Afghanistan Analysis: Dutch Government Falls Over Troop Withdrawal

UPDATE 0810 GMT: Afghanistan government officials say at least 33 civilians have been killed by a NATO air attack on a convoy of vehicles in Uruzgan. Nato confirmed that it fired on Sunday on a group of vehicles that it believed contained fighters, only to discover later that women and children were in the cars.

On Friday, our colleagues at The Holland Bureau --- one of the up-and-coming blogs on political issues in and beyond The Netherlands --- wrote:

We still have a government, for the moment. Opinion polls taken today indicate 45% in favour of Uruzgan [Dutch troops in Afghanistan] being worth a crisis, 35% against. Supporters of [Geert] Wilders’ PVV and the Socialists are above 60% in their hope that the Cabinet falls, as are – significantly – 55% of Labour. Yet overall 54% still come out hoping the Cabinet stays together, economic concerns being the main reason. It's rare that a foreign policy issue can be so divisive, and potentially so decisive.

Transcript: General Petraeus on Afghanistan, Pakistan, & Other US Conflicts (21 February)

Indeed. Less than 72 hours later, and the Government of Jan Peter Balkenende is no more. Balkenende, of the centre-right Christian Democrat CDA, wanted to extend the August deadline for withdrawal of Dutch troops from Afghanistan by a year. He miscalculated, possibly because of misleading signals, that he would the support of his coalition partner, the Labour Party; Labour leader and Deputy Prime Minister Wouter Bos announced:

A plan was agreed to when our soldiers went to Afghanistan. Our partners in the government didn't want to stick to that plan, and on the basis of their refusal we have decided to resign from this government.

With elections likely in May, the immediate issue is whether all 1,600 Dutch soldiers leave Uruzgan, southwest of Kabul and north of Kandahar. NATO's Secretary-General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, filed an official request for the extension of the Dutch mission earlier this month.

The crisis exposes the too-common perception, at least in the US and UK press, of a military intervention in Afghanistan led by American forces, supported by a British junior partner. While 1600 Dutch troops may not seem much, compared to the 100,000+ that the US intends to have in place after its current escalation, any loss of soldiers --- especially in central Afghanistan --- is a blow to military plans.

Even more important, however, is the symbolic impact of this news. It comes in the middle of the vaunted US-led offensive, Operation Moshtarak, to clear the Taliban from Afghanistan's center and put in Afghan forces to hold the area. The vital support, beyond the word "coalition", of non-American troops is not just that they share the fighting; perhaps more importantly, they offer the image of peacekeeping and rebuilding after the Taliban are vanquished. The political message from Holland is that some politicians, supported by a large section of their public, don't buy the rhetoric that this will be the long but decisive resolution of Afghanistan's political, economic, and social issues.

There will be a lot of damage limitation this week from US and NATO press offices, and within America, there is the bonus of simply ignoring the story. (In his interview on US television yesterday, General David Petraeus, the overall American commander for the region, was never asked about the Holland situation, and he certainly did not volunteer a reaction.) But beyond US shores and en route to Afghanistan, others will see this as a wobble in the narrative of "this time, we win Afghanistan".