http://www.flickr.com/photos/rsetia67/4361140382/sizes/l/

It’s been over two tousand years, but the syndrome of Asterix is doing very well and we can see it clearly in our country. We also have soldiers sitting in the fortified camps, but not in North Gaul- France, but in Eastern Afganisthan, who watch that country from proverbial fortifications, peepholes and windows of all means of wheeled transport, that they use to move around. What is interesting, they are not actually the main symptome of that syndrome in Poland. This syndrome is eating through the whole Polish desision-making process, connected with our commitment and its range in Afghanistan.

Syndrome of Astherix is throughout defensive concept, consisting of dispatchig the soldiers on another peace or stabilisation mission and at the same time ignoring the fact, which really makes them go to the war, without the possibilty to lead it or  take part in the “fight with  insurrectionist” in Afghanistan, even if it is very spectacular and on a large scale and does not come down to the kinethic operations.

This is the idea to close the Polish forces in the miliatry bases and hardly peek out, and if so, then only in big, spectacular and well planned actions like “ Eagle Feather”, that can be properly advertised  by the media.

This is the suggestion to the confused society that Polish presence in different stabilisation missions is the part of the way bigger plan, concept, strategy or the doctrine of the national security.

In practice, it is rather rattling off national security by sending the reduced contingents to different parts of the world.

There these contingents embody the  desire of Polish state  to wait for change-over, namely when somone else, mostly USA will make a decision and defite the direction and development of the the particular mission and will define their priorities, which Poland will try to adapt. Meanwhile they are going to wait in their fortifications, on their well secured political positions  not to irritate the Gauls (The Talibs) and Rome ( Washington).

There are no signs that Poland is going to get healed from the syndrome of Astherix, as it is just sending to Asia next hundreds of soldiers, whose presence in the province of Ghazni should mean bigger commitment of our country in Afhganistan. The commitment is getting bigger and bigger, more visible presence on the missions is being counted into the number of soldiers, of which the contingent consist.

Briefly speaking, Polish commitment is defined not by questions starting with how? and what?, but how much, or rather how many (soldiers). This is the expression of  extremely easy logic, which seems to stymulate Polish strategy of national security – the more we are “involved” (which means the more soldiers we send) into different missions under the leadership of the US, the more they will appreciate us as a reliable part of Northatlantic Alliance. Polish contingent of the army in Ghazni and especially its basis, actions, devotion and professionalism are about to guarantee our country respect and favour from the main force of the NATO – the United States of America. Afterwards it may result for instance in bigger supply of Patriots in our country, which means it will sthenghten our bargaining position when it comes to the issue that has the strategic meaning for us, but not necessarily for the US.

Ashamed in the light of that reasoning Americans admit that Poland is an important and somehow special ally and they are about to reorganise their politics in reference to our region of Europe and especially when it comes to Russia for Poland’s sake.

The circle will close and our more and more criticised presence in the province of Ghazni will get totally new sense and meaning, which was to be proved.

In the meantime the reality looks totally different. It is not enough to send the next groups of soldiers and to build the new fortified camps and in accordance with the syndrome of Ashterix – to forbid them to participate in the Afghanistan war. We can not just wait for another decisions of Americans to be made – we have to get our own Afghanistan’s strategy, which was said to be in their last, final phase of preparations at the end of 2009. It is not sufficient to hold Ministry of National Defence responsible for the preparation of the mission and for putting it into practice.

If we decide to send to the different part o the world more than 2500 soldiers, armed and trainded at our expense, who are the instrument of the Polish foreing policy, we  have to have a plan of our presence, policy and actions, which is supported and authorised by the whole gouvernment and all ministeries. The plan, in which an important role would by played by not only the ministeries headed by Klich and Sikorski, but also ministeries headed by Pawlak, Sawicki and Rostowski. In short, we have to get a plan, which would be integrated with new American strategy of colonialism without colonizers, and in which the substance of Polish presence in Ghanzi and its short and long term goals  would be clearly explained.

We can also try to overcome the syndrome of Astherix, because if we assume that our stay in Ghanzi and “meaningful” participation of the Polish army in International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) is pontless, we have to immediately  reduce the number of the soldiers in the country drastically and maximise the quality of the army. By the “quality presence” I mean in here holding and developing co-operation of Polish special forces with their American and British counterparts on the issue of Afghanistan and further investment into the intelligence activities, not only the civil one but also the militar one in the area of Middle East, and South Asia and the Middle East.

Such activities would lead to the impairment of Poland in the coalition with countries from ISAF, in the NATO and in the special, bilateral alliance with the United States, which unfortunately is just a pious wish of our politicians and does not depend on the number of “yeomen” sent to the Ghanzi. “Yeomen” not from the lack of respect for our soldiers, but because we send them mostly to the garrison service under the extreme conditions and such allies America needs less than we think it does. They prefer to get those who act maybe on a smaller scale, but can offer better and more.

It is high time we understood that the speech of Minister Klich saying that the US treats Poland the same way as Egipt or Pakistan, is one of the most incorrect speeches in the history of Poland after 1989.

Not only because we want to be neither Egypt nor Pakistan,  because there is nothnig to be jelaous of as far as they are concerned, but also because we can not try compare ourselves with the most important allies of USA from the regions of the strategic importance. It is good to be aware of the fact that Poland is for the US nothing more but promising regional partner, whose interests often do not exactly overlap these defined by Washington..

The thing is simple – there are only American interests, nothing personal and it is high time to realize that. We could get out of Afghanistan quickly, but we can also try to get certain profits from our stay there. Yes, profits , because it is really hard to find any Polish interests that would demand our presence in that country, for such a long time and in such big number of soliders. Let’s leave for a while the honouring of the allied obligations aside, which nobody will keep for us or our care about the state of Afghanistan. Our potential benefits are deepening and continuing the co-peration between Polish army and their British and American equivalents and spreading of the spy ring  in strategic regions of the world, which means in Middle and South Asia as well as in the Middle East. These are the good things which we can reach and in the futer we can try to trade them for our own interests when it comes to the close neighbours of Poland. For 2500 soldiers from the country with “the syndrome of Atherix” in the province of Ghanzi we will not get anything.