×
Like, the ONE time that Germany is fighting on our side in a war, they have to go and get all incompetent:
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. The comments came from General Hans-Christoph Ammon, head of the army's elite special commando unit, whose officers are in Afghanistan fighting alongside US forces against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.Germany is the largest NATO member to still use conscripts, although all those deployed to Afghanistan are volunteer professionals. Nevertheless, one of the arguments against conscription is that it reduces military effectiveness, and does so not just by putting into uniform inadequate, unmotivated soldiers, but also by producing an unprofessional organizational attitude. The German Army has historically been an exception to this argument, and the Germans still contend that conscription works for them. Nevertheless, the evidence of German inadequacy in Afghanistan seems to be mounting. We truly live in curious times when France has both a bigger navy than Britain, and a better army than Germany.Germany was responsible for training the Afghan police, but the German Interior Ministry, led by the conservative Wolfgang Schauble, has faced criticism from the United States and other NATO allies for providing too few experts and inappropriate training. The training operation was "a miserable failure," Ammon told DPA, the German press agency, after describing the German record in Afghanistan to a gathering last week of a reservists' association. The government has provided $15 million for training the Afghan Army and police, while the United States has given more than $1 billion, he said.
Via AG.
--Robert Farley
