Vol. 71/No. 35      September 24, 2007

“I reject … a predetermined exit timetable that would undermine our international obligations, as well as hindering the task of our armed forces,” he told opposition politicians August 27.

Britain has 5,500 troops in Iraq, mostly outside Basra at its airport. The 7,100 British military personnel stationed in Afghanistan will increase to 7,800 by October. Armed forces Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Dannatt said August 28 that Britain was “in a wider conflict that may last for a generation.” He added that the “go first, go fast, go home” course outlined by the British government in 1998 had to be “balanced with a willingness and a structure to ‘go strong and go long.’”

BBC News reported August 31 that bloodshed in Afghanistan is the highest it’s been since the 2001 Anglo-American invasion overthrew the Taliban government. An estimated 4,000 people were killed there in 2006. A quarter of them were civilians.

A 12-hour battle in Musa Qala in late July left 60 Afghans dead. While the imperialist forces claim they were all Taliban fighters, local residents said many were civilians. The Taliban has held the town since British forces withdrew last October after a deal with tribal elders. In early August, 50 Afghans were hospitalized when a U.S.-led air strike hit a marketplace. Further strikes on Musa Qala August 31 killed 24.

To advance the striking power of British imperialism, Brown has decided to construct the largest aircraft carriers Britain has ever put to sea. Security minister Alan West, a former admiral, called the ships “four acres of British sovereign territory that you can move anywhere in the world to project power.”

Meanwhile, tensions between U.S. politicians and two retired British generals have sharpened. Maj. Gen. Timothy Cross and Gen. Michael Jackson both recently criticized U.S. policy in Iraq. Jackson, who headed the British Army during the invasion of Iraq, declared U.S. policy “intellectually bankrupt.”

In late August U.S. presidential advisor Frederick Kagan said that Britain’s “ground forces are too small and are now paying the price.”

The September 2 Sunday Times editorialized that “after 168 deaths the government is lacking the political and military strength to go on sacrificing soldiers in the Basra meat grinder. Better to fight in Afghanistan, where the mission and the enemy are more clear cut.”

But Brown has made clear his government’s commitment to follow through on its course in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“With a new Brown government some people are looking for evidence that our alliance [with the United States] is breaking up,” Foreign Secretary David Miliband told the Times July 16. “There isn’t any, and there won’t be any. Nothing has changed. Our single most important bilateral partner is the USA.”

A week earlier, Miliband refused to rule out military action against Iran. He claimed that Iran “doesn’t have the right to undermine the stability of its neighbours” and said that the United Kingdom would push for a UN resolution to tighten sanctions.
 
 
Related articles:
General: U.S. troops in Iraq for ‘long-term effort’
Troops out of Iraq, Afghanistan now!  
 
 
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