SINGAPORE, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- NATO's future is at stake in Afghanistan, warned Asia's senior statesman, and unless America's European allies abandon appeasement and the United States realizes Afghanistan cannot succeed as a democracy, the world balance of power will shift in favor of Russia and China.

In an exclusive interview with United Press International, Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew, long known as the Kissinger of the orient, took the Europeans to task for balking at casualties in Afghanistan. He blamed "short memories" that have forgotten that "America came to rescue them in two world wars," which has rekindled the "appeasement" of the 1930s.

The United States, said this key player in every major Asian event for almost half a century, "should realize Afghanistan cannot succeed as a democracy. You attempted too much. Let the warlords sort it out in such a way you don't try to build a new state. The British tried and failed. Just make clear if they commit aggression again and offer safe haven to Taliban, they will be punished."

Now known as the "minister mentor" of Singapore, who turned a malarial island into a city of skyscrapers that thinks like a great power and is more important to the global economy than most big countries, Lee fears failure in Afghanistan will alter the world balance of power in favor of China and Russia. These two powers "would be faced with a much weakened West in the ongoing global contest."

Europe's NATO allies have turned a deaf ear to Bush administration requests to send additional troops to bolster the 21,000 U.S. and 20,000 NATO soldiers now in Afghanistan. Canada warned last month it would pull its 2,500 troops out early next year unless NATO agrees to send reinforcements. In Afghanistan last month, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates took the European allies to task for contributing to this rising violence in the fight against the Taliban as some of them "don't know how to do counterinsurgency operations." Hoping to show the example, Gates committed an additional 3,200 troops -- all Marines -- to the Afghan war.