Afghanistan: Is Australia Looking for a Way Out?

DefenseNews.com reported October 21 that Australia is looking to end its military operations in Afghanistan in the very near future, even as the United States and Great Britain are talking about increasing troop levels for the fight against the Taliban and remnants of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda.

While Australia has not announced a date for withdrawal of its military forces from Afghanistan, the defense minister, John Faulkner, is cited as saying that his country was studying how it could wrap up its military mission in the "shortest time-frame possible." Faulkner is quoted as saying, "I've certainly asked the Australian Defence Force for any recommendations they have about ensuring we do complete that important role and responsibility both effectively, but in the shortest time-frame possible."

The story says, "Faulkner admitted Australia's move would affect the push by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, for an Iraq-style troop 'surge' against the increasingly powerful Taliban militia. 'I've been discussing these issues with the chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, and obviously it's a critically important matter for me,' he said. 'I'm not going to talk specifically about the approaches we'll take but I do acknowledge that there will be impacts on the approach that NATO and ISAF partners will be taking as a result of General McChrystal's 60-day assessment.'"

Personally, I think more U.S. allies are going to follow suit, and the pace with which they do so will probably accelerate if the United States signals in even the slightest way that it will not stay in Afghanistan for the decade or more (on top of the 8 years already invested) it will take to stabilize the former Taliban and al Qaeda stronghold. At least one analyst, Clive Williams of Macquarie University's Centre for Policing Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism, thinks this may be a ploy to keep the United States from asking Australia for more troops, rather than a real plan for getting out of Afghanistan. Williams is quoted as saying, "We can't leave before the Americans do, therefore we're pretty much locked into an American timetable. If we started to draw down prematurely, they wouldn't appreciate that." The theory has some merit, since Australia has been one of the U.S.'s staunchest allies in Afghanistan.

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