Don't give up, new military chief urges

Sunday, 14 November 2010 12:00 AM

By Alex Stevenson

There is "all to play for" in Afghanistan, the new chief of the defence staff has urged.

General Sir David Richards appealed to the British public not to abandon hope in the nine-year struggle against the Taliban in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph newspaper.

He will lay a wreath at the Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday at 11:00 GMT after the Queen, other senior royal family members and political party leaders have done so.

The last 12 months have seen over 100 of the 343 British fatalities in Afghanistan lose their lives.

Gen Richards told the Sunday Telegraph: "Don't give up folks, it's all to play for."

He said the British public and government had been "guilty of not fully understanding what was at stake" but appeared to acknowledge that a complete victory against the Taliban was impossible.

Instead he invoked the Cold War rhetoric of containment, suggesting the job of Britain's armed forces was to protect the country from the terrorist threat without seeking a decisive confrontation.

"In conventional war, defeat and victory is very clear cut and is symbolised by troops marching into another nation's capital," he explained.

"First of all you have to ask: do we need to defeat it [Islamist militancy] in the sense of a clear cut victory? I would argue that it is unnecessary and would never be achieved.

"But can we contain it to the point that our lives and our children's lives are led securely? I think we can."

Tags:
• defence
,
• foreign policy