The Bundestag’s Afghanistan investigative committee can do German politics a great service – but only if its members resist the temptation to blame their political opponents. The political leaders responsible for the withdrawal and the military evacuation operation are now retired or no longer in the forefront. That is why the committee should not become a political tool of struggle, it was said in unison when it was set up.
However, the chairman Ralf Stegner (SPD) shows that he sees the responsibility for the disaster above all in the Federal Intelligence Service, led by Bruno Kahl, who is close to the CDU, and the Ministry of the Interior, then headed by CSU man Horst Seehofer – before the work has even started. In fact, the interior department certainly did not contribute to the fact that the local staff of German government agencies could be brought to safety quickly and unbureaucratically. And the German foreign intelligence service was in line with the CIA when assessing the different scenarios, but it was still wrong.
Was the assessment of the situation perhaps driven by political preferences?
But the MPs have to ask the urgent question: Why was it, why is it so bad for the forecasting ability of German politics? It was clear to the Foreign Office that the embassy in Kabul would have to be secured differently if the US no longer guarded the Green Zone. At the Department of Defense, officials and soldiers worried about the pull that images of the deduction could cause. Charter flights for local staff were discarded across departments because they did not want to convey the impression of flight or collapse. The Ministry of Economic Cooperation intended to continue development cooperation.
Didn’t the picture come together because the departments didn’t share information? Or rated them differently? Because the people who were in the country weren’t being heard enough? Or was the assessment of the situation perhaps primarily driven by political preferences? These questions arise not only in view of the disaster in Afghanistan. The unanimous mantra in Berlin is that lessons should be learned from the last major foreign assignment in Mali.
In the case of Russia, the Germans were even more blatantly wrong
However, the failure to predict developments is much more blatant and serious when dealing with Russia. Weeks before the invasion of Ukraine, when US intelligence services were treating the invasion as by far the most likely scenario, representatives of all relevant government institutions in Berlin were busy trying to see reasons why an attack on Ukraine would not be in the interests of Russian President Vladimir could be Putin. Once again, people did not want to admit what did not fit the political line.
A similar denial of reality was observed when Putin set himself up as the savior of dictator Bashar al-Assad in Syria and bombed Aleppo and Homs to rubble. In dealings with China – much more important for Germany’s future – economic interests and wishful thinking dominated the perception for a long time. Getting to the bottom of this problem and identifying the structural causes for it must be the aim of the MPs, taking Afghanistan as an example.