Gamble over Afghan retreat

Yet it also shows the fragile nature of any progress being made and the scale of the challenge facing Afghan security forces once the British and Americans pull out.

The Prime Minister also made great play of a further reduction in troop numbers, to be announced today, and there will be few in this country who will not breathe a sigh of relief once Britain finally ends its combat role in 2015, a full 14 years since the start of a war which has become increasingly unpopular on the home front.

It will be a sad epitaph to those years of bravery and sacrifice, however, if this withdrawal proves premature because the Afghan security forces are not ready to hold the line and if the Kabul government collapses, sending the country spiralling back into chaos and conflict.

Indeed, if Afghanistan becomes a failed state yet again, and a breeding-ground for international terrorism, it will be more than merely regrettable, it will be a serious threat to Britain’s national interests.

This is why there is increasing concern on both sides of the Atlantic that the British and American withdrawals are being calibrated to coincide not with the birth of Afghanistan as a viable nation-state but with election dates in the UK and US.

It is right that David Cameron and Barack Obama are looking to bring an end to a conflict which once looked as if it would continue indefinitely, but wholly wrong if they are looking at withdrawal from Afghanistan purely as a headline for their own re-election manifestoes.

No-one is expecting Afghanistan to emerge as a fully functioning, corruption-free Western-style democracy. But it has to have a government strong enough to make rival factions consider joining it rather than undermining it through armed insurgency.

And this will not be achieved by planning Afghanistan’s future according to the electoral timetables of Britain and America.