Editor's Foreword

106 ThE MiliTary BalancE 2010
military cohesion. Questions about burden-sharing
are increasing once more as the International
Security Assistance Force (ISAF) becomes visibly
Americanised. The increase in US troops during 2009
has found no European equivalent. As of 1 October
2009, ISAF had a total strength of over 67,000,
including around 32,000 American troops, a number
that was set to rise even higher. Persistent caveats,
interoperability problems and capability shortfalls
suggested that not all allies were willing or able to
make the same kind of contribution in qualitative
terms. Rasmussen repeated an oft-heard mantra
when he said in October that ‘the Alliance is about
sharing security, but that doesn’t just mean sharing
the benefits. It also means sharing the costs and the
risks.’
A general problem for NATO is that the absence
of clearly identifiable progress in Afghanistan, and
rising casualty figures among allied forces, have
begun to undermine the domestic sustainability of
the deployment. For example, the Dutch parliament
voted in early October 2009 that the country’s military
commitment should end in 2010. While this decision
is not binding for the Dutch government, it is
difficult to see how it could be ignored.
Even countries like the United Kingdom, where
overseas deployments have traditionally been relatively
uncontroversial, were not spared an intensifying,
and some might say ‘overdue’, defence debate.
By early 2010, the UK may have increased its deployment
to Helmand province to some 9,500 troops. An
increase of 700, first announced as temporary because
of the Afghan elections in August 2009, was later made
permanent, and plans for a further boost of 500 were
mooted in autumn 2009, though certain conditions
were laid down for this deployment. Furthermore, a
battlegroup previously based in Kabul was due to be
committed to Helmand. The issues of troop deployments
and equipment remained high on the political
agenda throughout the year. As the UK moved into
an election year, debate over the country’s overall
defence priorities grew, especially as the strain on
government finances grew more apparent. Some
questioned whether the UK would have to downscale
its global ambitions in light of the available resources
for defence. While there was cross-party consensus
that security challenges and risks to the UK would not
diminish in the foreseeable future, no major political
party foresaw a budget increase for defence, and all
hinted at necessary, though unspecified, cuts. British
ambitions and capabilities have reached a point of
divergence, and whichever party wins the election,
the government is likely to commission a defence
review in which the overall level of ambition is reassessed
and substantive decisions taken regarding
procurement programmes and processes. As of late
2009, the process was under way for the generation of
a Green Paper that will inform a later defence review.
Given that the last paper was produced in 1998, some
have also argued that this review process should
be placed on a more regular footing, with Bernard
Gray’s report arguing that reviews should take place
‘in the first session of a new parliament’ (see Defence
Economics, p. 109).
General elections on 27 September 2009 in
Germany saw the formation of a centre-right
governing coalition led by incumbent Chancellor
Angela Merkel. With the Social Democrats (SPD)
losing support to a degree unprecedented in post-war
Germany, Merkel was able to end the grand-coalition
arrangement and join forces with her preferred
partner, the Free Democrats (FDP), under the leadership
of Guido Westerwelle. The change of government
is unlikely to have a major impact on Germany’s operational
commitments, and the extension of the country’s
Afghanistan mandate in December 2009 was
expected to be approved with a significant majority
in parliament. However, the structural underfunding
of the German defence budget and the lack of financial
room for manoeuvre made it likely that the new
government would conduct a review of the armed
forces’ structure in 2010 to align it with resources and
procurement priorities.
A significant increase in piracy off the Horn
of Africa prompted increasing involvement of
European navies in an effort to combat this phenomenon
through both the EU and NATO. In March 2009
NATO launched Operation Allied Protector, a maritime
mission to counter piracy and armed robbery off
the Horn of Africa, involving vessels from NATO’s
Standing Maritime Group 1, which in turn was
replaced by Operation Ocean Shield in August 2009.
The EU began its anti-piracy activities on 19
September 2008 when it set up a military coordination
cell, EUNAVCO, in the secretariat of the EU Council
to organise a response to incidents of piracy and to
protect maritime trade. EUNAVCO was to mobilise
EU member states and organise escort slots. Its duties
were taken over by Operation Atalanta, the first EU
naval operation, which was launched in December
2008. In June 2009 the EU Council extended Atalanta’s
mandate by another year to December 2010. Personnel