Atlantic Council

General Hans-Christoph Ammon, the head of the German army's elite special commando unit KSK, called Germany's contributions to the NATO mission in Afghanistan a "miserable failure" while speaking to the German press agency DPA.  IHT:

"Breaking with a military tradition of keeping silent about policy, a top German general has branded his country's efforts in Afghanistan a failure, singling out its poor record in training the Afghan police and allocating development aid.

Germany was responsible for training the Afghan police, but the German Interior Ministry, led by the conservative Wolfgang Schäuble, has come under repeated criticism from the United States and other NATO allies for providing too few experts and inappropriate training.

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The government had provided a mere €12 ($15.2) million for training the Afghan Army and police while the United States has already given more than $1 billion, he said.  'At that rate, it would take 82 years to have a properly trained police force,' he said.  More damaging for Germany's reputation, Ammon said, was that its police-training mission was considered such a 'disaster' that the United States and EU had taken over responsibility."

Furthermore, the rare nature of Ammon's comments seems to have given gravity to his message:

"The Defense Ministry said Ammon was expressing his personal views. Even so, because such views are rare, security experts said they showed the level of frustration building among senior military officers over German reluctance to provide adequate financing for Afghan mission or even explain to the public why Germany has 4,500 soldiers there.

Neither Chancellor Angela Merkel nor her conservative defense minister, Franz-Josef Jung, have been willing to debate the issue publicly.  For the first time since German soldiers were sent to Afghanistan six years ago, Jung referred in November to the 'Gefallene,' or fallen soldiers, who had died there."

Merkel is facing increasing pressure both from her Christian Democratic Union party as well as from outside critics to more fully address the Afghanistan issue and Germany's role there.  This pressure will likely grow next year, as Obama is expected to push Europe for greater troop contributions to Afghanistan upon taking office.

Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai has called for a withdrawal timeline for foreign troops from his country. Al Jazeera reports:

He told a delegation from the UN Security Council that without the timeline he would have to seek a political solution to the Taliban-led insurgency, his office said on Tuesday. "The international community should give us a timeline of how long or how far the 'war on terrorism' will go," Homayun Hamidzada, Karzai's chief spokesman, cited the president as telling the delegation.

"If we don't have a clear idea of how long it will be, the Afghan government has no choice but to seek political solutions," he said. He said that a political solution included "starting to talk to Taliban and those opposing the government".

However, critics have suggested that Karzai's statements come cynically close to the Afghan elections scheduled for next year. They suggest that Karzai is trying to curry favor with factions within Afghanistan who want to see foreign troops leave the country. Meanwhile President-elect Obama has called for greater troop numbers in Afghanistan in order to curb the rising levels of violence and disorder there.

President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to make fighting terrorism a priority.

Obama has pledged a new focus on Afghanistan when he becomes president in January, but while still a candidate he criticised Karzai for failing to tackle corruption, the booming drugs trade and for "not getting out of the bunker" to govern effectively.  But Obama assured Karzai of more U.S. cooperation with the Afghan government to combat terrorism and bring security.  "Obama said America will increase its commitment to bring security and stability to the government and people of Afghanistan," the Afghan president said in a statement after the two spoke on the telephone late on Saturday.  "Obama also emphasized that combatting terrorism and bringing security to Afghanistan, the region and the world would be a priority of his government," the statement said.

What precisely this means in terms of actual public policy decisions is unclear.  A CNN report is headlined "Obama promises Afghanistan more aid" but gives no details.

The UN Security Council is to despatch a fact-finding mission to Afghanistan Saturday in order to evaluate conditions in the war-torn country. AFP reports:

Headed by Italy's UN Ambassador, Giulio Terzi di Sant'Agata, the delegation includes representatives of the 15 council members, including Afghan-born US Ambassador to the United Nations Zalmay Khalilzad. During their week-long visit, the UN diplomats will visit Kabul and Herat, in western Afghanistan, but will travel nowhere else in the country because of security concerns, the Italian Embassy said.

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It will also "review the progress made by the Afghan Government ... in addressing the interconnected challenges in the areas of security, governance, rule of law and human rights, economic and social development, as well as in the cross-cutting issue of counter-narcotics."

The diplomats also plan to show support for UNAMA (United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan) and "review the implementation of the enhanced coordinating role assigned to UNAMA and the Special (UN) representative," said Norwegian diplomat Kai Eide, chiefly with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. The UN delegation will also "review efforts by the Afghan authorities ... to address the threat to the security and stability of Afghanistan posed by the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, illegal armed groups, criminals and those involved in the narcotics trade and in the diversion of chemical precursors".

The UN mission comes amid calls for greater troop numbers to compliment the 70,000-strong NATO contingent already in the country. President-elect Obama has already spoken of his desire to shift U.S. troops from Iraq into Afghanistan, and has urged recalcitrant European leaders to offer more support. Just last week ISAF Commander General David McKiernan told the Atlantic Council that Afghanistan would only be better off "if the will of the international community remains strong."

Transcript by Federal News Service, Washington, D.C.

During his address this evening to the Atlantic Council, ISAF commander General David McKiernan emphasized the many positive trends in Afghanistan, noting that he preferred a "Glass Half Full" view. 

General David D. McKiernan, the Commanding  General of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan and NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) Commander, spoke tonight at the Atlantic Council as part of the Commanders Series organized by the Council's Program on International Security.

Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai pledged Sunday that he would provide security for Taliban head Mullah Mohammad Omar if Omar was willing to negotiate a peace with the Afghan government.  WaPo reports:

"Striking a defiant tone, Karzai said during a news conference in the Afghan capital that if the Taliban leader agreed to negotiate a peace settlement with Karzai's government, he would resist demands from the international community to hand over Omar to U.S. authorities.

'As for Mullah Omar and his associates, if I hear from him that he is willing to come to Afghanistan or to negotiate for peace and for liberty so that our children will not be killed anymore, I as the president of Afghanistan will go to any length to provide him security,' Karzai said.

'If I say I want protection for Mullah Omar, the international community has two choices: Remove me or leave,' he added."

This appears to be another sign that the possibility of dialogue with the Taliban is gaining traction.  RFE/RL adds:

"U.S. President-elect Barack Obama has also suggested he was open to talks with more moderate Taliban leaders to explore whether a strategy used in Iraq of talking to enemies, that is credited with helping turn around the situation there, would work in Afghanistan."

A Pakistani security measure is threatening NATO's ability to supply troops in a key Afghan region, AP reports.

A Pakistani decision to temporarily bar some trucks from a key passageway to Afghanistan threatened a critical supply route for U.S. and NATO troops on Sunday and raised more fears about deteriorating security in the militant-plagued border region.  The suspension of oil tankers and trucks carrying sealed containers came as U.S.-led coalition troops in eastern Afghanistan reported killing five al-Qaida-linked fighters and detaining eight others, including a militant leader.

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Last Monday, a band of militants hijacked around a dozen trucks whose load included Humvees headed to the foreign forces in Afghanistan. Renewed security concerns prompted officials to impose the temporary ban late Saturday, government official Bakhtiar Khan said. He said it could be lifted as early as Monday.

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Many of the supplies headed to foreign troops arrive in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi in unmarked, sealed shipping containers and are loaded onto trucks for the journey either to the border town of Chaman or the primary route, through the famed Khyber Pass.

This is yet another indication of the complex interrelation between the two neighbors. 

Britain could send up to 2000 extra troops to Afghanistan if U.S. President-elect Barack Obama asks allies for more help in the fight against the Taliban, according to the BBC.  At Downing Street, during a visit to London, Afghanistan's President, Hamid Karzai, told Gordon Brown all efforts were being made "to bring violence down" after the Afghan foreign minister urged Britain to send in more troops. However, the Ministry of Defence said it had not received a request for extra troops.

Obama has pledged to send more troops to Afghanistan, where the United States has more than 30,000 soldiers, and he is expected to put pressure on European members of NATO to do more. Britain, which has already has more than 8,000 troops in Afghanistan, has urged other countries to make a bigger contribution.

High time for other NATO members to contribute their fair share in Afghanistan methinks.