NEW YORK, Dec. 14 (UPI) -- The European allies' decision to send an additional 7,000 troops to Afghanistan is welcome but falls short of the needs there, The New York Times says.
"Afghanistan is not and should not be just the United States' fight," the Times said in an editorial. "Al-Qaida has used its sanctuaries in Afghanistan and Pakistan to plot and launch attacks on European cities.
"We welcome the news that some of America's 42 military partners in Afghanistan plan to send more troops," the editorial said. But it added sending the additional 7,000 troops "falls short of what is needed and has too many casualty-limiting caveats attached."
The newspaper said NATO has never shouldered its share of the burden of the Afghan mission and that "it is unfair to the American people, who are being asked to make disproportionate sacrifices for what is, emphatically, a common fight."
In fact, the editorial said, almost 2,000 of the additional troops will actually come from countries outside the NATO alliance, including Australia, South Korea, Sweden and aspiring alliance members Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia and Montenegro.
And the editorial noted more than half of the new NATO troops will come from just three member states: Britain, whose force will increase to 10,000; Italy, which will go to roughly 4,000; and Poland, which will total 2,800.
Neither France, which has 3,750 troops in Afghanistan, nor Germany, with roughly 4,300, has agreed to send additional troops, the editorial said.
