Afghanistan

Lord Benyon Excerpts

Wednesday 11th February 2015 Westminster Hall

[Richard Benyon (Newbury) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Broadland (Mr Simpson) on securing the debate. I first came across him at Sandhurst, where he was chairing a debate entitled “This house would rather be dead than red.” It being the Army, I was instructed to propose the motion, regardless of my views at the time.

My hon. Friend spoke with his customary knowledge and intelligence about this difficult issue. He quoted the famous German field marshal, Moltke, who said that no plan survives contact with the enemy, and that was certainly the case in the United Kingdom’s foray into Helmand.

Afghanistan remains the monkey on the back of United Kingdom foreign policy. I recall the Father of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell), talking in 2006 about how difficult it would be to succeed in Afghanistan. He quoted historical precedents, and some Members of the House smiled and laughed at that, but my right hon. Friend was right. He was prescient about the morass of conflicting political agendas in that country; indeed, the Pashtun peoples alone comprise 60 major tribes.

Currently, there is an element of historical revisionism being played out between the political and military leaders at the time of the Helmand deployment, with each perhaps seeking to deflect criticism or to deny shortcomings. Some of this occasionally has the unattractive smell of those at the top drawing on circumstances in which commanders on the ground were found wanting, which is regrettable.

To truly understand the decisions that were made, and whether they were right or wrong, we need to take a more sensible approach. My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who spoke so well, and I are on the Defence Committee, which is looking at decision making in defence matters. One of the key decisions we are looking at is the move into Helmand, and I hope the Minister will take our report very seriously, because I think it will inform future operations.

I do not want to stand here like some armchair general and second-guess decisions taken in the teeth of battle. There were difficult decisions to be taken at times, when local Afghan requirements were one thing, the requirements of the international security assistance force and the Afghan Government were another, and the demands of the United Kingdom Government and our constituents were in conflict with both. It is incredibly difficult to assess what happened and what was right or wrong.

However, the first fact of which there should be no doubt—I intend to deal in facts—is that our troops performed magnificently against, in the main, a determined and incorrigible enemy. Like many hon. Members, I have been moved to hear commanders describe with pride how young men and women have performed in the most difficult and testing circumstances. We are told daily in the media about the failings of the young—the PlayStation generation—but we have seen in recent wars how this generation is every bit as brave and resourceful as their grandfathers and great-grandfathers were in a perhaps more heroic age.

One of the groups of men I have in mind is the platoon I once had the honour to command several decades ago—9 Platoon, C Company, in what is now 2 Rifles. In one day, the platoon lost four men, with several more wounded, including the platoon commander. His replacement was severely wounded on his journey to the patrol base to take command. The whole unit was held together by a remarkable man—Platoon Sergeant Moncho. He has since been awarded the conspicuous gallantry cross, and I can do no more than recite a line from his citation:

“His supreme courage in the face of the most testing of circumstances was exemplary and his personal actions steadied all those around him.”

With much of the public and media focus centred on the as yet to be published Chilcot report into Britain’s military endeavours in Iraq, understanding and learning the lessons of a conflict that lasted longer than the first and second world wars combined, and that was Britain’s fourth foray into Afghanistan, should by no means be neglected. It is clear that, between 2004 and 2006, policy makers in Whitehall significantly underestimated the threat posed by the Taliban and the conditions on the ground, which led to the roll-out of inadequate equipment in the early days.

That situation was compounded by huge gaps in our capacity to deliver nation building, and I entirely accept the concerns my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) expressed about that. As a result of opaque directives, the term has now come to be used in a different sense—using an armed force to underpin an enduring transition to democracy, as opposed to making a deliberate effort to construct and install institutions, which was the accepted view before.

What is even more frustrating about this period is that the threats and risks posed in the intelligence picture were clear and present. However, they were misunderstood, ignored or clouded by differences of opinion or conflicting priorities. In 2005, the failure of senior military officials to react to the intelligence picture was exacerbated by the fact that our force was under-resourced and based on best-case and aspirational objectives.

Either the brutal facts were kept from political leaders, or politicians did not ask the right questions. Lord Reid has my respect for pausing the deployment in the early days, but many argue it should have been paused for longer. That was, of course, a double-edged sword, because it allowed the Taliban to organise more determined resistance.

The key point is about the mission. In the Falklands, the mission was simple: to retake the islands. In Afghanistan, one got a different priority depending on which Department, ally or actor in the conflict one spoke to. Put simply, how can one hope to achieve success when success and failure are undefined concepts? Was the mission to defeat the Taliban? Was it to implement an anti-narcotics strategy? Was it to pursue nation building? Was it to introduce education for women or one of the other laudable things that were mentioned in the House? Or was it all of them?

Setting numerous and competing missions, with sub-optimal command and control structures in the UK taskforce, ISAF and the London headquarters, nearly resulted in the campaign failing within the first six months. Those fundamental issues were addressed only following the implementation of a campaign that was redefined with achievable objectives and that saw a surge in Helmand, resulting in a tenfold increase in force levels by 2010. That was supported by structured command and control mechanisms.

Von Clausewitz said war is the continuation of politics by other means. That makes the cessation of war a resumption of politics by normal means. However, nothing is normal in Afghanistan. I supported the Prime Minister’s determination to end our combat role by 2014, for a variety of reasons I will not go into. However, although pulling out by a precisely flagged date may have been a triumph of logistics—I hope those involved in that remarkable piece of logistics are being rewarded—it is questionable whether Afghanistan is ready to survive and progress.

So what are the lessons? Some of the revisionism centres on perceived or actual failings in the chain of command, which meant that commanders on the ground took the wrong tactical decisions, but that is not, in the main, backed up by evidence. Judging by the evidence I have seen and that we in the Defence Committee have seen, the truth is that issues including insufficient resources, ill-thought-through time lines, mission deliverability and the move north were raised from as early as 2005. All politicians and senior military personnel who visited the Helmand taskforce in 2006 received the same briefing with regard to the situation and the huge challenges facing the mission at that time.

The war cannot be viewed in isolation, given the events that unfolded in Iraq, which proved a major distraction with respect to both resources and intellectual analysis—political and military. The hypothesis that the military could deliver its objectives of deploying two medium-sized commitments simultaneously was evidently incorrect.

So what is the main lesson from Afghanistan, besides the obvious one never to be tempted to go there a fifth time? By late 2005, those at the highest levels of government and the military should have asked the strategic question about what we wanted to achieve in Helmand province. They should have had the courage to pause the deployment in advance of the unstoppable momentum, to ensure sufficient resources and appropriate command-and-control structures and measures were in place to achieve deliverable successes. The simple implementation of common sense would have highlighted the fact that better governance, some development objectives and sustainable security were always highly unlikely to be achieved in southern Afghanistan, and that they were never going to be achieved within a set three-year time scale. We forget that that was the time scale.

I look with interest at developing thinking in our armed forces about a smarter, more subtle type of intervention. I think that that is what my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East was referring to in his excellent speech. I applaud the creation of the new 77 Brigade, which I have visited; it is in my constituency. Organisations of that kind will change the way we do warfare—in a way that might actually mean we do not do warfare, because we will achieve different results without using kinetic forces. That is an interesting new development.

I met a young Army officer at a Remembrance day parade. He had a chest full of medals. I said, “You have been busy,” and he replied, “Yes, I have done all of Blair’s wars.” Whether one may refer to them in that way or not, that is the lexicon in the armed forces today. Perhaps we have learned the lessons of “Blair’s wars” and perhaps we have not, but we know that in Afghanistan we undoubtedly paid a heavy price in both blood and treasure.