With the bold prison attack the Taliban scored big time. But I still believe that smarter NATO tactics and a LOT more support for the normal Afghan People this is still winnable.

BBC News: Trimmed French military is no retreat

There are two very odd things regarding European integration: Britain’s unwillingness to accept that it is part of Europe and France’s odd military status in NATO.

Finally the later will be fixed soon - after almost 40 years since Charles de Gaulle pulled out of NATO.

France has long been fighting side by side with their other western allies - but they were never officially part of the team. Sarko finally wants to put an end to that charade and join the team as a full member.

He also wants to shake up the military establishment and bring the troops into the 21st century - just like the Brits did several years ago.

Germany still hardly makes an effort to improve it’s military.

And all the big European ideas about a quick reaction force and all these stupid dreams never really gotten anywhere.

Europe still depends on NATO and therefore on the US and Canada.

More? Military of France @ Wikipedia

If this propaganda website from NATO is any indicator for the current state of affair for the North Atlantic Alliance than it is bad … very bad.

The website feels so 1999 and really stinks. Who made this? The 14 year old son of a Polish General? Sorry, I am so incredibly underwhelmed by this …

Watch for yourself: natochannel.tv

Expanding NATO is a good thing. Expanding NATO to get new cannon fodder for war that has hardly anything to do with NATO is a bad thing.

When America attacked Afghanistan after 9/11 NATO stood behind the US of A and pledged it’s support with troops and money.

It was understood that America would take the military lead and the Europeans would do the whole nation building stuff (together with the brave Canadians and Australians) - like they did in Kosovo.

But instead of finishing the job in Afghanistan the Americans rushed off to fight another little war in Iraq and dropped the ball. Suddenly the rest of NATO found itself in the hot zone.

Once again Bush showed is incompetence building alliances and offending his allies. And still Afghanistan doesn’t get the support it needs to rebuild the country and provide security - and some European countries should do more … it’s not all the Americans fault …

I am all for making Afghanistan a better place and fighting the Taliban. I also agree that Germany and so many other NATO members have to do more.

But let’s not forget: the NATO mandate was to support the rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan and provide some policing. It was expected that the Americans would continue their war on the Taliban.

But what happened? America went to Iraq and allowed the Taliban to remerged. They also ignored warnings from Afghans and the international community that the US sock puppet Hamid Karzai does not have the backing and power to push serious development in Afghanistan ahead. Instead corruption, drugs and local warlords succeeded. The Taliban are back and more and more locals support them instead of ‘their’ government.

Also the international rebuilding efforts were uncoordinated and wasteful. Not the kind of results you want to have to convince the locals that western democracy is better and improves the lives of the poor Afghan people.

The US loves to shift the blame to NATO for it’s own failures. While the rest of NATO is going through a tough realization of their shared failure. Loosing Afghanistan is not an option they say - but most countries lack the political will and commitment to make it work.

Very sad.