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Armchair generals are courting strategic disaster
Robert Fox14 Jul 2009
Pulling British forces out now from Afghanistan would be crazy and dangerous. It would hand victory to the Taliban and make life even worse for the millions of Afghans they prey on.
The advice of the back seat drivers this weekend reached a crescendo. Some of the former military chiefs and ministers among the commentators should know better.
They ignore one of the key principles of contemporary British military practice and doctrine, the concept known as mission command — which as far as I know is being practised highly successful by section, platoon and company commanders in Operation Panther's Claw.
This means that full responsibility for command is devolved to the lowest critical level. The leader of an eight man section has the ability to alter and amend his orders if circumstances change and he has good reason. Under this principle a British corporal can have more responsibility than a captain or major in the US army.
This freedom of command in small fighting units is essential in the close and difficult fighting in the dense vegetation of the lower Helmand Valley. This is really a form of semi-rustic street fighting. Too much co-ordination in street fighting — as British troops found in Belfast in the Seventies — can lead to confusion.
In these circumstances, calls for removal of senior ministers and defence chiefs seem wide of the mark, and it wouldn't make any difference to the present state of the fight in Helmand. On the ground there, British troops appear well commanded by a particularly thoughtful and nimble-minded brigadier, Tim Radford of 19 Light Brigade. Nor is there any indication that Operation Panther's Claw is failing. It has been a tough fight, as the 18 fatalities in 10 days underline.
But they are not an indication of failure as such — reflections to the contrary say more about the excessive sentimentalism of the media than the state of minds and morale in the Army.
Large numbers of Taliban are being killed and their structure and supply bases have been severely depleted.
The biggest problem is the lack of soldiers on the ground — the Army said it needed roughly 10,000 troops on the ground for this summer's operations. The Treasury and No 10 said they could only afford reinforcement to the present 9,000 on a temporary basis. So there haven't been enough troops to hold places such as the market town of Sangin once it has been cleared. The Taliban sneak back and place their bombs — leading directly to the five British deaths there last Friday.
The Government can and should send more troops to Helmand. Then later in the autumn there should be a full review of British policy and concepts of operations in Afghanistan. This should take in the entire record of Labour's schizoid defence, security and foreign policy. Muddling through with second best equipment and resources is no good — particularly as it has left the UK with no assets and reserves for tackling any new strategic emergency — such as the fall-out of another 9/11 or 7/7.
The notion that the indecision of Downing Street and the senior civil service is final is to court real strategic disaster.
