International

Poland to send 1000 soldiers to Afghanistan

30.11.2009 10:02

Poland is planning to increase troop deployment in Afghanistan by one thousand.

The enlargement of the Polish contingent in Afghanistan is a response to the call of General Stanley McChrystal - US commander in Afghanistan – to increase the allied presence by up to 40,000 troops.

Originally, Poland’s government intended to send only 600 soldiers to reinforce the present contingent consisting of 2,000 soldiers. However, the Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Piotr Paszkowski assures that the number of troops will be increased still further.

“We will send not more than a thousand soldiers to Afghanistan,” said Paszkowski.

The troops will spend five years in Afghanistan unless the allied forces manage to prepare Afghan army and police to take over control of the country earlier. So far only the UK has made any definite announcements to respond to the call of General McChrystal. The British will send 500 additional soldiers to Afghanistan, which is fewer than expected by the US.

The government’s decision to enlarge the Polish contingent has been fiercely criticized by the opposition Democratic Left Alliance party. The Parliament Speaker and Former Defence Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski claims that Poland cannot afford to send additional forces to Afghanistan.

The Defence Ministry project on the enlargement of Polish troops in Afghanistan has been forwarded to the Foreign Ministry and later will be sent to the President Kaczynski who is expected to OK the project.

“The army itself needs to decide how strong the support should be,” said Aleksander Szczygło, head of the National Security Bureau. (mg/pg)

Comments: 10 Add new comment

hairball

30/11/2009 12:11:31

More body bags will return to Polska carrying the brave remains of Polands sons.

This sucks!!

Karl Naylor

30/11/2009 13:25:03

Polish governments have yet to reject any demand the USA has made of Poland with regards supporting its Wars in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Poland has been described with some accurancy as a vassal state, having swapped being a satellite of Moscow under Soviet domination to a US one.

The better term for Poland at the beginning of the C21st offered has been that it is a client state because Poland has a stake in developments in Afghanistan.

Over Iraq politicians and right wing and neoliberal think tanks complained that Polish contruction companies and other businesses did not get a fair stake in rebuilding it.

So Poland did have economic aims in supporting Iraq but in Afghanistan it is never explained to the public why it is there apart from the usual 'war on terror drivel.

The reason Afghanistan means much to Poland is in proving itself a willing model pupil in supporting the USA and extracting concessions from the USA.

The irony is that Radek Sikorski complained in early Nov 2009 about Russia's 'War Games" in Belarus and called for permanent US troop installations as a 'shield'

Yet at the same time Poland is prepared to send more troops and spend more on Afghanistan when it has little to do with its defence as a nation state.

The reason is energy security and NATO's task is in making Afghanistan a pipeline protectorate state, as will happen when the TAPI pipeline is built in 2010.

Sikorski knows Afghanistan well as a reporter there in the 1980s when the USA backed the mujahadeen against the Soviets.

The strategic significance of Afghanistan in the Great Game has been central since the C19th as a transit route from East to West and North to South.

Control over Afghanistan and the TAPI pipeline being built would mean that NATO had a definite stake in controlling the flow of Turkmenistani gas.

It blocks off Chinese inroads from the East and means it can flow through states considered largely to have interests in common with the West-Pakistan & India.

The TAPI pipeline will run through Kandahar where most British & Canadian troops are dying to defend 'democracy' at this moment.

Defeating the Taliban across Afghanistan is a losing battle,however, whilst the War of Drugs ensures that the high price of heroin makes it always profitable.

The irony is that Polish soldiers are expected to die to fight a Taliban armed and deadly from the profits made from Western consumer demand for drugs.

The only way of defeating the Taliban would be to legalise drugs and reduce the scale of the opium profits to negligible proportions.

Yet that would not be something Western politicians seeking election would be able to propose in states like the US, Uk, Poland with its shrill 'moral force' rhetoric.

The level of debate in Poland over Afghanistan remains low, shrouded in obfuscating power jargon like 'NATO credibility' and seldom is heroin or oil mentioned.

Yet the irony is that the mess in Afghanistan is a consequence of Brzezinski's policy of arming and training the mujahadeen in 1979.

The Eastern card, to divert the Soviet Union East into 'its Vietnam' happened contemporaneously with the rise of Solidarity in 1980.

Whether Afghanistan played a crucial part in allowing Poland to have breathing space is an interesting historical question but Brzezinski certainly aimed at it.

Yet Brzezinski, a key foreign policy advisor behing Obama, was also aiming at the 'stupendous prize' of the oil and gas of the Caspian.

To that end the reason Poland is in in Afghanistan now is crucially concerned with control of the natural resources of the 'stans'. A continuity going back to the 1970s.

The fact this policy was reckless and dangerous in the long term-causing the blowback of 9/11-is seldom discussed in Poland.

The pro-US Polish cheerleaders of US policy come hell or highwater like Adam Michnik have never questioned the way both US and Poland's FP has been subordinated to oil.

The underlying driving forces of conflict and militarism from the US perspective are obfuscated by 'liberal interventionist' tropes about defeating "Islamo-totalitarianism'.

Where are the dissidents now ? Who in Polish public life is willing to speak out against the use of Polish troops to support a flawed policy ?

There has been a noticeable silence from Michnik.

No 'living in truth' was necessary after 9/11/ Just pro-Bush propaganda and the quips about the Poles being 'more American than the Americans'.

janusz starkel

30/11/2009 14:45:32

Poland have no interest to send troops aboard. We been at war way too many times. Enough of this.
Polish solders should not fight for someone else interest.
It is all political agenda and security have nothing to do with.

Jozek

30/11/2009 15:59:57

U.S. has an accomplice it can count on.

This well not quell the possibility of a terrorist attack on Poland, it wil only inspire exactly that.

That is good news for people who like the NON-STOP wars.

TO them I say, purchase a good video game based on war. There you can live out your fantasy of fighting for your "freedom".

Jozek

30/11/2009 16:11:26

Karl,

I read some of your points. Can I suggest a terrific book on the subject of resource wars? "Rising Powers, SHrinking Planet", by Michael T. Klare

Resource scarcity is among us, and this book basically outlines all the strategic moves conducted by the G8 in attempt to secure energy.

Just in the past five years, the actions by China will amaze you.

That is why I have mixed feelings about afghanistan. If we wish to develop energy there we need to be much more diplomatic (too late now). Only the wishful thinkers still believe we went into Iraq and Afghanistan to "liberate" the people of terrorist's and tyrant's.

Karzai is no longer the preferred politician there any longer. China has been communicating there wish to help stabilize the region with development and commerce in return for resource access.

Karl Naylor

30/11/2009 21:03:09

Jozek,

I have read Blood and Oil by Klare but not Rising Power, Shrinking Planet. His overall message is bleak and terrifying and too few people seem to have read it. Resource Wars could lay waste to the world before AGW

Karl Naylor

01/12/2009 01:06:56

The banal and highly uneducated Maciej Skiba has warbled off elsewhere, having conceded utter defeat on a previous thread

By reeling off, a bit like a loose wheel falls off a cart and slowly revolves in a pin like direction to the certainty of certain central like centre.

Face it Skiba. You can't compete with me., My argumetts are too stronf. Making you look weaklma nd feble. Admit it

Excuse me. My husband is tired and must go to sleep. I do not care which of the arguments you are having with him, but he is tired and going to sleep now.

He can come back later in Evening but must go to sleep.
Dobra Noc

Unreported News

01/12/2009 08:54:37

That's what you call "independent Poland"?! Under the Soviet domination Poland would never send its troops to Afghanistan.
It's a shame that Polish civil society has been squashed by a regime in Warsaw. No public protests are expected, as ordinary Poles are trying to survive.

Karl Naylor

02/12/2009 15:11:19

Well the wife booted me off the computer for being drunk, Apologies to all for having to read the inebriated drivel that followed on later. I stand by the first comment of course, though. Tsk...

stas

07/12/2009 18:28:48

Soviets killed 1 million there and displaced more than 4 million.
They lost because the country was collapsing behind them, not because of "heroic mujahadeens"
May be this is a way to win there - this time kill 2 millions and displace 8.

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