Foreign Policy to Afghanistan: In Search of the Lost Course

With the end of the Bundeswehr’s mission in Afghanistan, the focus of the debate is on German foreign and security policy. The opposition is sharply critical of the federal government’s course.

Ralph Brinkhaus is not the only politician these days who is wondering what future foreign and security policy should actually look like. The head of the Union parliamentary group told the “Spiegel” that he sometimes had the feeling that the Germans were responsible for all injustices in the world. What could Germany really achieve? Brinkhaus asks himself symbolically after this almost 20-year mission in Afghanistan, after the Taliban took power again in no time at all.

His CDU colleague, foreign policy expert Johann Wadephul has already drawn a conclusion: “We have to get out of American dependency. The whole situation came about because two American presidents ordered a quick end, and we were helpless. This European helplessness must be terminated. ” According to Wadephul, there must be a willingness within the European framework to “do more” and the Bundeswehr must be appropriately equipped.

New wave of terror in Afghanistan?

The Bundeswehr has now withdrawn from Afghanistan. Only in Uzbekistan is there still a MedEvac aircraft left to take care of the injured. After the attack on Thursday, not only the FDP defense politician Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann feared a new wave of terror: “The situation on the ground is dramatic. Our great concern is that what we have tried to build will be destroyed – and that Afghanistan is becoming a place of terror again. ” The helpers and those in need of protection who remained in the country are now at the mercy of the Taliban.

Jürgen Trittin from the Greens made serious accusations of the federal government on “Welt TV”: “The Taliban were brought into a situation where they can now blackmail us and have taken hostages.” In order for these people to be released, political steps must be taken towards the Taliban.

Future of those left behind unclear

The federal government assumes that there are still around 300 Germans in Afghanistan. According to the Ministry of Defense, Germany has so far taken 5,347 people out of the country – including 500 Germans and 4,000 Afghans. Around 10,000 Afghans are still registered by Germany in the country – either local workers or other people in need of protection – who want to leave.

How it will go on for them is unclear. “I can only tell you that our feeling of responsibility and concern for these people does not end with the airlift,” said government spokesman Steffen Seibert. “Instead, we will try to take the various options, including assistance with leaving the country.”

“Trying to seize”: The people in Germany have obviously understood well what that might mean for the people there. In the latest ZDF political barometer, 57 percent of those surveyed say that Germany is doing too little for local workers in Afghanistan.