Word: german
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...election campaign that has been interminably dull, even by German standards, the Sept. 4 missile strike on two oil tankers hijacked by Taliban insurgents in northern Afghanistan was always going to grab attention. The U.S. strike, called in by a German commander worried about the security of his troops, allegedly killed some 90 people, including dozens of civilians. It also reminded German voters that the distinction between supporting a combat mission - which is what they like to think their soldiers are doing - and tackling bad guys directly can blur pretty quickly in the Hindu Kush...
...France and Germany stayed firm on Afghanistan. But public support has fallen over the years, and especially in the past 12 months. An August poll by French daily Le Figaro found that just 36% backed France's military's presence in Afghanistan. In July, a Forsa poll for German magazine Stern found that 61% of Germans want the country's military involvement to end. In Britain, which has 9,000 troops in Afghanistan - the second largest deployment after the U.S. - a recent survey for the National Army Museum found that only 25% favored the mission, compared with 53% opposing...
Mission Creep Nowhere is the task less clear to the average voter than in Germany. Successive German leaders have sold the country's troop deployment as nation-building, not combat. But as the oil-tanker episode proved, mission creep is hard to avoid when the enemy starts attacking you. German involvement in Afghanistan was snuck "past people," Jurgen Trittin, the foreign policy spokesman for the Greens, recently argued. Now, with the Taliban moving into the once peaceful north, where most of Germany's troops are stationed, Germans have to face the fact that their military - a force that...
...workers traded aprons for lederhosen Friday night as the Cambridge Queen’s Head celebrated the German holiday of Oktoberfest...
With posters of stein glasses on the walls and a German brass band playing polka, the Queen’s Head served regional fare—three different kinds of bratwurst, sauerkraut and potato salad...