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(Gen. Lauris Norstad - leaving the picnic early)

As my colleague Jason Sigger over at C&L pointed out this morning, it's been hard getting other NATO allies to commit their fair share of troop strength during the current Afghan crisis. Sad to report, it's always been that way.
In fact, it's had wide ranging political ramifications for quite some time. As evidenced by this Meet The Press interview from January 1963, then NATO Commander General Lauris Norstad was asked why it was difficult to some NATO allies (in that case France) to commit to a security force in the region of Europe.

Marquis Childs: “General Norstad, during your six years as Supreme Commander of NATO, one of the important duties was to try and persuade the French, and in the last four years President DeGaulle, to integrate his forces with NATO. But progressively the direction has been the other way, toward not . . toward against integration. What is your explanation for this?

Norstad: “Mister Childs you’re laying a tremendous responsibility on my shoulders, I’m not so sure I deserve all of this. But, to answer your question, I think General DeGaulle has made it extremely clear throughout the years, and perhaps particularly in his press conference earlier . . last week that he feels very strongly that France must have some independent strength. He is increasing the strength of France including the military strength, but he is not putting it within the Alliance. I may deplore this, as a matter of face I have deplored this, but I think we should recognize first that he is increasing strength. I hope that circumstances, and these are political considerations and not military considerations as you appreciate – I hope that circumstances will permit him to commit these forces to the Alliance in the future.”

Granted, Norstad was a big believer in nuclear weapons as a viable and active option. Something that staggers the imagination today. But even at the height of the Cold War, it was difficult to get support from a unified NATO without walking through a political minefield in order to do it. It was widely thought the fallout between Norstad and DeGaulle quickly aided in his premature resignation from his NATO command

It begs the question just why there still is a NATO, since it really was the byproduct of the Cold War and could be considered something of a historic curio. But I will leave that up to my colleagues to discuss at length and with better information at their disposal.

Editor's note: Please welcome to the Crooks and Liars team Jason Sigger, who many of you may already know from his superb work at the Armchair Generalist. Jason is going to be writing about national-security issues for C&L; we're pleased and excited to have him aboard.

There has been some talk in the papers about the NATO Secretary General's support for Gen. McChrystal's report. I would suggest that what he said was that Afghanistan clearly does need some COIN support. What he also said was this (see around 3:30 mark):

"NATO will consider the addition of ground forces when the time is right."

Wow. So it's okay to endorse the strategy, but there's no way that NATO is going to actually add any substantive amount of troops to the mix. Other than Britain, I am not sure we're going to see more than a few dozen military personnel from the rest of the community. So whenever NATO wants to get serious about sending its fair share of troops - say, about 20,000 or so of the 40,000 request on the table - then feel free to discuss how our operations in Afghanistan ought to be conducted, Mr. Rasmussen.

More from Spencer Ackerman.

Minor disclaimer - My usual audience at Armchair Generalist knows that I am not a COIN fan and pessimistic as to how NATO works in these coalition operations. As others wiser than I have noted, the US govt can certainly stay and do COIN, but it's long term and very expensive. I'd much rather see a limited COIN/CT strategy such as the one described by VP Biden, Gen Krulak and others, with a disengagement and pull out before 2012. The US engagement won't end overnight, but we certainly need to put a cap on the future investments of "blood and treasure" in this region.

Why do I feel like I've seen this movie before? I'm hoping against hope for a different ending this time: America having the strength to walk away from something that will drain our resources with no clear goals in sight.

The top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan warns in an urgent, confidential assessment of the war that he needs more forces within the next year and bluntly states that without them, the eight-year conflict "will likely result in failure," according to a copy of the 66-page document obtained by The Washington Post.

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal says emphatically: "Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near-term (next 12 months) -- while Afghan security capacity matures -- risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible."

His assessment was sent to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates on Aug. 30 and is now being reviewed by President Obama and his national security team.

McChrystal concludes the document's five-page Commander's Summary on a note of muted optimism: "While the situation is serious, success is still achievable."

But he repeatedly warns that without more forces and the rapid implementation of a genuine counterinsurgency strategy, defeat is likely. McChrystal describes an Afghan government riddled with corruption and an international force undermined by tactics that alienate civilians.

But Obama is trying to figure out whether that's actually the road he wants to take:

Instead of debating whether to give McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, more troops, the discussion in the White House is now focused on whether, after eight years of war, the United States should vastly expand counterinsurgency efforts along the lines he has proposed -- which involve an intensive program to improve security and governance in key population centers -- or whether it should begin shifting its approach away from such initiatives and simply target leaders of terrorist groups who try to return to Afghanistan.

McChrystal's assessment, in the view of two senior administration officials, is just "one input" in the White House's decision-making process. The president, another senior administration official said, "has embarked on a very, very serious review of all options." The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations.

Obama, appearing on several Sunday-morning television news shows, left little doubt that key assumptions in the earlier White House strategy are now on the table. "The first question is: Are we doing the right thing?" the president said on CNN. "Are we pursuing the right strategy?"

"Until I'm satisfied that we've got the right strategy, I'm not going to be sending some young man or woman over there -- beyond what we already have," Obama said on NBC's "Meet the Press." If an expanded counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan contributes to the goal of defeating al-Qaeda, "then we'll move forward," he said. "But, if it doesn't, then I'm not interested in just being in Afghanistan for the sake of being in Afghanistan or saving face or . . . sending a message that America is here for the duration."

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September 15, 2009 PBS News Hour

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September 08, 2009 CNN

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July 02, 2009 CNN

(President Truman and members of the NATO Alliance, April 3, 1949)

"A simple document. Had it existed in 1914 and in 1939, supported by the nations that are here today, I believe it would have prevented the acts of aggression which led to two world wars." President Truman

Sixty years ago today, President Truman signed the treaty that created NATO, a document which basically stated that an aggressive act towards one member nation constituted an aggressive act towards all member nations. Viewed as another block of ice in the already frozen Cold War, it was largely a reaction to the increased presence of Soviet influence in Eastern Europe and a rise in tensions brought about by the situation in divided Germany. Six years later, in response, the Eastern Bloc nations would form The Warsaw Pact, pledging to do pretty much what NATO was doing.

In his opening statement, President Truman remarked if NATO was in existence in 1914, World War 1 and World War 2 would have been prevented. I'm not entirely sure that would have been the case in 1914 since the heads of most of the warring nations were, in fact cousins. Perhaps family counseling, but not NATO would have been a good idea.

But that's another story.

Juan Cole with the latest updates on U.S. efforts in Pakistan:

In a major blow for the US and NATO military effort in Afghanistan, the parliament of Kyrgyzstan voted Thursday formally to end US use of Manas Air Force base to resupply troops in nearby Afghanistan. With the effective closure of the Khyber Pass route into Afghanistan from Pakistan, this step endangers the logistics supply line to the US and NATO troops. The move comes in part as a result of Russian aid to Kyrgyzstan. Russia and the Shanghai Cooperation Council have long been concerned about the expansion of US military and political influence into Central Asia.

With the Pakistani route under severe pressure and the closing of the Manas base to the US,t is hard to see how the 17,000 new US troops to be sent to Afghanist can be provisioned.

October 22, 2008 BBC World
Afghanistan's Defense Ministry officials say the strike hit an army checkpoint in Khost early Wednesday. The ministry condemned the attack, warning it could weaken the moral of Afghan security forces.
An American military statement says U.S.-led coalition forces were returning from an operation when they were involved in fighting that may have killed and injured Afghan soldiers. The statement called the incident "a case of mistaken identity on both sides."

I posted yesterday that nuke-armed Pakistan is only a month away from bankruptcy. Now tiny Iceland looks like it might get there first.

Iceland has formidable international reach because of an outsized banking sector that set out with Viking confidence to conquer swaths of the British economy — from fashion retailers to top soccer teams.

The strategy gave Icelanders one of the world's highest per capita incomes. But now they are watching helplessly as their economy implodes — their currency losing almost half its value, and their heavily exposed banks collapsing under the weight of debts incurred by lending in the boom times.

... A full-blown collapse of Iceland's financial system would send shock waves across Europe, given the heavy investment by Icelandic banks and companies across the continent.

Iceland right now is apparently in a state of shock and gives a snapshot of what a depression with the Great in it will look like everywhere - "cafes were half-empty, real estate agents sat idle, and retailers reported few sales" says the AP.

And, just as Pakistan has begged the West for $100 billion to stave off economic collapse, Iceland has had to go cap-in-hand to a bigger power too. Only they've chosen the Russians - asking for a 5.4 billion loan to shore up the nation's finances.

That must be giving NATO planners conniptions. Loans like that, in the present climate, aren't going to come without strings and Iceland is the keystone in NATO's maritime defenses in the North West Atlantic, designed to keep Russian warships and subs containable in their home waters should the need arise.

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(VOAvideo of US, Poland Sign Missile Defense Deal)

American plans for missile defense bases in bordering nations infuriate Russia, and the US has had to bend over backwards to push through the Polish and Czech sites over the objections of those nation's populace - even going so far as to offer Poland US troops and air-defense missiles on their border with Russia. But why is the Bush administration pushing so hard for a defense against a so-far entirely hypothetical threat from Iran and to have bases for missiles that don't work?

Phil Coyle, the Pentagon's former top weapons tester (.pdf), says it's all for nothing. "The system proposed for Poland and the Czech Republic doesn't exist, has never been tested, and has no demonstrated effectiveness to defend Europe or the U.S. under realistic operational conditions," Coyle contends in an exclusive conversation with DANGER ROOM.

He says that even our existing missile defenses, installed in Alaska, couldn't stop more than one or two rudimentary missiles from, say, Iran. "For these reasons the U.S. BMD system proposed for Europe is causing strife with Russia for nothing."

Well, not exactly for nothing.

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