GERMANY'S RELUCTANT WARRIORS

摘要

For the first timein three generations, Germany is embroiled in deadly combat, with 4,200 Bundeswehr troops deployed in an increasingly unstable Afghanistan. Just don't mention it: with national elections looming on Sept. 27, German politicians from Chancellor Angela Merkel on down have scrupulously avoided the W word, preferring euphemisms like "stabilization deployment." But that game got harder to play on Sept. 4, when an airstrike ordered by a Bundeswehr commander in Kunduz killed scores of Taliban and their supporters. It was easily the deadliest incident involving the German military since World War Ⅱ.