among the 46 alliance nations
President Obama’s Afghanistan plan envisages a “conditions-based”
chinastart on American withdrawals starting in July 2011.
At a news conference with Mr. Gates on Tuesday, Dr. Fox he said the first question he had asked when he became defense minister was, “Should we be in Afghanistan?”
“I’ve seen the human costs to our armed forces themselves and the sacrifices that they’re making, and when I did ask the question, the answer had to be ‘yes,’ of course,” he said. “I believe that we cannot afford Afghanistan to lapse back into a failed state.”
The renewed British commitment was expected. Mr. Cameron and Mr. Fox are Conservatives, who strongly supported the British role in Afghanistan when the party was in opposition, before they joined the left-of-center Liberal Democrats in a coalition after the inconclusive May 6 general election. The Conservatives’ differences with the former Labour government, which committed 10,000 British troops to the war, second only among the 46 alliance nations to the United States, with about 94,000 troops deployed, centered less on whether the war should be fought than on whether the British troops have been adequately equipped.
American officials regard a bolstering of Britain’s support as important at a time when many European countries with troops in Afghanistan, including Britain and Germany, are committed to sharp budget cuts in defense as part of their drive to reduce huge government deficits. With Britain reaffirming its backing for the Afghanistan effort, the American hope is that other European nations will now be hesitant to back out.
Mr. Gates said in London that he hoped the European allies would follow the Pentagon’s example in seeking $100 billion in spending cuts by reducing overhead costs and spending on new weapons programs. “I would hope that our allies, before they consider force structure reductions, and reductions
china more broadly in capabilities, will look overall at how they spend their money,” he said.
阅读(103) | 评论(0) | 转发(0) |
