Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Paul Flynn Excerpts

Tuesday 17th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

The professionalism, valour and courage of our soldiers who have served in Afghanistan and those serving there now are as distinguished as any in our long military history. Some of our allies have already decided to withdraw their troops. They are not the nations that were not enthusiastic about the war, but those that have paid huge costs in blood and treasure. Canada withdrew its combat troops after a debate in its Parliament that was supported by every party. The Netherlands has also done so, and we now know that Australia and France intend to bring their troops home early.

The United Kingdom has lost 422 troops, and we have spent £20 billion, but that is only part of the cost. We must also take into account the number of troops who return from Afghanistan broken in body and in mind. Figures from America show that more of its veterans from Afghanistan take their lives after combat than die in combat. The same applied to our figures from the Falklands war. We know that the dying will continue.

A case in Pembrokeshire involved a soldier who had suffered grievously in Afghanistan. His death is not counted among the 422 casualties, however. In Afghanistan, he was shot twice and involved in two separate incidents involving improvised explosive devices, but his loved ones explained that the experience that haunted him was holding his best friend, who had lost a number of limbs in an explosion, and watching as the life retreated from his eyes. It was that experience that drove him to take his own life.

There are powerful reasons for saying that we are continuing to order soldiers to risk their lives for the cause in Afghanistan, but I do not believe that a case can be made for doing so any more. A recent briefing said that we needed to get all our equipment out of Afghanistan at enormous cost, because we did not want to see the Taliban riding round in British tanks in five years’ time. However, having gone into Afghanistan when it was ruled by the Taliban and engaged in a civil war, the likelihood is that, by the time we leave, there will be another civil war and that it will be ruled by the Taliban once again.

For 10 years, we have heard optimism being expressed by all Governments, along with exaggerations of success and dismissals of the failures that mounted up, year after year. It was not necessarily a mistake to go there, although no British interests were threatened in 2001. It was, however, a terrible mistake to go into Helmand province. In our first five years in Afghanistan, only two of our soldiers died. Then, we provocatively stirred up the hornets’ nest in Helmand, in the foolish and mistaken belief that not a shot would be fired. Our operations in Helmand were described in the House at the time as being as futile as the charge of the Light Brigade, but we have now lost three times as many troops in Helmand as were lost in that charge.

It is a dereliction of duty for the House not to debate the withdrawal of our troops from Afghanistan. We know that the people of this country are strongly in favour of such a withdrawal. In a recent by-election, a candidate from a minority party with only one policy—withdrawal from Afghanistan—gained 56% of the votes and humiliated all the other parties. We also know that 80% of the public want our troops to withdraw now, yet we are being distracted by the bread and circuses of all the events taking place this year, and we cannot find a moment in our parliamentary diary to discuss whether we should bring our troops home before we reach the point that Senator Kerry described when he was an officer in Vietnam in the final days of that war. He spoke of asking the agonising question: who will be the last soldier that I will order to die for a politician’s mistake?