Afghanistan (NATO Strategy)

Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Justice – in the House of Commons at 12:32 pm on 18 September 2012.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of John Baron John Baron Conservative, Basildon and Billericay 12:32, 18 September 2012

May I thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting the urgent question?

At the very least there is confusion with regard to this issue. A NATO statement has made it clear that joint on-the-ground operations have been suspended until further notice. The decision announced in Afghanistan by General Allen has appeared to take the UK Government by surprise. Only yesterday, in Parliament, the Defence Secretary was rightly defending NATO’s continued work with Afghan troops on the ground. When did the Government know of this decision, and were they consulted on the matter?

This announcement threatens to blow a hole in our stated exit strategy, which is heavily reliant on these joint operations continuing until Afghan forces are able to operate independently and provide their own security following ISAF’s withdrawal. As a soldier myself, I know the real value of mentoring—coaching and training—at ground level, and there is no substitute for that. Anything else above battalion level is very much theory. If these operations are not going to take place at ground level, where does that leave our exit strategy? Will our soldiers be coming home early? The announcement adds to the uncertainty as to whether Afghan forces will have the ability to keep an undefeated Taliban at bay once NATO forces have left.

This, in a way, goes to the very heart of what our mission is in Afghanistan. For those of us who opposed our involvement in Afghanistan, there appears to have been confusion from the start. Al-Qaeda was driven from the country in the early stages. The mission has now morphed into one of nation building, human rights and democracy. Laudable though those aims are, they are very different from our original mission. I suggest that we need to be clear about this. Last week, the International Development Secretary talked of nation building. At the same time, the Defence Secretary, when visiting troops in Afghanistan, talked, rightly in my view, about it being wrong to risk the lives of our troops for nation building when they should only protect our vital national security interests. The importance of that distinction is that nation building requires defeat of the Taliban, whereas protecting our national security interests in preventing al-Qaeda from returning does not necessarily require their defeat, given their differences with al-Qaeda.

What is our mission in Afghanistan? Clarity is required. If we are remaining true to our original mission of eliminating al-Qaeda from Afghanistan, should we not now be doing more to encourage the Americans to conduct non-conditional talks with the Taliban in order to explore possible common ground?