6,000 troops urgently needed in Afghanistan: NATO
Pastor Dale Morgan
6,000 troops urgently needed in Afghanistan: NATO*
Reuters
Sunday, June 22, 2008; 12:24 PM
BERLIN (Reuters) - Up to 6,000 additional troops are urgently needed in
Afghanistan and a failure to deploy them will only prolong the presence
of Western forces in the country, a German NATO general said on Sunday.
Egon Ramms told public radio station Deutschlandfunk that alliance
members would end up paying a price later if they did not boost troop
numbers now.
"We are talking about a total of 5,000, 6,000 soldiers," Ramms said. "We
need these soldiers now, very soon, because we need to hold specific
areas, we need to win over Afghanistan's citizens and because at some
point, in 2010, 2011 or 2012 we will want to hand over responsibility to
Afghan forces.
Roughly 60,000 foreign troops are in Afghanistan, most of them part of
the NATO-led International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF), but
security has deteriorated over the past two years.
Some 6,000 people were killed in 2007, the deadliest year since U.S.-led
and Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in 2007.
"The troops that I don't have now could lead to delays in the withdrawal
of NATO and ISAF," Ramms said. "In other words, the costs that are not
being paid now will have a negative impact on the bottom line at some
point."
Ramms declined to say how many additional German troops he thought were
necessary, but said Germany should increase the number of troops it can
send to Afghanistan from a fixed ceiling of 3,500.
The parliamentary mandate for German troops operating in Afghanistan is
due to expire in October and Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung is
expected to request an increase of at least 1,000 in the troop limit.
(Writing by Noah Barkin)