary General Rasmussen can speak with authority to national leaders about domestic political pressures and the necessity of winning this war.

Rasmussen and Obama must continue to reinforce the message that the burden for Afghanistan is not one that the United States can or will shoulder alone. As U.N. Special Representative for Afghanistan Kai Eide stated bluntly at the NATO summit in Bratislava, “[A]dditional international troops are required…. [T]his can not be a U.S. only enterprise. There has to be contribution from other troop contributors, and in particular the Europeans.”[29]

Political Will. There is a sense of despondency over troop losses among Europeans, matched with a pervasive sense that the war cannot be won. European leaders need to counter the public perception that it is an unwinnable war of choice and help to shape public opinion in favor of bolstering NATO troop levels.

European officials could more easily convince their publics about the necessity of fighting in Afghanistan if President Obama would make an unequivocal statement on European soil about the stakes of winning in Afghanistan. President Obama has visited Europe multiple times since his election, as have Vice President Joseph Biden, Secretary of State Clinton, and other senior officials. Now is the time for the Administration to leverage its strong public diplomacy investment and realize tangible gains in the form of troops, equipment, money, and political support from Europe for the mission in Afghanistan.

The Obama Administration’s long debate about the new strategy for the war has already reduced the President’s credibility among the NATO allies. For example, while waiting for the results of his long deliberations on General McChrystal’s recommendations, the alliance postponed a major force generation conference on Afghanistan planned for November.[30] It is important for President Obama to reverse the impression, growing among the allies, that he lacks the commitment to “finish the job.”[31]

Specifically, in December, President Obama should give a major speech in London solely on the issue of Afghanistan. President Obama is already scheduled to be in Copenhagen and Oslo in early December and should add London to his itinerary because the U.K. is the largest European contributor of troops to Afghanistan. President Obama should call on other NATO members to follow the example of Britain, which has deployed 9,000 combat troops without national caveats. He should also lay out the risks of failure in Afghanistan, both for international security and for the future of NATO.

Combat Troops. In his report, General McChrystal stipulated that 40,000-60,000 troops would give his strategy a medium chance of success and that 60,000-80,000 additional troops would maximize his strategy’s chance for success as well as reduce the risks to NATO forces. The deployment of just 30,000 U.S. troops restricts the sheer geographical area that can be covered and, unless backfilled by other NATO allies, will fail to achieve a key NATO priority: protection of Afghan civilians.[32] A true counterinsurgency strategy can be implemented only with a higher troop-to-civilian ratio. Having endorsed General McChrystal’s assessment at the October ministerial meeting, NATO has already given its political blessing to the strategy, but NATO’s European members need to work with the United States to fully resource General McChrystal’s recommendations.

Removing national caveats would provide some reinforcements to hotspots for troops already deployed in Afghanistan. For example, French troops based in Kabul could be moved further into the East. But additional troops are needed. Secretary General Rasmussen recently stated that he expects nations to pledge “substantially more forces” to Afghanistan.[33] Slovakia has already announced that it intends to double its 246-man contingent.[34] The U.K. will also increase its large deployment by 500 troops as well as 500 additional special forces.[35] However, Europe needs to substantially boost its contribution, above the 5,000 troops that Secretary General Rasmussen expects to announce later this month.[36]

Almost all nations in the alliance have additional combat forces that could be deployed to Afghanistan–especially France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Spain, and Turkey. Albania and Croatia also have spare capacity to boost their relatively modest deployments, which would demonstrate their willingness as the newest members of the alliance to provide as well as to consume security.[37]

In addition to providing combat forces, these nations should supply critical enablers to increase the efficacy and flexibility of these troops where possible. Their deployments should be announced and arranged sooner rather than later.

President Obama and Secretary General Rasmussen should make it clear that France and Germany’s provisional announcement that they will wait until January to consider additional troop requests is unacceptable, especially in light of General McChrystal’s pressing timeline for action.[38] Secretary Clinton should make it a top priority to press Berlin and Paris on this matter during her visit to Brussels and hold French President Nicolas Sarkozy to his statement that this strategy gives “new momentum” to ISAF’s mission in Afghanistan.[39]

Considering the vital need for additional European combat troops in Afghanistan, the Netherlands should reconsider its planned withdrawal of forces on December 1, 2010. The Dutch have led the ISAF mission in Uruzgan, the province directly north of Kandahar, and have achieved notable successes working alongside Australian troops and local Afghan leaders. Since 2006, 16 Dutch soldiers and nine Australian servicemen have given their lives in Uruzgan.[40] Defense Minister Eimert Van Middelkoop is currently considering whether to withdraw the entire 1,450-man deployment–in accordance with a recent motion by the Dutch Parliament–or to move the troops to another part of the country.[41] It makes little sense to withdraw operationally tested soldiers with local knowledge, who have made significant progress and have earned the trust of local people, and move them to an unfamiliar province for reasons of domestic politically expediency.

Central and Eastern Europe. It remains to be seen whether the Obama Administration has any credibility to seek additional combat troops from Poland and the Czech Republic after its shameful decision to abandon the missile defense deal with Warsaw and Prague. This problem extends to the Baltic nations, which will have difficulty committing significant defense resources to Afghanistan when they have little confidence in the alliance’s Article V guarantees. For example, NATO has still not formally responded to Russia’s recent simulation of a nuclear attack on Poland.[42]

Central and Eastern Europe have long sought more than mere reassurances about the indivisibility of transatlantic security but have failed to secure tangible deliverables on this goal, such as contingency planning or the permanent stationing of U.S. troops in the region. President Obama’s apparent willingness to trade away the “third site” missile defense installations at Moscow’s behest has exacerbated this nervousness and discouraged greater participation in the American-led operation in Afghanistan.

Nevertheless, this provides an opportunity for Poland and the Czech Republic to demonstrate their commitment to NATO’s first operation under Article V. As NATO continues the negotiations for its new strategic concept, Warsaw and Prague will have greater authority to emphasize the importance of contingency planning for Article V operations if they have invested in the Article V operation in Afghanistan. Poland has provisionally indicated that it will send several hundred additional troops to Afghanistan and should be partnered by other leading nations in the region.[43]

Civil and Military Trainers. There is widespread agreement among the allies that the Afghan government needs the capacity and capability to provide more of its own security. The creation of a functional, non-corrupt security apparatus is essential for a successful counterinsurgency strategy and the long-term creation of an Afghan identity.

President Obama has emphasized General McChrystal’s recommendation that Afghanistan’s National Security Force (ANSF) should number 400,000, consisting of a 240,000-man Afghan army and a 160,000-man national police force.[44] Within the next year, General McChrystal aims to expand the Afghan National Army (ANA) from 94,000 to 134,000.[45] Considering his warning that the window of opportunity to defeat the insurgency is now just nine months, this will require an expeditious increase in the training of Afghanistan’s security forces.

Afghan National Army. NATO currently has 59 Operational Mentoring and Liaison Teams (OMLTs), each composed of 13-30 personnel, that train and mentor Afghan troops and accompany ANA trainees on missions. To reach existing projections of a 94,000-man ANA, nine more OMLTs are needed. Achieving General McChrystal’s recommendation of a 134,000-man ANA by the end of 2010 will require 103 OMLTs.[46]

A number of Continental countries have the capacity to staff additional OMLTs for Afghanistan, especially those members of the alliance that have comparably small deployments, including Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Portugal, Slovenia, and Turkey. Increased OMLT training and mentoring of the ANA should be complemented by the provision of modern equipment as the ANA seeks to upgrade its kit and weapons.

Afghan National Police. When the European Union launched its police training mission in Afghanistan in June 2007, NATO had high hopes that the EU would shoulder a large portion of the burden for the creation of a viable, non-corrupt Afghan police force. A fully functional police force is also a critical element of General McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy. However, the European Union has not been a serious player in training the Afghan National Police (ANP), nor will it be in the future unless major changes are implemented. As noted by the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, the EU Police Mission in Afghanistan is too small, underfunded, slow to deploy, inflexible, and largely restricted to Kabul.[47]

NATO members should therefore coordinate their efforts through the NATO Training Mission for Afghanistan, which was announced at the Strasbourg-Kehl Summit in April. The NTM-A will bring together the various training programs for both the ANA and ANP and will be led by a single commander, who is also responsible for the U.S.-led Combined Security Transition Command– Afghanistan.[48]