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UK Army faces `failure' in Afghanistan

Britain's most senior generals have issued a blunt warning to Prime Minister Gordon Brown that the military campaign in Afghanistan is facing a catastrophic failure, a development that could lead to an Islamist government seizing power in neighboring Pakistan.

Amid fears that London and Washington are taking their eye off Afghanistan as they grapple with Iraq, Britain's generals have told the prime minister's office that the collapse of the government in Afghanistan, headed by President Hamid Karzai, would present a grave threat to the security of Britain.

Peter Inge, the UK's former chief of the defense staff, highlighted the generals' fears in public last week when he warned of a "strategic failure" in Afghanistan.

It is understood that Inge was speaking with the direct authority of the general staff when he made an intervention in a debate in the House of Lords, the Westminster parliament's second chamber.

"The situation in Afghanistan is much worse than many people recognize," Inge told peers. "We need to face up to that issue, the consequence of strategic failure in Afghanistan and what that would mean for NATO ... We need to recognize that the situation -- in my view, and I have recently been in Afghanistan -- is much, much more serious than people want to recognize."

Inge's remarks reflect the fears of serving generals that the government is so overwhelmed by Iraq that it is in danger of losing sight of the threat of failure in Afghanistan.

One source who is familiar with the fears of the senior officers, said: "If you talk privately to the generals they are very, very worried. You heard it in Inge's speech. Inge said we are failing and remember Inge speaks for the generals."

Inge made a point in the Lords of endorsing a speech by Paddy Ashdown, the former Liberal Democrat leader, who painted a bleak picture during the debate. Ashdown said Afghanistan presented a graver threat than Iraq.

"The consequences of failure in Afghanistan are far greater than in Iraq," he said. "If we fail in Afghanistan then Pakistan goes down. The security problems for Britain would be massively multiplied.

"I think you could not then stop a widening regional war that would start off in warlordism but it would become essentially a war in the end between Sunni and Shia right across the Middle East," he said.

Ashdown said two mistakes were being made: a lack of a coordinated military command because of the multinational "hearts and minds" NATO campaign and the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom offensive campaign against the Taliban. There was also insufficient civic support on clean water.

Ashdown warned: "Unless we put this right, unless we have a unitary system of command, we are going to lose. The battle for this is the battle of public opinion. The polls are slipping. Once they go on the slide it is almost impossible to win it back. You can only do it with the support of the local population."

The warnings from Ashdown and the generals will be echoed in a report this week by the all party commons defense select committee. Members of parliament will warn that civilian casualties and efforts to eradicate poppy crops risk turning people toward the Taliban.
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