BERLIN, Feb. 23 (UPI) -- Germany will not agree to a U.S. proposal for a strategy change in Afghanistan, where the Taliban are preparing to escalate attacks with a spring offensive.
In light of the critical security situation and because of the expected Taliban offensive, U.S. National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley had called for abolishing the partition of the country in five zones, so that the troops of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force could be quickly moved depending on where they are needed, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper said Friday.
Such plans have been dismissed by officials in Berlin as "nonsense," the newspaper said. The German government sees Hadley's proposal as a move to add pressure on NATO countries to do more in Afghanistan.
Germany, for example, has some 3,000 soldiers stationed exclusively in the relatively stable north and has in the past refused to change that mandate. The United States, Canada and Britain, among others, are taking heavy damage in the south and would like to see more sharing of the burden.
The military expert of the German Social Democrats, Rainer Arnold, said the partition in five zones makes sense and should not be altered.
"To give up regional commands doesn't make sense also because we have to establish a close link between military and civil efforts in cooperation with the local players," he told online daily Netzeitung.
