German Green leader Joschka Fischer bangs the drum for Afghanistan war

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German Green leader Joschka Fischer bangs the drum for Afghanistan war
10 December 2009

The escalation of the Afghanistan war has created severe difficulties
for the German government. Contradictory statements on Germany’s
course in the war have emerged from the chancellery, the foreign
ministry and the Bavarian state chancellery.

While the CDU (Christian Democratic Union) chairperson and German
chancellor, Angela Merkel, together with Defense Secretary Karl
Theodor von Guttenberg (Christian Social Union—CSU), are preparing to
announce an increased German deployment by the end of January, the CSU
chairman and Bavarian prime minister, Horst Seehofer, has publicly
argued against such a move. The FDP (Free Democratic Party) chairman
and German foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle, has kept silent on the
issue.

Behind these divergences is increasing public opposition to the war.
According to a recent poll, 69 percent of those questioned favored the
fastest possible withdrawal of German troops from Afghanistan—an
increase of 12 percent since September. According to the poll, 77
percent are of the opinion that they have not been honestly informed
about the Afghanistan deployment by the government.

Der Spiegel commented on the results of the poll: “The government
cannot react as quickly as opposition to the Afghanistan deployment
grows.”

The increasing brutality of the war, the fraudulent Afghan
presidential election and rampant corruption of the regime of Hamid
Karzai, as well as the recent massacre at Kunduz and its cover-up by
the German government, have undermined the official rationale given
for the war. Barely anyone in Germany believes today that the role of
the German Army in Afghanistan is to dig wells, emancipate Afghan
women, protect the civilian population and promote democracy. For very
good reasons, however, the government is reluctant to reveal the real
aims of the war.

It is against this background that Joschka Fischer has gone public to
defend the Afghanistan deployment and provide new justifications for
it. As the first and only Green Party foreign minister (1998-2005),
Fischer played a key role in breaking the post-war taboo against
international deployments by the German Army. It was Fischer who
justified the participation of the German Army in the Kosovo war with
the cynical argument that the legacy of the Holocaust obliged Germany
to prevent alleged genocide in the Balkans. The dispatch of German
troops to Afghanistan also occurred during his term in office.

What stands out in Fischer’s latest commentary is that he no longer
seeks to justify the Afghanistan deployment on the basis of
humanitarian arguments. Instead, he cites exclusively geo-political aims.

“The source or meaning of the conflict in Afghanistan is impossible to
find in the country itself,” Fischer writes in a contribution to the
Süddeutsche Zeitung. “Afghanistan is the battlefield, but the causes
of the wars that have devastated it since the mid-1970s were and are
still to be found beyond its borders. So an exclusively ‘Afghan
solution’ is not possible.”

According to Fischer, what began in 1989, after the withdrawal of the
Soviet Army from Afghanistan, was “a proxy war between regional
neighbors over power in the Hindu Kush.” Pakistan, supported by Saudi
Arabia, “sought strategic depth against its arch enemy India,” and for
this purpose equipped the Taliban. Iran defended its interests with
the assistance of the Shiite minority, and the northern neighbors
(including Russia) looked for support to the Tajik Northern alliance
and the Uzbek militias.

The invasion of Iraq in March 2003, which Fischer terms a “folly,”
meant that US President George W. Bush was “not only squandering
America’s military strength,” but also that “Iran became the central
geo-political player in the entire region.”

Fischer continues: “So, those who are grappling with the Afghan riddle
today should consider, first and foremost, the regional realities: Can
the West afford to withdraw?”

Fischer answers this question with a clear “no” and demands the
continuation of the war on the basis of a clearly defined goal—“a
stable status quo in Afghanistan that will prevent the country from
again becoming a battlefield of regional interests and an
organizational base for Al Qaeda.” He continues, “Without a sufficient
military presence, as well as improved and reinforced reconstruction
efforts, this goal is not attainable.”

This is a revealing confession. In order not to leave “power in the
Hindu Kush” to regional neighbors, the leading figure of the Greens
endorses an expansion of a war which has already costs the lives of
thousands of civilians and will undoubtedly cause the deaths of tens
of thousands more. Fischer has the backing of his party, even though
its current spokesmen are somewhat more circumspect in their comments.

Fischer does not answer the obvious question as to why the US and its
European allies have more right to exercise “power in the Hindu Kush”
than the country’s regional neighbors. This is where his candor ends.
He presents the war as a selfless intervention by the US and its
allies, aimed exclusively at preventing terrorism, Islamic radicalism,
nuclear threats, regional conflicts and looming disintegration.

Fischer knows better. As a paid lobbyist of the Nabucco pipeline
project, which will allow leading European energy companies to exploit
the natural gas reserves of Central Asia, Fischer is in the front line
in the struggle for oil and gas—the resources which have fueled the
war in Afghanistan.

As a former foreign minister, Fischer is intimately acquainted with
the strategic conceptions of Zbigniew Brzezinski, who, as national
security adviser to US President Jimmy Carter, initiated the US
program of support for the Afghan Mujahedeen. In his 1998 book The
Grand Chessboard, Brzezinski developed the thesis that the key to the
defense of US global supremacy in the 21st century was control of
Central Asia. He attached particular significance to Afghanistan.

For Fischer, it is imperative that all means are employed to defend
access to the mineral resources of Central Asia and the supremacy of
the “West” in the region. While German and American interests are not
identical, any defeat for America in Afghanistan would not only
irrevocably damage the authority of US imperialism, it would also have
profound implications for the European powers. On both sides of the
Atlantic, Afghanistan serves as the “chessboard” where the ascending
nations of China, India and Russia can and must be held in check.

“The big question” for Fischer is “whether the US and its European
allies still have the strength, perseverance and far-sightedness for
such an undertaking.” He notes: “There are good reasons to doubt this.
The alternative would be a chaotic and dangerous future in this large
hot spot.”

A glimpse at historical developments reveals that the strength and
perseverance of a belligerent power depends on the extent to which it
can restrain and suppress internal opposition. A vital condition for
the “perseverance” of the German Army in the First World War was the
betrayal of the working class carried out by the German Social
Democratic Party; in the Second World War, it was the smashing of the
workers’ movement by the Nazis. More recently, the US lost the Vietnam
War largely because of increasing domestic resistance to the war.

In this respect, more can be expected from Fischer and the Greens.
They have transformed themselves from pacifists into enthusiastic
proponents of war. A hundred years ago, the German middle class
swooned at the naval program of the emperor. Today, the Greens express
their enthusiasm for the deployment of the German Army in Afghanistan.

The form has changed, but the content remains the same. This stance
has its own inevitable logic. As public opposition to the war grows,
so too will the readiness of Fischer and the Greens to support
repressive state measures to combat popular resistance.

Peter Schwarz

http://wsws.org/articles/2009/dec2009/pers-d10.shtml

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