The Dutch Army Oversea - On Numbers and Budgets · 4 January 2008, 18:57 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Currently I’m reading some literature on the decolonization of the former Dutch East Indies / Indonesia and what strikes me is the number of soldiers that the Dutch were able to field outside of the Netherlands, in Sumatra and Java. In his ‘Afscheid van Indië. De val van het Nederlandse imperium in Azië’ (Amsterdam 2000) historian H.W. van den Doel lists the numbers involved on the eve of the first Dutch major military offensive against the Indonesian insurgents on 20 July 1947. (page 201) According to Van den Doel the Dutch army comprised about 5,000 marines, 44,000 soldiers of the Royal Dutch East Indies Army (Dutch: ‘Koninklijk Nederlands Indisch Leger’, or in short: ‘KNIL’) and 70,000 soldiers of the Royal Netherlands Army (Dutch: ‘Koninklijke Landmacht’, in short ‘KL’). The KL constitutes the land forces element of the military of the Netherlands and, at the time, included a considerable amount of conscripts. (Stef Scagliola, ‘Last van de Oorlog’ (Amsterdam 2002), pages 50-52] The KNIL was the colonial army of the Dutch East Indies, of which the main purpose was to suppress revolts and which consisted of both ‘Indonesians’ and Dutchmen, of whom many had an ‘Indonesian’ (‘Indische’) look. [Scagliola, ‘Last van de Oorlog’, page 38] Altogether the Dutch were able to field 119,000 soldiers more than 10,000 kilometers away from the motherland.
Let’s put this number in perspective. According to Wikipedia the United States army was able to send 250,000 soldiers to topple Saddam Hussein in Iraq at the start of the Second Gulf War. This means that the amount of U.S. soldiers which were directly involved in the invasion of Iraq is only more than twice the amount of Dutch soldiers deployed on Sumatra and Java in 1947. ‘Only’, because the population size of the Netherlands amounted to about 9,000,000 people during the mid-forties of the 20th century [‘De Grote Geïllustreerde Bosatlas’ (Groningen 1983) page 75 and CBS Statline], whereas, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the United States amounted to 282,909,885 in 2003. This means that the U.S. population was more than 31 times bigger in 2003 than the Dutch population around 1945. Considering the fact that, as stated above, the Royal Dutch East Indies Army also consisted of indigenous men, my calculation is incorrect, however. Unfortunationaly, I don’t have the resources at my disposal to determine which part of the Royal Dutch East Indies Army drew on the indigenous population and how many soldiers were Dutch. Therefore, let us make another calculation based only on the amount of marines and Royal Netherlands Army soldiers.
Together the number of Dutch marines and the Royal Netherlands Army soldiers which were available on Sumatra and Java in 1947 amounted to 75,000 men. This means that the U.S. army that invaded in Iraq in 2003 was almost 3 and half times bigger than the Dutch army on Sumatra and Java in 1947. This still means, however, that the Dutch army was relatively much bigger than the U.S. invasion force of 2003. That is, only 0.088% of the U.S. population was sent to Iraq in 2003 whereas 0.83% of the Dutch population was sent to Java and Sumatra. If the U.S. had sent the same percentage of its population to Iraq the invading army would have amounted to 2,348,152 soldiers! But what about the ability of today’s Dutch military to project power overseas?
In 2007, according to CBS Statline, the Dutch popupulation amounted to 16,358,000 people. If the Netherlands would send 0.83% of its population on a military mission oversea this expeditionary force would comprise 135,771 soldiers. Currently, as a NATO member, the Dutch army is involved in the ISAF-operation in Afghanistan. To be more precisely, in Uruzgan. Hence the name of the operation ‘Task Force Uruzgan’, TFU in short. TFU, which officially started in March 2006, is considered to be a major operation by the Dutch. As such Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad terms TFU the biggest military expedition for the Netherlands since the above mentioned war in the former Dutch East Indies / Indonesia [Mark Kranenburg, ‘Eindelijk groen licht, na half jaar denken. Kamer stemt in met verlenging Nederlandse missie in Uruzgan’, NRC Handelsblad, 19 december]. But to what extent is the Dutch military preoccupied by TFU? Originally the Dutch Ministry of Defence estimated that two years in Afghanistan would cost 340 milion euro. In May 2007, however, it was estimated that the whole operation would cost 580 milion euro. [Maarten van der Schaaf, ‘Het ‘naïeve’ budget voor de Uruzgan-missie’, NRC Handelsblad, 25 mei 2007] NRC Handelsblad reported that the budget for TFU implied an enormous burden for the Dutch military, as a result of which it is forced to shrink the rest of its army, by selling armoured fighting vehicles (tanks, ‘pantserhouwitsers’) and F-16’s and cutting manpower (1,000 of its 70,000 jobs). [Steven Derix en Jaus Müller, ‘Defensie krimpt drastisch om in Uruzgan te blijven’, NRC Handelsblad, July 2, 2007] But how many soldiers are involved in TFU?
Originally, the Dutch army sent 1,200 to 1,400 soldiers to Uruzgan, but in April 2006 the government deemed it necessary to send another 200 soldiers. On November 30 2007 the Dutch government decided to stay another two year period in Uruzgan, but now with 1,400 soldiers. (Jaus Müller, ‘Belangrijke gebeurtenissen rond de Nederlandse missie in Uruzgan’, NRC Handelsblad, December 17, 2007] The difference with 1947 is staggering. Instead of deploying 0.83% of its population in Afghanistan the Dutch deployed only 0.00978% in 2007. No doubt this calculation isn’t very accurate. Nonetheless, the difference remains staggering. Especially considering the fact that in 1947 World War II was barely over and the process of recovery of the Dutch economy had only just started (European Recovery Program / Marshall Plan, July 1947).
Off course, there’s nothing new here, but for the Dutch it’s good to be aware of. In Newsweek’s recently issued ‘year-end Special Edition’ Minxin Pei, ‘director of the China Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’, states in an article entitled ‘An Unlikely New Ally’ that a group of Chinese thinkers are concerned about ‘the recent decline in U.S. prestige and leadership’. (pages 22-23) This group, ‘made up of the most cosmopolitan elites’, acknowledges the role of the United States as keeper of ‘some sort of stable order’ and provider of ‘public goods (...) as free trade, safe sea lanes, technological innovation and regional stability’. The Dutch should be concerned too about a U.S. decline in power. For it might very well lead to a world, in which a much more active and assertive role for European Union countries is required for the maintaince of a stable world order and the protection of their strategic interests. And such a would might very well require a considerable increase of their defence budgets and a significant increase in military manpower.
afghanistan,
decolonization,
dutch army,
dutch east indies,
indonesia,
isaf,
java,
knil,
koninklijke landmacht,
minxin pei,
netherlands,
sumatra,
task force uruzgan,
tfu,
u.s. military,
uruzgan
New Policy Towards Pakistan Required (2) · 15 July 2007, 21:42 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Shortly after the raid that ended the Red Mosque siege an anonymous source inside the Pakistani secret services leaked to Spanish news agency EFE that the Pakistani government attempts to cover up the scale of the bloodshed which the raid resulted in. (nu.nl, July 11, 2007) Apparently this source felt the need to depict the government of President Pervez Musharraf as an enemy of the extremists. Furthermore the impression arises that at least some within the Pakistani secret services feel sympathy for Pakistan’s extremists. According to military analyst Ayesha Siddiqa-Agha, however, President Musharraf used the raid on the extremist bulwark to appear before the footlights as an indispensable ally in the War on Terror and, as a result of this, to gain foreign support. In reality the relationship between the Musharraf government and Pakistan’s extremists is, on the contrary, very intimate. (NRC Handelsblad, July 5, 2007) This view complies with the findings of Carnegie Endowment scholar Frédéric Grare (‘Rethinking Western Strategies Toward Pakistan. An action agenda for the United States and Europe’, July, 2007) which I will deal with later and with Barnett R. Rubin’s view, as he expounded this in ‘Saving Afghanistan’, an article in the January / February edition of Foreign Affairs (volume 86, number 1, page 57-79) (For Rubin’s view also read ‘A New Policy Towards Pakistan Required’. How should the U.S. and its allies deal with this apparent close relationship? Both Grare and Rubin offer several recommendations in their above mentioned articles. Here, however, I would like to line up some ideas from ‘A False Choice in Pakistan’, an article on the matter written by Daniel Markey in the July / August edition of Foreign Affairs (volume 86, number 4, page 85-102). Markey is ‘Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations’ and ‘served on the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff from 2003 to 2007.
Markey’s article opens with the current state of the partnership between the U.S. and Pakistan in the War on Terror. Because of the fact that almost six years after 9/11 the Taliban is alive and kicking, destabilizing Afghanistan from its safe haven in the Afghan-Pakistan border region, that al Qaeda’s top also resides safely in Pakistan and that terrorist attacks both inside and outside Pakistan ‘persist with deadly regularity’ many in the U.S. are developing serious doubts about the alliance with Islamabad. ‘They charge (...) that Musharraf and his allies in Islamabad have taken billions of dollars in U.S. aid while doing too little to advance – and, in many ways, much to undermine – the fight against terrorism’. Because of this they argue that the U.S. should take a tougher stance on the Musharraf government, even threaten with sanctions, to force it to deal more aggressively with terrorism. Furthermore, they argue that the U.S. should actively promote a process of democratization, to downplay the role of the military in the government and to get a government of Pakistan’s moderates that will be really committed to counter extremism by addressing ‘the social and developmental deficiencies that cause extremism’.
According Markey such change of attitude will be counter-productive. First of all, tougher talk towards the Pakistani government, by threatening to cut military assistance, end the sale of major defence systems as the promissed sale of 36 F-16 jets, will only fuel deep-seated feelings of distrust about the durability of Washington’s support for the country. That is, the feeling exists that after Afghanistan is pacified and Bin Laden captured the U.S. will lose interest in the country. The continuing support of the Pakistani army and Inter-Services Intelligence for militant groups like the Taliban is only a result of this distrust and based on the notion that it served their security issues before, for example in Afghanistan and Kashmir, and will do so in the future after the U.S. has abandoned them. Other negative consequences for the U.S. might be that the skeptics in the military will be emboldend further at the expense of friends of the U.S. and that, if training programs will be cut, a cadre of officers will be created with ‘no personal connections to their U.S. counterparts and, correspondingly, less trust in or sympathy for the United States’. To conclude, sanctions targeted at the military will especially hit Pakistani officers, whose role in counterterrorism operations is ‘most vital’.
Secondly, efforts to downplay the role of the Pakistani army in society and to develop a ‘civilian democratic rule’ won’t work too, Markey states. Not so much because elections will result in a victory for extremists – for according to Markey it’s more likely that free and fair elections result in the ‘return power to the mainstream civilian powers’ as Benazir Bhutto’s PPP and Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League. But because it will be hard to circumvent the army, ‘Pakistan’s strongest government institution’ and the only force in Pakistan that will be able make a bold stand against the country’s extremists. Pakistan’s civilian institutions, on the other hand, are weak because they suffered from neglect or have become ‘incorperated into the army’s expanding sphere of influence’. This means that, even if national elections will result in a new government, in the end, it’s the army that calls the shots.
Now let’s take a closer look at Markey’s view on the relationship between the military and the secret services on the one hand and Islamists on the other, for it rather differs from the view of the supporters of a less cautious attitude towards Islamabad. As the latter believe that it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to sever this relationship, Markey is more positive about it. He discerns several developments which will likely make the Pakistani army more ‘amenable to a strategic shift’. First of all, because it realizes that maintaining ties with the Islamists has become very dangerous. Until 9/11 the U.S. ‘tolerated, applauded, or overlooked Pakistan’s association with Jihadi groups’, but after 9/11, as the Bush administration took on its ‘with us or against us’ strategy, Islamabad would invoke the wrath of Washington if it would continue its overt support for the extremists. Secondly, Musharraf’s siding with the U.S. makes him ‘a marked man’, a target for ‘jihadi sponsored attempts on his life’. Furthermore, as a result of heavy clashes in the Federally Administered Tribal Area’s the relationship between the army and extremists has deteriorated.
To continue, Markey sees two more favorable developments. To start with, the relationship between Pakistan and India has improved since India extended its ‘hand of friendship’ by the mouth of its Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in April 2003. This ‘offers tangible economic and political incentives for putting an end to the militancy over Kashmir’. The other development Markey discerns is the ‘commitment to building Afghanistan’s nascent democratic institutions, supporting President Hamid Karzai’s Pashtun-led government and remaining in the country for the foreseeable future’ which the United States and NATO ‘convincingly demonstrate’. As consequence of this commitment the Pakistani army will be more inclined to ‘invest in Afhanistan’s stability rather than hedge against collapse or the rise of a threatening neighbour’. Considering, for example, the desperate call for more troops on the ground by retired Canadian major-general Lewis MacKenzie, whom I quoted in the previous posting, Markey’s valuation of the state and nation-building process in Afghanistan sounds somewhat optimistic, so to speak. Therefore, his prediction that Pakistan’s military is now more likely to invest in Afghanistan’s stability doesn’t sound convincing either. Nonetheless, Markey might have a point here: when NATO shows true commitment as far as Afghanistan is concerned, Pakistan might become more willing to support pacification of Afganistan.
Now, what should Washington do to make the relationship with Islamabad more profitable? Markey sees a ‘twofold task for U.S. policy makers’. On the one hand they should stimulate Pakistan’s commitment in fighting terrorism. They can accomplish this by following ‘three basic rules’, which will demonstrate that Washington intends to maintain a long-term partnership with Pakistan and that allying with extremists isn’t an option anymore. To start with, rebukes and threats, whether issued publicly or privately, should be avoided, for they only undermine Pakistan’s confidence in a partnership with the United States. Secondly, the U.S. should show ‘tangible benefits’ of this partnership, by continuing to provide Pakistan with money and materiel, by addressing Islamabad’s security issues in Kabul and New Delhi and by promoting the ‘Indo-Pakistani rapprochement’ in order to, among other things, ‘link Pakistan’s economy into India’s massive growth engine’. Thirdly, when Washington feels the need to be more compelling towards Pakistan it should do this by demanding Islamabad to allow the U.S. to be more engaged in Pakistan’s counterterrorism efforts. It’s important to note that Pakistan ‘is deeply averse to having U.S. armed forces operate autonomously’ within its borders, so it should try to integrate Americans into Pakistani forces in an unobtrusive way. This will show Washington’s willingness ‘to invest in long-standing, working-level ties and that its ultimate goal is deeper, closer cooperation’. More U.S. engagement could, furthermore, be expressed by assistance by improving ‘the effectiveness of Pakistan’s security and intelligence services’ and transforming its heavy army ‘into a more agile counterterrorism, counterinsurgency force’. Because a weak state and economy is a source of discontent and radicalization Washington should, to conclude, invest in Pakistan’s institutions and its infrastructure.
On the other hand, U.S. policy makers should not promote the democratizing of Pakistan as a means of getting rid of a government led by Musharraf and the military. Instead, they should acknowlegde the role of the army and prop a government consisting both of Musharraf’s Pakistan Muslim League as well as Bhutto’s PPP. The military shouldn’t be ignored for reasons expounded above. The PPP, a ‘nationwide mainstream party’, should be part of the government because it will make this government more rooted in Pakistan society and, consequently, better equipped to deal with extremism. Markey discerns three ‘basic principles’ which ‘top U.S. officials’ should use as a point of departure for their attempts to promote elections which will lead to a Musharraf-Bhutto government. First of all, they should prevent that the elections will be rigged by ‘hard-liners around Musharraf’ by, among other things, sending observers. Secondly, Washington should unequivocally advocate human rights and the rule of law to further the creation of an alliance of Pakistan’s ‘progressive political forces’, which will be better able to cope with the country’s extremists. Thirdly, to conclude, it should stress the importance of ‘internal party democracy’, because this will create parties that won’t depend on individuals or families anymore, parties that will outlast individuals and families.
9/11,
afghanistan,
al qaeda,
benazir bhutto,
bhutto,
bush,
bush administration,
musharraf,
pakistan,
red mosque,
taliban
'We have a tiny, tiny force in Afghanistan' · 7 July 2007, 10:57 CET by Charles Vermeulen
While the knuckels of Dutch Defence Minister Eimert van Middelkoop were rapped by a majority in parliament this week after he had stated that the Dutch goverment intended to keep an army in Afghanistan after August 2008, retired Canadian major-general Lewis MacKenzie calls upon the NATO members to double its military presence on the ground in the country.
afghanistan,
mackenzie,
nato,
netherlands,
van middelkoop
The Taliban as a Migration Age Tribe (1) · 2 June 2007, 10:17 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Let us start with the lack of a stable, societal and political context in both nowadays Afghanistan and Late Antiquity / Early Medieval Europe in which the Migration Age tribes came into being. In the May / June edition of Foreign Affairs (volume 86, number 3, pages 24-40) Bruce Riedel once more stresses that al Qaeda ‘thrives on failed and failing states’ (page 32) (Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq, Balochistan / Baluchistan-Pakistan). The same applies for the Taliban, which came into power in war-torn Afghanistan and which is apparently resurging from its sanctuary in Quetta in turbulent Baluchistan-Pakistan after being pushed out of Afghanistan. (Barbett R. Rubin, ‘Saving Afghanistan’, Foreign Affairs, volume 86, number 1, page 57-79) In this respect European Migration Age tribes were no different: a prerequisite for their creation seems to be that, in the words of Reinhard Wenskus, ‘der ganze Raum sich schon einem Unruhezustand befindet.’ (Stammesbildung und Verfassung, page 76) This brings us to another, closely related similarity: their capability to absorb various kinds of people and the considerable social mobility as a result of this capability which their presence in a certain area seem to bring about.
In ‘The Sham Fight with the Taliban’ (‘Het Schijngevecht met de Talibaan’), an article in M (April 2007, pages 50-57), newspaper NRC Handelsblad’s monthly, journalist Antoinette de Jong reports that the Taliban are mutated into a ‘sponge’ for the ‘growing group of opponents of the Karzai-government’, which makes them almost ineradicable anno 2007. As such they’re reinforced by drugs cartels and militants originating from bin Laden’s training camps. The fact that Hamid Karzai is a member of the Pashtun tribe the Durrani, furthermore, influences the ethnic composition of the Taliban, which apparently are attractive to the age old adversaries of the Durrani, the Ghilzai. In ‘Saving Afghanistan’, an article in the January / February edition of Foreign Affairs (volume 86, number 1, page 57-79) Barbett R. Rubin furthermore states that the Taliban ‘have drawn on fugitives from Afghanistan, newly minted recruits from undisrupted training camps and militant madrasahs, and tribesmen alienated by civilian casualties and government and coalition abuse to reconstitute their command structure, recruitment and funding networks, and logistical bases in Pakistan’. (page 58)
According to Wenskus the Migration Age tribes were no less dynamic. That ‘der ganze Raum sich schon einem Unruhezustand befindet’ and people were forced to leave behind their homes was important, because it meant that the existing ‘Klansystem’ came under pressure and splinter groups were enabled to break away from the clans. These splinter groups, Wenskus stated (ibidem), were better equipped to assimilate to other, larger groups than the clans. In such a situation the so-called Wanderlawinen (‘migration avalanches’), which formed the starting point of the typical Migration Age tribe (Stammesbildung, pages 439-441), could arise. These Wanderlawinen, however, were unstable constellations. While migrating their composition permanently changed as again and again new members joined the bands and others left. (Stammesbildung, pages 429-458 and passim) As a consequence of this Migration Age tribes were ethnic heterogeneous / polyethnic units by definition. Only after settlement in a certain area the Wanderlawine could morph into a more steady, lasting form. An example, drawn from Herwig Wolfram’s History of the Goths (Berkeley 1988) may illustrate this polyethnic nature of a Migration Age tribe:
In the same work Herwig Wolfram furthermore shows that Migration Age tribes were not only capable of absorbing people with various ethnic backgrounds; once in the Roman empire they offered the posibility of upward social mobility to ‘the native lower classes’ as well. In the case of the Gothic groups this meant that slaves, peasants, skilled craftsmen and merchants all tried to become a warrior in the Gothic army. For, as Wolfram states, ’[t]he principle of the time is clear: whoever proves himself as warrior is lord; whoever works (...) is and will remain a slave.’ (History of the Goths, pages 7-8 and passim)
As I wrote down above this posting is nothing more than some sketchy thoughts, some brainstorming written down, maybe ready to be thrown on the scrapheap for bad and useless ideas, so feel free to make short work of it.
afghanistan,
balochistan,
failed state,
gothic,
goths,
herwig wolfram,
migration age,
pakistan,
reinhard wenskus,
roman empire,
stammesbildung,
stammesbildung und verfassung,
taliban,
wenskus,
wolfram
Detainees Captured by the Dutch in Afghanistan · 6 January 2007, 17:59 CET by Charles Vermeulen
In the previous posting I wrote about Dutch joint responsibility for human rights violations committed by the Americans. I mentioned the fact that sending Dutch troops to Afghanistan enabled the U.S. to continue to wage its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the support of non-U.S. troops in the ‘War on Terror’ provided the latter with some legitimacy. But off course there’s also the issue of prisoners of war (POWs), which might be captured by Dutch troops. Preceding the sending of the troops the Dutch government has decided that captured POWs will be handed over to the Afghan authorities. Furthermore, in a Memorandum of Understanding the Dutch government and the government of Hamid Karzai have agreed upon that those POWs, thereupon, won’t be handed over by the Afghan authorities to third parties, that is to the U.S. (source: NRC Handelsblad, ‘Wel skibril in Uruzgan, maar geen dwang’, 21/11/2006) But what if the Afghan authorities decide to officially release a POW and directly thereafter some obscure militia, secretely affiliated to the authorities, kidnaps the released POW to torture and / or kill him / her? Or to hand over the POW to the U.S.? Or that U.S. secret agents waylay the released POW at the prison’s gate? Technically the Dutch don’t need to violate their own agreements then to bring a POW in danger. Furthermore, it’s doubtful whether POWs are better of with their kinsmen than with the Americans. In Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad (‘Wel skibril in Uruzgan’, 21/11/2006) Human Rights Watch’s Asia research director Sam Zarifi said that prisoners who are assumed to be Taliban are detained by the NDS, the Afghan secret service, which beats them up and gives them electric shocks. Considering all this it seems hard to avoid that in the end the human rights of POWs captured by the Dutch won’t be violated.
afghanistan,
human rights,
karzai,
taliban,
uruzgan,
war on terror
Van Bommel Tendentious on Uruzgan Mission · 5 January 2007, 11:10 CET by Charles Vermeulen
The legitimicy of the presence of Dutch troops in Uruzgan, Afghanistan, has provoked only modest debate in the Netherlands. Harry van Bommel, a prominent MP of the Dutch Socialist Party, therefore rightly keeps the subject on the agenda. The way he deals with it, however, is in my opinion rather questionable and tendentious. In an interview in this weeks edition of Dutch magazine Vrij Nederland (page 14-18) he expounds his views.
On the one hand his line of thought seems an accurate one. In its ‘War on Terror’ the U.S. has committed several kinds of human rights violations including torture. Referring to among others the treatment of detainees at Guantánamo Bay Van Bommel therefore coins this war a ‘dirty war’. Nonetheless, the Dutch government supports the U.S. in this ‘dirty war’ by sending troops to Afghanistan. Because of this the MP denominates the Dutch government a ‘subcontractor’ of the U.S. Although this is somewhat populistic, in my opinion the Dutch government has indeed become jointly responsible for human rights violations committed by the U.S. Firstly, by sending its soldiers the Netherlands helps the U.S. to continue to wage its wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, of which especially the latter seems to have stretched the U.S. military capacity to the breaking point. Secondly, the sending of troops by U.S. allies provides the ‘War on Terror’ with some legitimacy, because it turns the ‘War on Terror’ into a more or less international effort.
On the other hand, Van Bommel easily puts aside some very good reasons for the ousting of the Taliban from Afghanistan. He acknowledges that the Taliban ‘ruled Afghanistan by means of violence’ and ‘unpleasant things happened during their rule with respect to the suppression of women and jurisdiction’, but ‘the situation isn’t all that simple’. (...) ‘Uruzgan is in fact a Taliban-province. The Pashtuns which live there are inclined to support the Taliban-warriors.’ According to Van Bommel this implies that ‘we are, in fact, waging a war against the local population’.
What strikes here, firstly, is that the MP uses a far more detached language to describe the crimes of the Taliban than to describe those commited by the U.S. Compare for example ‘unpleasant things happened during their rule with respect to the suppression of women and jurisdiction’ with ‘torture’ and ‘dirty war’. As a result of this the impression arises that the U.S. presence in Afghanistan was in fact worse than the violent Taliban have been for the country. Secondly, it might be true the Pashtun in Uruzgan are inclined to support the Taliban, but that doesn’t imply that the Taliban plan to confine their rule to the area of their supporters. Afterall, preceding the U.S. invasion their rule confined almost the whole of Afghanistan. Thirdly, by stating that Dutch troops are waging a war against the local population because they’re fighting the Taliban is really manipulative, for it suggests that Dutch troops deliberately and systematicly shoot at or throw bombs on civilians in Uruzgan. And last but not least: let’s not forget that the Taliban harboured Osama Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda, which are responsible for thousands of deaths.
afghanistan,
al-qaeda,
harry van bommel,
sp,
taliban,
uruzgan,
van bommel
Kaplan's 'Imperial Grunts' - Some Comments · 24 December 2006, 11:10 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Currently I’m reading Rovert D. Kaplan’s ‘Imperial Grunts: The American Military On The Ground’ (2005), in which he describes, among others things, the fascinating world of U.S. marines, Rangers and Special Forces (Green Berets). That is, the Dutch translation of the work, because that allowes me to read it wherever I want without the need of lugging around a dictionary. While reading it several descriptions and statements caught my eye.
Special Forces and Beards – A few weeks ago I dedicated a posting to Vic Franke’s documentary ‘09.11 Zulu. Onze commando’s aan het werk in Uruzgan’ (‘09.11 Zulu. Our commando’s at work in Uruzgan’. This documentary showed Dutch Special Forces, who had grown big ferocious beards. As such their appearance didn’t exactly matches ‘the image of the well-groomed western soldier’. It reminded me of Kaplan’s ‘Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan’ (1990), in which he ‘described how even journalists transformed after entering the martial world of the Afghan mujahideen. Adopting to local customs they grow wild beards as a sign of masculinity and start to despice their newly arrived fellow reporters with their smoothly shaved, effeminate faces’. But this only partly explained the behaviour of the Dutch Special Forces. On InfoVlad.Net Clearinghouse I found an interesting comment on my observation by a member of the site, Azog:
‘Special forces are usually exempt from the strict codes of the regular armed forces. US Special Forces are allowed to wear local clothes and to choose weapons as they please, you can see SEALs with AKs, keffiyehs and sporting beards just like locals do. The idea is that since they operate far away from the main forces that they should blend in with the populace as much as possible while maintaining the insignia and symbols of the US forces. Since most of the western countries armies are molded after Anglo-American model, it is no wonder that Dutch and Germans do the same.’
In ‘Imperial Grunts’ Kaplan adds another interesting explanation as he depicts the U.S. Special Forces, contrary to the U.S. marines, ‘standardized company men’ with extremely short haircuts and digital camouflage uniforms, as individualists who grow beards and wear baseball caps and Afghan garb (page 296). So according to Kaplan the appearance of the U.S. Special Forces is also the result of the individualistic culture of this Special Operations Force. Assuming that, as far as this feature is concerned, Dutch Special Forces are no different than their U.S. counterparts, it would explain why not all of them wore beards in Franke’s documentary.
Embedded journalism – In chapter six, ‘From the Army to the Marines-Fort Bragg and Camp Lejeune, North Carolina’, Kaplan defends his role as embedded journalist. In it he demisses the idea of objective journalism, because of the unavoidable invidual perspective from which no journalist or any other author can escape. (page 265) No one would deny that, but the problem here is that any embedded journalist might be inclined to identify himself that much with the troops he hangs out with that he will be tempted to ignore any shortcoming or moral misstep which crosses his path.
The suspension of general conscription – In 1997 conscription was suspended in the Netherlands, as a result of which the Dutch army fully consists of volunteer professional soldiers nowadays. In chapter seven (‘horn of africa, winter 2004’) of ‘Imperial Grunts’ Chad Dickinson, a U.S. marine Staff Sergeant, says about the Marine Corps that it recrutes ‘people who are mean and troublesome and turns them into people that are simply very powerful’ (page 305). With this in mind one wonders what it does to a society when conscription is abolished or suspended and when only a small professional army remains. Does it result in more vandalism, crime, hooliganism?
afghanistan,
embedded,
kaplan,
pakistan,
robert d. kaplan,
special forces,
uruzgan,
vic franke
Bill Clinton on the Iraq Study Group Report · 8 December 2006, 09:49 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Last Wednessday Twan Huys of Dutch current affairs programme NOVA interviewed former U.S. president Bill Clinton, which was broadcast last night. In the interview Clinton, who paid a visit to the Netherlands, made some some interesting statements on the report which the Iraq Study Group came up with last Wednessday.
Clinton admitted that he was familiar with only 3 or 4 of the 79 recommendations of the study group yet, but he thinks that ‘putting more emphasis on training and embedding [American] troops in advisory roles with the Iraqi’s is a good tactical suggestion’ and he thinks that the U.S. ‘has to have some lowering of [U.S.] troop levels if for no other reason than to free up some troops to go to the internationally approved mission in Afghanistan to stop the resurgent Taliban and the resurgent Al-Qaeda that would follow that.’ Furthermore he agrees that the U.S. government has ‘to restart the peace momentum (...) between the Israelis and the Palestinians. That would help a great deal (...) overall in reducing the terrorist tensions and improving the climate in the Middle East.’ And he agrees that the U.S. government ‘should reach out to the Iranians and the Syrians and try to get a regional solution’. Although ‘right now the Iranians don’t want to do anything, probably because their policy seems to be: what ever causes America heartburn is good for us’, Clinton believes that this isn’t a mission impossible: ’[t]he truth is that there are 1.6 million Iraqi refugees already. If Iraq were to deteriorate to the point Bosnia did before we had a stabilization, there will be 10 million Iraqi refugees, most of them would be in Iran. I don’t really think that Iran wants that. So I think that there may be an opportunity for us to all work together.’
On the question whether Clinton is afraid that the conflict in Iraq will spill over its borders to the neighbouring countries, he responded that he’s afraid that ‘the country will may disintegrate internally and many, many more people may die and that it may become the new epicenter of organised terror activity throughout the region. (...) [A]nd that (...) it could destabilize other countries. But not some much by having the conflict itself spill over. Although (...) the Iranians (...) and the Syrians should be worried about whether their own financial and political resources could be strained if they have too many refugees.’
To conclude, Clinton said that he doesn’t hold the view that the U.S. army should leave Iraq as might be physically possible, for in 2003 the U.N. has endorsed the presence of international troops in the country to prevent its collapse and he subscribes to the view that it would result in ‘more chaos and death in the country of innocent civilians’. But, on the other hand, the U.S. has ‘to look to the time when our military involvement will end and (...) readjust what [it’s] doing there now’ and he favours ‘some lowering of the troops now’ for ‘it will send a signal that [the U.S.] is changing policy and to ‘free up some troops to try to be strong in Afghanistan’.
Update – For the coming days the interview with Bill Clinton, which furthermore is about climate change and the ambition of his wife senator Hillary Clinton to become U.S. president, can be viewed here. Don’t be discouraged by the introduction in Dutch, for the interview itself is completely in English.
afghanistan,
al-qaeda,
bill clinton,
clinton,
iran,
iraq,
iraq study group,
syria,
taliban
Dutch Special Forces Grow Beards in Uruzgan · 21 November 2006, 07:29 CET by Charles Vermeulen
Yesterday night I watched ‘09.11 Zulu. Onze commando’s aan het werk in Uruzgan’ (‘09.11 Zulu. Our commando’s at work in Uruzgan’) a documentary by Vik Franke on the (fighting) missions of Dutch commando’s in Uruzgan, Afghanistan. Franke joined them as an ‘embedded’ journalist on some of these missions. What caught the eye was that image of the well-groomed western soldier didn’t quite apply. Many of the Dutch commando’s wore big ferocious beards. At first I thought: no wonder, these guys stay out of their camps in the Afghan dessert for days, maybe for weeks and because of that they simply lack the possibility to shave. But on second thoughts that couldn’t be the explanation, because some of them combined their beards with perfectly cropped haircuts, while others had no beard at all and their interpreter had a neatly groomed whisker. Then I remembered Robert D. Kaplan’s ‘Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan’ (1990). In this book Kaplan described how even journalists transformed after entering the martial world of the Afghan mujahideen. Adapting to local customs they grow wild beards as a sign of masculinity and start to despice their newly arrived fellow reporters with their smoothly shaved, effeminate faces.
Update – Click here to watch the documentary (in Dutch).
09.11 zulu,
afghanistan,
commando's,
dutch special forces,
masculinity,
robert d. kaplan,
special forces,
uruzgan,
vik franke