So far, the German government is resisting pressure to deploy troops from the relatively calm north of Afghanistan to the war-torn south where British, Canadian and Dutch troops are fighting Taliban insurgents.

Business daily Handelsblatt writes: "The government and parliament have been avoiding foreign military missions that threaten to involve heavy casualties. Our society isn't prepared for it. Under Red-Green (the previous center-left government of Social Democrats and Greens) it got used to foreign missions but only to ones that focused on soft themes such as reconstruction.

"We shouldn't underestimate the value of such missions. If there's anything working in Afghanistan, it's the combination of military security and civil reconstruction. And it's true that Germany has in recent years gained respect because the use of military force isn't a reflex reaction for us.

"A German foreign policy focused on 'soft power' has become a brand which we shouldn't gamble away. Nevertheless we're nearing the point where the military will fight.

"If the lives of German soldiers are being put at risk, Berlin must insist more urgently than it has so far that the overall framework of conflict solution is right. In the arc of crises from the Palestinan Territories through to Iraq and Afghanistan the USA, the biggest Western partner, is too passive towards Israel and one-dimensionally martial in Iraq and Afghanistan. If we agreed to take on the role of military gap-fillers without political influence we would gamble away foreign policy capital without getting better at solving crises."

The Financial Times Deutschland says Germany will have to send troops to the south. "Afghanistan is about to slip out of the West's hands. The German government can continue to hesitate and keep its NATO partners waiting for its domestic political reasons. Or it can face up to reality, recognize the dramatic situation in Afghanistan and start controlling events. It has to convince its partners that it won't only take more troops, but also more money and more involvement to avert the foreseeable debacle in the Hindu Kush. A first step would be to send Bundeswehr units to southern Afghanistan.

Merkel's Government Celebrates First Birthday

It's been one year since Chancellor Angela Merkel came to office at the head of a grand coalition of her conservatives and the center-left Social Democrats. How has she done? Conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes: "There's no mood of celebration on the first anniversary of the grand coalition. There's general disappointment that this alliance didn't use its big majorities in the Bundestag and Bundesrat to achieve great things. Even its members don't deny this. But they never announced gigantic plans in the first place.

"There was no standstill, but nothing revolutionary happened either," adds the paper. "It's easy to call a politics of small steps under-ambitious. But recent decades have shown that a highly developed welfare state topped by a complex federal structure can't just be governed straight from the top down.

"The weight of the grand coalitions' seats has proved to be an optical illusion. Even the chancellor's own party is divided on many issues. "

Bush in Hanoi

US President George W. Bush, in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi for a summit meeting of Pacific Rim countries that belong to APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation), failed to persuade APEC members to make a strong written statement condemning North Korea's nuclear ambitions, although he did get an oral one.

Liberal daily Süddeutsche Zeitung writes: "His appearance in Hanoi -- two weeks after the Republicans' slump in midterm congressional elections -- looked like an escape from his critics. The defensive posture didn't help his bid to underscore American leadership ambitions in Asia.