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Scandal Rocks Bundeswehr
// Photos Damage the Image of the German Army in Afghanistan
The winds of scandal are brewing in Germany in connection with the actions of several German soldiers from the NATO coalition in Afghanistan. The German newspaper Bild recently published photographs taken by soldiers who appear to have desecrated Afghan graves, and the resulting scandal could seriously damage the image of the German peacekeepers in Afghanistan. The publication of the pictures came almost immediately after the German government supported a program proposing a more active role for German troops in operations beyond the country's borders for the first time since the Second World War.
The five amateur photographs published in Bild on Wednesday were taken in 2003. They show soldiers in the German Bundeswehr from the NATO coalition in Afghanistan smiling as they pose before the camera with a human skull in their hands, sometimes accompanied by obscene gestures.
The publication of the pictures provoked a storm of emotion in Germany, where anything that evokes negative associations with WWII is an extremely tender subject. The mood is all the more anguished since journalists have discovered that the soldiers shown in the pictures are from a Bavarian rifle unit that is considered the cream of the German army. At the time the photographs were taken, they had been in Afghanistan for no more than a few weeks.
The identities of the soldiers have already been established. One of them, according a report from the radio station Deutschlandfunk, has admitted to taking part in the crime. Four of the soldiers are no longer serving in the army, but they still face up to three years in prison under an article in German law that forbids "desecrating graves and committing outrages against corpses."
The American and British armies, which take part in many operations abroad, have also weathered such scandals in recent years, but German soldiers in the modern German army have never before been implicated in such events. The government of Afghanistan yesterday accused the soldiers of "an outrage against Islamic values and a lack of respect for the Afghan tragedy." Kabul demanded that the guilty parties be severely punished and that everything possible be done to ensure that nothing of the kind would ever happen again. "Nothing can justify that kind of behavior," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and the German Bundestag unanimously condemned the soldiers' acts. NATO General Secretary Jan de Hoop Scheffer called the events "absolutely unacceptable."
The most extreme line on the incident was taken by German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung, who has already promised that the soldiers who are implicated in the scandal will be made to bear the consequences of their actions. "Those who behave themselves in such a manner have no place in the Bundeswehr," declared the minister. Mr. Jung stressed, however, that he considers what happened in Afghanistan to be "an isolated incident." He explained that the German army has a special program that prepares German soldiers to be deployed on peacekeeping missions in the Muslim world. The first thing that they are taught in the program is respect for the religious sentiments of the local population. Mr. Jung has promised to review the training program.
Local observers suggest that the Afghanistan photographs may undermine the reputation of the Bundeswehr. "Such unforgivable actions damage the reputation of the Bundeswehr and of our country as a whole," said German Foreign Affairs Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier. Those most tainted by the scandal, however, are the 3,000 German soldiers stationed in Afghanistan as part of international peacekeeping operations. Until now, they have enjoyed good standing in the country, and German government officials maintain that the local population does not see the German soldiers as "occupying forces."
The training and discipline of the German army go a long way towards explaining the relatively low number of casualties suffered by the Bundeswehr in Afghanistan. Since the beginning of the operations there (in the fall of 2001), the German army has lost 18 soldiers, while the American army has lost more than 300. But now it is possible that attitudes towards the German contingent in Afghanistan will change. It is only a matter of time before the photographs published by Bild make their way to Afghanistan. Experts have no doubt that the Taliban leadership opposing the NATO forces in the country will circulate the scandalous photographs and attempt to squeeze as much useful propaganda from them as possible. The scandal is also fair game for Islamists in countries other than Afghanistan. In any case, Bild confirmed that the German Foreign Affairs Ministry has already told German embassies in Muslim countries to take increased security measures in case of terrorist acts.
The scandal became public at a most inopportune time for the German government. Last Wednesday, Angela Merkel's cabinet put forth a program outlining the country's foreign policy for the next several years. Among the foreign policy priorities listed in the document, tasks such as fighting international terrorism and promulgating respect for human rights throughout the world appear for the first time. Experts maintain that the new document gives the green light to more active participation by the German army in peacekeeping operations outside Germany. More than 9,000 German soldiers are already serving in ""hot spots" around the world.
The political opposition had criticized the new foreign policy even before the scandalous photographs appeared, and criticism continues to mount. The German army is already met with an uneasy reception in some countries in the world in connection with the events of World War II. Berlin has spent enormous amounts of energy and funds on changing that stereotype. But many commentators are suggesting that all that work on a new image for the Bundeswehr may now go down the drain.
Tim Tsyuverink (Berlin)
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 27, 2006
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