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European reluctance forces U.S. to consider sending Marines to Afghanistan

BRUSSELS, Belgium — For America’s European allies, Afghanistan has never been Iraq.

France and Germany, who vehemently resisted the Iraq war, were quick to offer forces to help overthrow the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks. All 26 NATO nations have soldiers serving with the allied force, which with 42,000 troops has grown to more than eight times its original strength.

For the U.S. that’s still not enough, but months of pressure to persuade European allies to fill shortfalls have failed to produce sufficient combat units for the dangerous southern and eastern provinces.

U.S. officials acknowledged last week that allied reluctance is forcing the Pentagon — already stretched in Iraq — to consider sending 3,000 more U.S. Marines in April for an expected upsurge in Taliban activity after Afghanistan’s snows thaw.

Fourteen thousand American troops already make up a one-third of the NATO force. A further 13,000 U.S. troops are in Afghanistan outside the NATO mission to train Afghan forces and hunt al-Qaida fighters.

Washington is adamant that sending the Marines will not let allies off the hook. It stresses that, if approved, the deployment will be for only seven months to reinforce allied troops over the spring and summer.

Some at NATO headquarters suggest the Bush administration also hopes a surge in the number of well-trained, well-equipped U.S. troops can hurt the Taliban and bring some good election-year news from Afghanistan, just as President Bush’s decision to send more troops to Iraq has received credit for improvements there.

However Washington’s failure to find allies to do the job also reflects on the administration’s lack of clout in some European capitals and public misgivings in key allies such as France, Turkey, Germany, Italy and Spain about America’s war on terror.

“There would be strong public reaction if a single soldier were killed in what is essentially seen as a U.S. war against Taliban or al-Qaida,” said Gokcen Ogan, of the Ankara-based think tank Eurasia Strategic Research Center.

Germany and Italy are among the biggest contributors to the NATO force, but have barred their troops from fighting the Taliban in the front-line southern provinces, keeping them instead in the relatively peaceful north and west to provide security for reconstruction efforts.

Prime Minister Romano Prodi faces persistent calls from left-wing parties within his own coalition for a withdrawal of Italy’s 2,550 troops. The German government has resisted opposition calls to pull out its more than 3,000 soldiers. To maintain parliamentary support, it underscores the troops’ role in supporting development, rather than accepting an expanded combat role, which polls indicate would be unpopular.

Fear of casualties, and commitments to military missions in Africa, the Balkans and the Middle East, have added to some Europeans’ reluctance to send more troops to Afghanistan.

That refusal to deploy to the most dangerous parts of the country has opened a rift with NATO allies such as Britain, Canada and the Netherlands who, along with the United States, have borne the brunt of the renewed Taliban violence in the south.

Some of those nations have a bigger proportional contribution to NATO’s International Security Assistance Force than even the United States. With 7,750 troops, Britain has 4 percent of its troops in Afghanistan according to NATO figures. Denmark has 3.5 percent, the Netherlands 2.9 percent and Canada 2.6 percent.

The U.S. has 1.1 percent of its troops serving with the alliance force in Afghanistan, the NATO data shows.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates last month acknowledged the political difficulties faced by European governments and suggested a switch in Washington’s tactics for procuring more support.

“Continuing to publicly go after our allies for things that -- to do things that politically are just impossible for them is probably not very productive,” he told reporters after a meeting with key allies in Scotland. “Many of these governments are minority governments; they’re coalition governments; their position is fragile.”

U.S. diplomats are working with European allies to prepare a revised political strategy on Afghanistan for an April summit of NATO leaders in Bucharest, Romania. It is expected to place greater focus on the need to combine military and civilian efforts in Afghanistan, boosting economic development and improving governance by building up the Afghan police and judiciary. NATO experts are also hoping the summit will boost efforts to train the Afghan army, which they see as key to an eventual reduction of the international force.

Officials hope the Bucharest message could persuade allies to increase contributions.

NATO military planners already see some signs of movement. They point out that France recently agreed to redeploy Mirage warplanes from Tajikistan to a NATO base in southern Afghanistan, and send French military experts into the south for the first time to help train Afghan army units.

President Nicolas Sarkozy on a visit to Kabul last month hinted that France’s contingent of 1,300 could be further strengthened.

The Dutch government agreed in November to keep its troops — currently around 1,500 — in volatile Uruzgan province for two more years. NATO officials are confident a government-commissioned report due out next week in Canada will recommend maintaining its 1,700 troops there.

NATO diplomats are hopeful Britain will increase its contribution in Afghanistan as it downscales operations in Iraq. Poland recently announced it would add 400 troops and eight much-needed helicopters to its contingent of 1,140, despite an opinion poll in December that showed 83 percent of Poles opposed their county’s participation.

The poll carried out by the CBOS institute gave a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points.

Analysts say Turkey — which has NATO’s second-largest military — may agree to do more if it receives U.S. support against the PKK rebel bases in northern Iraq and on other international issues.

“If there were satisfactory developments in important foreign policy issues, like on the PKK issue, or on the Cyprus issue, the government would be able to exert more pressure on the military to expand activities in Afghanistan,” said security expert Ogan.

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Associated Press Writers Jamey Keaten in Paris, Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin, Suzan Fraser in Ankara and Ryan Lucas in Warsaw contributed to this story.