NATO’s political will for its mission in Afghanistan is wavering, one of the organization’s top commanders said Monday, citing reluctance from some nations to commit troops to tough combat roles. Army Gen. Bantz Craddock, the head of U.S. European Command and NATO’s supreme allied commander for Europe, said on Monday that worries over increasing violence in the country is hindering progress in tackling insurgents, the drugs trade and corruption.

In a lecture to London’s Royal United Services Institute, a military think tank, Craddock said the decision of some NATO members not to join fierce fighting in southern Afghanistan, and to impose restrictions on the duties their forces can carry out, had exposed the alliance’s failings. “A brief look at the will of our alliance in the mission in Afghanistan demonstrates some real shortcomings,” Craddock said in an address to policymakers. “In view of the more than 70 national operational restrictions — we call them caveats — and our continual inability to fulfill our agreed upon statement of requirements in theater, we are demonstrating a political will that is, in my judgment, sometimes wavering,” he said.

This shouldn't be any surprise. There are very few countries that have showed the intestinal fortitude to actually carry out the required missions while fighting this enemy. It seems like so many are afraid of offending that they forget to actually stand up for them selves. Or maybe they are just plain afraid. With Iraq finally become a stable place in the world (much to the chagrin of our enemies) we are now ready to make the surge into Afghanistan, and we are finding out who our true allies are. Should we continue with the fight in Afghanistan, or just give it back to the Taliban?

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