Dusseldorf, Germany (CNSNews.com) – Germany has been effusively supportive of Barack Obama – opinion polls showed he had the backing of 85 percent of the population – but early signs of strain are showing with Chancellor Angela Merkel. She has warned the president-elect that she will turn down any request for more German troops in Afghanistan.
 
Merkel’s coalition partners in the socialist Social Democratic Party (SPD) are also sounding warning bells. In the build-up to national elections next September, however, the government is downplaying any potential for differences with Obama.
 
Shortly after Obama’s election victory, Merkel had a 10-minute phone conversation with him, and the two agreed to work together to face the world’s problems.
 
“Germany must, should and will take on responsibility,” Merkel promised the president-elect. But days later Merkel altered her emphasis.
 
Referring to Obama’s call during his high-profile visit to Berlin last July for Germany to beef up its role in fighting the Taliban, Merkel told supporters of her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party that Germany would not agree to any request to send troops to southern Afghanistan, where fighting is most intense.
 
Merkel said she would tell Obama this “just as well” as she had told President Bush.
 
Germany provides the third-biggest component in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), but its troops are based only in northern Afghanistan. Other countries – the U.S., Britain, Canada and the Netherlands – have faced the heavy Taliban insurgency in the south.
 
Sending troops to Afghanistan is a sensitive issue among voters here. In a recent poll by the market research company Forsa, 80 percent of respondents said any U.S. requests for more troops should be turned down, while only 15 percent disagreed.
 
When Obama visited Berlin on July 24, more than 200,000 people came to hear his speech at the city’s Victory Column.
 
He drew cheers when he declared, “For the people of Afghanistan, and for our shared security, the work must be done. America cannot do this alone. The Afghan people need our troops and your troops; our support and your support to defeat the Taliban and al-Qaeda, to develop their economy, and to help them rebuild their nation. We have too much at stake to turn back now.”
 
Now, however, German politicians are turning to more immediate concerns. With elections less than a year away, politicians are setting limits on how much support they are prepared to offer the next American president.
 
“The deployment of German soldiers will be decided by the German government and the German parliament, regardless of what requests a future U.S. president may approach us with,” said CDU foreign policy spokesman Eckart von Klaeden.
 
Karsten Voigt, an SPD foreign policy expert, said, “Our partners know that this is politically impossible in Germany, especially during an election year.”
 
Officials already have prepared arguments to put forward in resisting the expected demands:  The German presence has just been increased by 1,000 men to 4,500 troops; the Bundeswehr (armed forces) has sent a rapid deployment force of 200 soldiers that can help out in the south if necessary; and Berlin is prepared to deploy NATO AWACS reconnaissance aircraft to monitor Afghanistan airspace.
 
But while determined not to send additional troops, the governing coalition also is eager to avoid statements that may antagonize Obama.
 
Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier of the SPD, who will challenge Merkel for the chancellorship in next September’s election, told the Hamburger Abendblatt newspaper that Obama “greatly appreciates” German efforts in Afghanistan.
 
“We are very close to Obama on this,” he said. “We will only be successful in Afghanistan if we concentrate on more than just military means.”
 
Steinmeier, who advised former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder when Berlin refused to support the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, is eager to burnish his credentials in the run-up to the election.
 
Given the opinions of pacifist-minded Germans, as borne out in polls, Steinmeier tends to stress non-military solutions – even in dealing with problems like the Taliban’s insurgency.
 
Merkel, too, is keen to emphasize the benefits of nation-building approaches in Afghanistan. Addressing the German Atlantic Society in Berlin on Monday, she said the ISAF mission was a clear example of the security gains that could be made by developing infrastructure alongside fighting militants.
 
Merkel said the only approach that would work in Afghanistan was “networked security,” provided by both military and civilian elements.