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8 July 2009 : Column 286WH—continued
I shall concentrate on Helmand, because I believe that what happened there was a great turning point. I am grateful to see here in the Chamber my right hon. Friend the Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Mr. Ingram), who was the Minister answering a debate on this subject in March 2006. I am
not one to attack him or any other Minister, but having gone through the wonderful pack that the Library has prepared for the debate, which gives details of all the debates on this issue in recent years, I see one compelling truth: the Government and the main Opposition have always been wrong in their forecasts, and the critics have nearly always been right.
The intervention in Helmand took place in 2006, at which time the then Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (John Reid), said that he hoped it would last for only three years and that not a shot would be fired. That phrase will be part of our history for a long time. To be fair to him, he pointed out the dangers, but his view was that the British should go there to ensure that reconstruction could take place, and that if there was any shooting to be done, it would be done by the Americans. However, others took a different view at that time. In a 2008 debate on this issue, it was said that what we were doing was as futile and as dangerous as the charge of the Light Brigade. This time it was
Into the valley of the shadow of death
Those words were described as an exaggeration, but we now know that, since Helmand, more people have died there than died in the charge of the Light Brigade. At that time, the war, or intervention, in Afghanistan was going fairly well. Only seven British soldiers had died in five years, and five of those were in accidents, but since Helmand, 176 British lives have been lost. It was said then that we were stirring up a hornets’ nest, and that is what happened, but the Government blundered on, and the lives of our British troops have been sacrificed because of that.
Bob Spink (Castle Point) (Ind): No doubt the hon. Gentleman heard Prime Minister’s questions today; did he notice that the Leader of the House refused to call the engagement a war, and twice called it a mission instead? Would he, like me, feel more comfort if there was a definite, well-planned exit strategy for this war? Does he agree that other NATO countries, particularly our European neighbours, are not sharing their part of the burden in front of the fire?
Paul Flynn: We do not have wars any more; we rarely declare war, so the nomenclature that we use is misleading. But, certainly, by any standards, this is a war. We have always had an excessive share of the burden—quite unreasonably. We are not the policemen of the world, and our young men are not there to be slaughtered in order to correct every injustice that takes place in the world.
I am a member of the Western European Union, and I have spoken about this issue in Hungary and several other countries in Europe, including France and Germany. The view there is that they will not go to Afghanistan to do the dying. They will go there to do police work and
other jobs, but they will not put their young soldiers at risk of being killed in a war that they know to be futile. I think we should accept that view. Some people did not accept that a year ago, but I believe that everyone accepts it now.
In 2006, there were voices—not just politicians’—saying that what was being done would be a calamity, and was a mistake that would rank in British history as having been as bad as Suez and the UK’s decision to join Bush’s war in Iraq. Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, who led 16 Air Assault Brigade in Helmand, before the real trouble began said:
“There is not to my mind an insurgency in Helmand. But we can create one if we want to.”
It was a peaceful area, and we created the insurgency by our presence there in 2006. Ministers sleepwalked into the hornets’ nest of Helmand and changed what was a manageable situation in Afghanistan into one that is now unwinnable.
After eight years, what progress have we made? What is this brave new world of Afghanistan that we are now asking our soldiers to die for? Certainly, there have been advances, for example, worthwhile advances in education, particularly in the education of girls. There is a frail embryo democracy and there has been some reconstruction, but the democracy itself is so frail and fragile that the Economist Intelligence Unit classified it as the 134th least democratic nation out of 167 countries. Progress has been painfully slow.
Corruption—to clean out the state—was one of the reasons that we went in there. Integrity Watch Afghanistan tells us that of the $25 billion given in aid to Afghanistan only $15 billion have been spent and for every $100 that have been spent, only $20 reached the Afghan recipient. However, there has been an extraordinary increase in the number of millionaires and billionaires in Kabul and those two events are connected. Transparency International UK points out that Afghanistan has slipped from being 119th in the international table of corruption to 154th out of 159 countries. So, we have gone backwards in that area.
President Karzai’s half brother, Wali Karzai, is head of Kandahar’s provincial council and is widely believed to be the source of drug trafficking and trade eastward beyond Kandahar. Many people in the Afghan Government and many of the provincial leaders are up to their neck in the drugs trade. What progress have we made in human rights that justifies us calling our young men to go to Afghanistan to die? Karzai refused a pardon to a young man who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for accessing an article on women’s rights on the internet. However, Karzai did pardon a group of young men who were found guilty of gang-raping a 13-year-old girl. Those trials are very rare in Afghanistan because if such a case comes before the courts, it usually means the disgrace of the victim. Yet, he pardoned those who gang-raped a 13-year-old girl. A law to legalise rape in marriage was approved by Karzai in spite of western protests, and a father murdered his daughter for having a passing acquaintance with a NATO soldier. The Afghan Government refused to intervene because it was an honour killing.
The very distinguished woman MP in Afghanistan, who has now been suspended from Parliament, Malalai Joya, visited this country last year to accept a human
rights prize. Her judgment is that the rights of women in Afghanistan now are worse than under the Taliban. Is it really sensible to ask our soldiers to die for those human rights, which are the result of eight years of our presence there?
On drugs, Tony Blair was fond of saying that Afghanistan was a terrible state because 90 per cent. of the drugs on the streets of Britain came from there. I have heard almost every Secretary of State down the years say exactly the same thing. In some years, we have spent £90 million of our taxpayers’ money and in some years, up to £260 million of taxpayers’ money to eradicate drugs. That is British money. We led the field in the elimination of drugs. However, the result is that we have had the three biggest harvests of drugs ever in Afghanistan and the money spent has made no difference. There has been no reduction; the only reduction that takes place is when the price of wheat goes up and there is a higher market for that. The market for heroin is flooded throughout the world. There has been one change as a result of the misuse of taxpayers’ money: the price of heroin on the streets of this capital and every capital in the world has gone down and it is much easier for people to become drug addicts.
When David Loyn recently gave evidence to the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, he said that 60 per cent. of the police in Afghanistan are heroin addicts and virtually all members of the Afghan army use cannabis. Those are our allies in our war against drugs. Afghanistan drug exports are worth £3.4 billion. For a cut of that, the Afghan officials and the police allow free passage along their roads. They allow public land to be used for growing drugs and they protect the drug dealers. The main source of the Taliban’s funding, which is certainly hundreds of millions of dollars, comes from the drug barons. They come to the Taliban and the money is used to buy weapons to attack our troops. Does anyone seriously believe that such an anti-drugs policy can ever change or be successful? Such a policy has failed for everyone during the past eight years—in fact, the money has had no effect whatsoever. The market out there is untouched by our interventions and activities—it is a hopeless cause.
We could all acknowledge that we cannot win by military means in Afghanistan, and that we have to win by persuading the Afghans that we are there for their own good. We need to win the battle for hearts and minds. I have received a reply today from the new Secretary of State for Defence that points out that we do not collect statistics on the number of civilian deaths in Afghanistan. However, as far as we can, we should do that because every one of those deaths is a problem to us and every one of those deaths means a family that is hostile to the mission of NATO. Happily for us, the United Nations calculates that just last year, 826 civilian casualties resulted from NATO activity and 1,160 civilian casualties resulted from the activities of the insurgents. We know that all those deaths are a defeat to us. Will we now learn the lesson—perhaps the Americans have—that hearts and minds cannot be won by bombs and bullets?
Another independent source of information on Afghanistan is UNICEF, which points out the sad fact that hundreds of schools have been closed in the south and that most of the country’s polio cases are in the
same region. Where there is a lack of security, vaccination dives. Afghanistan has the world’s third highest child mortality rate, with 257 in 1,000 children dying before they are five. Only two other nations in the world are worse. Afghanistan also has the world’s second highest maternity mortality rate with around one in eight women dying because of child birth and, according to UN figures, most cases are preventable. Those are horrific pictures. Considering the amount of money—the great tsunami of dollars and pounds that have been poured into the country—things have not got better; in many areas they have got worse.
We have discussed the terrorist threat before, but we need to call on the Government to provide the proof. Where is the evidence that we are protected against terrorist threats in Britain because we are in Afghanistan? I can think of none and I have not seen any produced, but that canard is repeated again and again as if it were a truth. Today it was used as a justification for the loss of seven lives in seven days. I press the Minister to tell us what he thinks the evidence is for that claim, which I am sure will continue to be repeated.
Our present position is very interesting because, just a year ago, there were signs that we would have to adopt a different policy. Exactly a year ago, I was in the Pentagon and I was told by the religious right and the old neo-cons that we will be in Afghanistan for generations. Others said that no invading alien army has ever won a battle against a local insurgency—a very chilling argument to make. The only possible exception is Malaya, but that insurgency did not have any popular support; it just represented a small tribe.
The way that these things go, we are likely to end up with one of two possible outcomes. One is that a deal is done: something happens and negotiations take place which will give us a chance to consolidate and preserve the gains made in education and reconstruction while making concessions on government concerns and the NATO presence. I believe that that is achievable. The alternative is that we run out in the same way the French did from Dien Bien Phu, the Americans did from Saigon and the Russians did from Kabul. In 2001, a fellow member of the Council of Europe, a Russian, slapped me on the back and said, “Ah, you British, you are very clever. You’ve conquered Afghanistan. We Russians did that. It took us six days. We spent billions of roubles there. We had 120,000 troops there. We killed 1 million Afghans and lost 16,000 of our own soldiers. We ran out, and, within a short period, there were 300,000 Mujahedeen around Kabul. It will happen to you.” That was in 2001, and the Russians are now looking at us and saying that we are making the same mistakes as they did.
A year ago, there was hope of drawing in other European states, as the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) suggested. That is gone; it will not happen now. A year ago, our UK ambassador in Kabul, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, stated:
“American strategy is destined to fail”,
and warned that increasing troop levels would serve only to
“identify us even more clearly as an occupying force and multiply the number of targets”.
He urged the presidential candidates not to get bogged down in Afghanistan. America’s top general at the time, Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, said:
“We’re not going to win this war.”
“If the Taliban were prepared to sit on the other side of the table and talk about a political settlement, then that’s precisely the sort of progress that concludes insurgencies like this.”
There are hopeful signs in the election of President Obama. He was committed to the surge by an election promise. On 9 February, an early-day motion was put down in this House pointing out that a surge in troops in Afghanistan would mean a surge in fatalities. It is no comfort to see that the prophecy was accurate; it was certain to happen. We have had the surge of troops, which was based on the conclusion that if a surge worked in Iraq, for very different reasons, it might work in Afghanistan. Politically, President Obama had no choice but to become involved in the surge, but he has done other things that are far more promising—for example, he got rid of his previous NATO supremo and appointed General Stanley McChrystal, who has used words that have never been used before about Afghanistan. He used the word “defeat”, and we must consider the possibility of defeat. No one in America had ever dared to utter such a word, but General McChrystal uttered it, and he is a practical soldier. He used another word that is important to us: “exit”. We must now concentrate not on a perpetual war—a war without end—but on looking for practical ways of getting out. The main reason our soldiers are dying is not the wickedness of the Taliban; they are dying because of our presence in Afghanistan. We should look at previous insurgency wars that have taken place and learn from their results.
As I said earlier, we are at a turning point today and this week. Public opinion will suddenly become aroused. There are exact precedents for that in other parts of the world. We know of the anger that was expressed about our reasons for going to Iraq. There was virtually universal approval of the reason for our going to Afghanistan in the early stages, but, in my view, if there had been a debate and a vote in this House, there would not have been approval for the incursion into Helmand province. That was the disastrous turning point that turned a manageable situation into what we have now: one in which it is impossible to win.
I conclude by paying tribute to the soldiers. I speak as the proud son of a soldier who faced the enemy on many occasions. This House sent those young men and women to Afghanistan. It was our decision, and we should confront it. I was called on Friday by a reporter from the Wales on Sunday newspaper who asked whether I was proud that there were more Welsh troops in Afghanistan than there have been in any British operation since Malaya. I said that, yes, I was proud of their bravery and professionalism, but that I worried that the outcome would be the loss of more Welsh lives.
I recall the words that are on the side of the beautiful Welsh war memorial in Cardiff:
“Dros ei wlad fe rodd ei lw,
Dros fôr fe aeth i farw.”
For his country, he gave his oath, over the sea he went to die. Let us for a moment recall the names of those who went over the sea to die. They all have families and relatives who are now suffering a wound that will never heal. They are: Ben Babington-Browne, Dane Elson, David Dennis, Robert Laws, Rupert Thorneloe, Joshua Hammond, Sean Birchall, Paul Mervis, Robert McLaren, Cyrus Thatcher, Nigel Moffett, Stephen Bolger, Kieron Hill, Robert Martin Richards, Jordan Rossi, Petero
Suesue, Jason Mackie, Mark Lawrence Evison, Ben Ross, Kumar Pun, Adrian Sheldon, Sean Binnie, Tobie Fasfous, Dean Thomas John, Graeme Stiff, Christopher Harkett, Michael Laski, Tom Gaden, Paul Upton, Jamie Gunn, Stephen Kingscott, Darren Smith, Daniel Nield, Richard Robinson, Tom Sawyer, Danny Winter, Travis Mackin, Chris Reed, Liam Elms, Benjamin Whatley, Robert Deering, Stuart Nash, Aaron Lewis, Steven Fellows, Damian Davies, John Manuel, Marc Birch, Tony Evans, Georgie Sparks, Alexander Lucas, Krishnabahadur Dura, Neil David Dunstan, Robert Joseph McKibben, Yubraj Rai, James Munday, Nicky Mason, Jason Lee Rawstron, Gary “Gaz” O’Donnell, Justin James Cupples, Barry Dempsey, Wayne Bland, Peter Joe Cowton, Jonathan Mathews, Kenneth Michael Rowe, Jason Stuart Barnes, James Johnson, Dan Shirley, Michael Norman Williams, Joe John Whittaker, Sarah Bryant, Sean Robert Reeve, Richard Larkin, Paul Stout, James Bateman, Jeff Doherty, Nathan Cuthbertson, Daniel Gamble, Charles David Murray, Dale Gostick, James Thompson, Ratu Sakeasi Babakobau, Robert Pearson, Graham Livingstone, Gary Thompson, John Thornton, David Marsh, Damian Mulvihill, Damian Stephen Lawrence, Darryl Gardiner, Lee Johnson, Jack Sadler, John McDermid, Jake Alderton, Alexis Roberts, Phillip Newman, Brian Tunnicliffe, Ivano Violino, Craig Brelsford, Johan Botha, Damian Wright, Ben Ford, Christopher Bridge, Aaron James McClure, Robert Graham Foster, John Thrumble, David Hicks, Tony Rawson, Michael Jones, Barry Keen, David Atherton, Alex Hawkins, Daryl Hickey, Dave Wilkinson, Sean Dolan, Thomas Wright, Neil Downes, Paul Sandford, Mike Gilyeat, Darren Bonner, Daniel Probyn, George Russell Davey, Simon Davison, Chris Gray, Michael Smith, Benjamin Reddy, Ross Clark, Liam McLaughlin, Scott Summers, Jonathan Holland, Mathew Ford, Thomas Curry, James Dwyer, Richard J. Watson, Jonathan Wigley, Gary Wright, Paul Muirhead, Luke McCulloch, Mark William Wright, Craig O’Donnell, Steven Johnson, Leigh Anthony Mitchelmore, Gareth Rodney Nicholas, Allan James Squires, Steven Swarbrick, Gary Wayne Andrews, Stephen Beattie, Gerard Martin Bell, Adrian Davies, Benjamin James Knight, John Joseph Langton, Gary Paul Quilliam, Oliver Simon Dicketts, Joseph David Windall, Anare Draiva, Jonathan Peter Hetherington, Bryan James Budd, Sean Tansey, Leigh Reeves, Andrew Barrie Cutts, Alex Eida, Ralph Johnson, Ross Nicholls, Damien Jackson, Peter Thorpe, Jabron Hashmi, David Patten, Paul Bartlett, Jim Philippson, Peter Edward Craddock, Mark Cridge, Steven Sherwood, Jonathan Kitulagoda, Robert Busuttil, John Gregory, Darren John George, and a solider who is yet to be named who died yesterday. May they rest in peace.
3.4 pm
Nick Harvey (North Devon) (LD): I begin where the hon. Member for Newport, West (Paul Flynn) finished. He reminded us of the ultimate price paid by so many of our soldiers in Afghanistan. I join him and others in paying tribute to those brave service people who did what they believed in and paid a terrible price for it. I pay tribute to everybody else who has fought in Afghanistan during the eight years that we have been there. I salute their courage, their professionalism and their determined perseverance in difficult circumstances at every twist and turn.
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