Afghanistan: British Equipment and Training

Lord Marlesford Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

With all respect to the noble Lord, I do not recognise what he describes. I think we are all united in support, admiration and respect for what our troops did, as the noble Lord, Lord Browne, said, within the NATO operation in Afghanistan. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the people who served in Afghanistan—150,000 of them—in particular the 457 who lost their lives and those who sustained life-changing injuries. They have achieved improvements and change in Afghanistan that would not otherwise have been possible and I think we should celebrate that.

[Lord Marlesford (Con)]

My Lords, does the Minister accept the warning from the Times in its “remembering 9/11” leader on Saturday, which concluded:

“America’s wars helped to radicalise a generation of Islamists, whose poisonous ideology has spread across the Middle East to Africa, from where new terrorist franchises plot fresh attacks on the West”?

How are the Government planning to protect our country from the terrorist threat of this poisonous ideology?