05/19/2008 12:00 AM
DER SPIEGEL
NOT LICENSED TO KILL
German Special Forces in Afghanistan Let Taliban Commander Escape
By Susanne Koelbl
[email protected]
and Alexander Szandar
German special forces had an important Taliban commander in their sights in
Afghanistan. But he escaped -- because the Germans were not authorized to
use lethal force. The German government's hands-tied approach to the war is
causing friction with its NATO allies.
Unlike their Delta Force colleagues, Germany's KSK special forces are not
authorized to use lethal force in Afghanistan except in the event of an
attack.
The wheat is lush and green in the fields of northern Afghanistan this
spring. A river winding its way through the broad valley dotted with walled
houses completes the picturesque scene. Behind one of these walls, not far
from the town of Pol-e-Khomri, sits a man whose enemies, having named him a "target," would like to see dead. He is the Baghlan bomber.
The Taliban commander is regarded as a brutal extremist with excellent
connections to terror cells across the border in Pakistan. Security
officials consider him to be one of the most dangerous players in the
region, which is under German command as part of NATO's International
Security Assistance Force (ISAF) mission in Afghanistan. The military
accuses him of laying roadside bombs and of sheltering suicide attackers
prior to their bloody missions.
He is also thought to be behind one of the deadliest attacks in
Afghanistan's history, the Nov. 6, 2007 attack on a sugar factory in the
northwest province of Baghlan. The attack killed 79 people, including dozens
of children and many parliamentarians and other politicians, as they
celebrated the factory's reopening.
Germany's KSK special forces have been charged with capturing the terrorist,
in cooperation with the Afghan secret service organization NDS and the
Afghan army. The German elite soldiers were able to uncover the Taliban
commander's location. They spent weeks studying his behavior and habits:
when he left his house and with whom, how many men he had around him and
what weapons they carried, the color of his turban and what vehicles he
drove.
At the end of March, they decided to act to seize the commander. Under the
protection of darkness, the KSK, together with Afghan forces, advanced
toward their target. Wearing black and equipped with night-vision goggles,
the team came within just a few hundred meters of their target before they
were discovered by Taliban forces.
The dangerous terrorist escaped. It would, however, have been possible for
the Germans to kill him -- but the KSK were not authorized to do so.
The threat to the international relief workers and the ISAF soldiers
stationed in the north may now be even greater than it was before. Warned of ISAF's activities and intent on taking revenge, the man and his network are
active once again. Over 2,500 Germans are stationed between Faryab and
Badakhshan, along with Hungarian, Norwegian and Swedish troops.
The case has caused disquiet at the headquarters of the ISAF peacekeeping
force in Kabul. The current strategy for fighting the enemy is to buy as
many Taliban sympathizers as possible, to at least win them over for a while
-- and to "eliminate" the hardliners through targeted assassinations.
From a military point of view, the so-called targeting has been a success.
Close to one-third of the Taliban leaders, about 150 commanders, have since
been "neutralized," meaning they are either dead or captured. Most of the
capture-or-kill missions, as the operations are called in military jargon,
are undertaken by British or American special forces.
But so far the Germans haven't wanted to take part. And that causes
problems, because the insurgents are increasingly gaining influence
</international/world/0,1518,547037,00.html> in the nine provinces under
German command.
And the extremists appear to be confident of victory. Maulawi Bashir
Haqqani, 40, the Taliban's military commander in Kunduz, told SPIEGEL: "The
Germans are the most important enemy in the north. If they leave their base,
they will find booby traps and bombs waiting for them on every road. They
will have to carry many more bodies in coffins on their shoulders if they
don't come to the realistic conclusion that their forces must withdraw from
our country."
Nonetheless, even in a time of growing threats in Afghanistan, Berlin is
sticking to its "principle of proportionality," stressed one high-ranking
official in the Defense Ministry. A fugitive like the Baghlan bomber is not
an aggressor and should not be shot unless necessary, the official explains.
Soldiers from Britain's British Special Air Service or the US's Delta Force
are less bothered about such hair-splitting. For them, this is a war in
which it comes down to "kill or be killed," say sources in military circles
in Kabul. The "targets" are identified, tracked down and -- often with the
help of laser-guided weapons systems -- "eliminated."
The Germans have considerable misgivings about such an approach. They have secretly given "clarification notes" to NATO with far-ranging instructions
for their soldiers which expressly contradict the usual procedures: "The use
of lethal force is prohibited unless an attack is taking place or is
imminent." Sources in NATO circles regard the confidential document as a
"national exception," a caveat which places restrictions on operational
capability. The Germans, for their part, always avoid using the word caveat,
out of diplomatic considerations vis-à-vis their allies.
The most remarkable thing about the secret document is its stated
justification. The German government considers its allies' approach as "not
being in conformity with international law." Little wonder that NATO's
mission in Afghanistan is marked by tension and friction.
Critics accuse the Germans of achieving precisely the opposite effect of
what they claim to be aiming for. "The Krauts are allowing the most
dangerous people to get away and are in the process increasing the danger
for the Afghans and for all foreign forces here," says an incredulous
British officer at ISAF headquarters on Great Massoud Road in Kabul.
The case of the Baghlan bomber is not the end of the story. More trouble has
been brewing for the Germans in Afghanistan. They are actually supposed to
be currently participating in Operation Karez in northern Afghanistan in
conjunction with the Afghan army and the Norwegian Quick Reaction Force.
The operation, like a mission in autumn 2007, is aimed at fighting Taliban who
have a stronghold in the northwestern province of Badghis. The Taliban
forces there currently include about 150 hardliners and some 500 irregular
fighters.
But because the area of operation, which is in Ghormach district, lies
exactly on the border with the area under Italian command, the German
government hesitated to deploy the reconnaissance, logistics and KSK forces
which were originally promised by the German regional commander. It was only
at the end of last week that German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung
decided to approve the mission after all. At that point, Germany's allies
had already been taking part in bloody fighting for a week.
Last Friday, an armored infantry battalion from Augustdorf in the German
state of North Rhine-Westphalia put on an impressive military display on a
training ground for the benefit of the German Chief of Army Staff Hans-Otto
Budde -- demonstrating, ironically, an operation to seize enemy combatants.
The battalion will be relieving the Norwegian Quick Reaction Force in
northern Afghanistan as of July 1. Then, at the latest, the Germans will be
on the frontline.
URL:
* Not Licensed to Kill: German Special Forces in Afghanistan Let Taliban Commander Escape - International - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News
</international/world/0,1518,554033,00.html>
And people question why the Americans do things like go into Iraq by themselves and not wait for 35 years while the UN makes up its mind! Had the US not decided to go into Bosnia, the death toll there would still be rising and the Euros would still be wringing their hands, aid convoys would still be held up for weeks by a checkpoint with two irregular soldiers, and the possibility of spreading chaos and violence would be threatening southern Europe, or perhaps it would already have arrived.
We should replace the Germans with the French. Sarkozy has no qualms about dealing with the enemy. A battalion of French Foreign Legion paratroops would make short work of the Taliban in their area of responsibility. "Je ne regrette rien."
DER SPIEGEL
NOT LICENSED TO KILL
German Special Forces in Afghanistan Let Taliban Commander Escape
By Susanne Koelbl
[email protected]
and Alexander Szandar
German special forces had an important Taliban commander in their sights in
Afghanistan. But he escaped -- because the Germans were not authorized to
use lethal force. The German government's hands-tied approach to the war is
causing friction with its NATO allies.
Unlike their Delta Force colleagues, Germany's KSK special forces are not
authorized to use lethal force in Afghanistan except in the event of an
attack.
The wheat is lush and green in the fields of northern Afghanistan this
spring. A river winding its way through the broad valley dotted with walled
houses completes the picturesque scene. Behind one of these walls, not far
from the town of Pol-e-Khomri, sits a man whose enemies, having named him a "target," would like to see dead. He is the Baghlan bomber.
The Taliban commander is regarded as a brutal extremist with excellent
connections to terror cells across the border in Pakistan. Security
officials consider him to be one of the most dangerous players in the
region, which is under German command as part of NATO's International
Security Assistance Force (ISAF) mission in Afghanistan. The military
accuses him of laying roadside bombs and of sheltering suicide attackers
prior to their bloody missions.
He is also thought to be behind one of the deadliest attacks in
Afghanistan's history, the Nov. 6, 2007 attack on a sugar factory in the
northwest province of Baghlan. The attack killed 79 people, including dozens
of children and many parliamentarians and other politicians, as they
celebrated the factory's reopening.
Germany's KSK special forces have been charged with capturing the terrorist,
in cooperation with the Afghan secret service organization NDS and the
Afghan army. The German elite soldiers were able to uncover the Taliban
commander's location. They spent weeks studying his behavior and habits:
when he left his house and with whom, how many men he had around him and
what weapons they carried, the color of his turban and what vehicles he
drove.
At the end of March, they decided to act to seize the commander. Under the
protection of darkness, the KSK, together with Afghan forces, advanced
toward their target. Wearing black and equipped with night-vision goggles,
the team came within just a few hundred meters of their target before they
were discovered by Taliban forces.
The dangerous terrorist escaped. It would, however, have been possible for
the Germans to kill him -- but the KSK were not authorized to do so.
The threat to the international relief workers and the ISAF soldiers
stationed in the north may now be even greater than it was before. Warned of ISAF's activities and intent on taking revenge, the man and his network are
active once again. Over 2,500 Germans are stationed between Faryab and
Badakhshan, along with Hungarian, Norwegian and Swedish troops.
The case has caused disquiet at the headquarters of the ISAF peacekeeping
force in Kabul. The current strategy for fighting the enemy is to buy as
many Taliban sympathizers as possible, to at least win them over for a while
-- and to "eliminate" the hardliners through targeted assassinations.
From a military point of view, the so-called targeting has been a success.
Close to one-third of the Taliban leaders, about 150 commanders, have since
been "neutralized," meaning they are either dead or captured. Most of the
capture-or-kill missions, as the operations are called in military jargon,
are undertaken by British or American special forces.
But so far the Germans haven't wanted to take part. And that causes
problems, because the insurgents are increasingly gaining influence
</international/world/0,1518,547037,00.html> in the nine provinces under
German command.
And the extremists appear to be confident of victory. Maulawi Bashir
Haqqani, 40, the Taliban's military commander in Kunduz, told SPIEGEL: "The
Germans are the most important enemy in the north. If they leave their base,
they will find booby traps and bombs waiting for them on every road. They
will have to carry many more bodies in coffins on their shoulders if they
don't come to the realistic conclusion that their forces must withdraw from
our country."
Nonetheless, even in a time of growing threats in Afghanistan, Berlin is
sticking to its "principle of proportionality," stressed one high-ranking
official in the Defense Ministry. A fugitive like the Baghlan bomber is not
an aggressor and should not be shot unless necessary, the official explains.
Soldiers from Britain's British Special Air Service or the US's Delta Force
are less bothered about such hair-splitting. For them, this is a war in
which it comes down to "kill or be killed," say sources in military circles
in Kabul. The "targets" are identified, tracked down and -- often with the
help of laser-guided weapons systems -- "eliminated."
The Germans have considerable misgivings about such an approach. They have secretly given "clarification notes" to NATO with far-ranging instructions
for their soldiers which expressly contradict the usual procedures: "The use
of lethal force is prohibited unless an attack is taking place or is
imminent." Sources in NATO circles regard the confidential document as a
"national exception," a caveat which places restrictions on operational
capability. The Germans, for their part, always avoid using the word caveat,
out of diplomatic considerations vis-à-vis their allies.
The most remarkable thing about the secret document is its stated
justification. The German government considers its allies' approach as "not
being in conformity with international law." Little wonder that NATO's
mission in Afghanistan is marked by tension and friction.
Critics accuse the Germans of achieving precisely the opposite effect of
what they claim to be aiming for. "The Krauts are allowing the most
dangerous people to get away and are in the process increasing the danger
for the Afghans and for all foreign forces here," says an incredulous
British officer at ISAF headquarters on Great Massoud Road in Kabul.
The case of the Baghlan bomber is not the end of the story. More trouble has
been brewing for the Germans in Afghanistan. They are actually supposed to
be currently participating in Operation Karez in northern Afghanistan in
conjunction with the Afghan army and the Norwegian Quick Reaction Force.
The operation, like a mission in autumn 2007, is aimed at fighting Taliban who
have a stronghold in the northwestern province of Badghis. The Taliban
forces there currently include about 150 hardliners and some 500 irregular
fighters.
But because the area of operation, which is in Ghormach district, lies
exactly on the border with the area under Italian command, the German
government hesitated to deploy the reconnaissance, logistics and KSK forces
which were originally promised by the German regional commander. It was only
at the end of last week that German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung
decided to approve the mission after all. At that point, Germany's allies
had already been taking part in bloody fighting for a week.
Last Friday, an armored infantry battalion from Augustdorf in the German
state of North Rhine-Westphalia put on an impressive military display on a
training ground for the benefit of the German Chief of Army Staff Hans-Otto
Budde -- demonstrating, ironically, an operation to seize enemy combatants.
The battalion will be relieving the Norwegian Quick Reaction Force in
northern Afghanistan as of July 1. Then, at the latest, the Germans will be
on the frontline.
URL:
* Not Licensed to Kill: German Special Forces in Afghanistan Let Taliban Commander Escape - International - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News
</international/world/0,1518,554033,00.html>
And people question why the Americans do things like go into Iraq by themselves and not wait for 35 years while the UN makes up its mind! Had the US not decided to go into Bosnia, the death toll there would still be rising and the Euros would still be wringing their hands, aid convoys would still be held up for weeks by a checkpoint with two irregular soldiers, and the possibility of spreading chaos and violence would be threatening southern Europe, or perhaps it would already have arrived.
We should replace the Germans with the French. Sarkozy has no qualms about dealing with the enemy. A battalion of French Foreign Legion paratroops would make short work of the Taliban in their area of responsibility. "Je ne regrette rien."
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