Asymmetric Military

The Dutch Army in Afghanistan

I'm not qualified to answer whether they're effective fighters or not. I think effective insurgency fighting is mostly a matter of learning a new set of fighting skills for soldiers and tactics for leaders. A more interesting question is: If the previous sentence is true and some of our allies are still ineffective fighters, are the United States and Great Britain the only Western nations willing to risk the lives of their soldiers, outside of their own soil, to fight their enemies or pursue their interests.

**update. I didn't know about the Canadian sacrifices. God bless them.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has unleashed a storm by criticising NATO forces in southern Afghanistan, saying they are ill-prepared to fight an insurgency.

"I'm worried we have some military forces that don't know how to do counter-insurgency operations," Mr Gates told the Los Angeles Times.

"Most of the European forces, NATO forces, are not trained in counter-insurgency."

Troops mainly from Britain, Canada and the Netherlands are deployed in southern Afghanistan bearing the brunt of a fierce resurgence by the Taliban Islamic militia, which left around 6000 people dead, including some 220 international soldiers.