30 September 2010 By Robert Stevens On September 20, the last 1,000 remaining UK troops
withdrew from Sangin, southern Afghanistan. After more
than four years, they handed over control of their
bases to the United States. The withdrawal is officially presented as merely
redeployment, with the troops, part of an overall
total British force of 9,500 in Afghanistan, being
sent to the central Helmand province. But nothing can
gloss over the fact that Britain has suffered a major
defeat. This is not, as sections of the media claim,
merely because Sangin has become a “training ground”
for the Taliban. Britain’s armed forces were driven
out as occupiers by a determined, popular insurgency. That is why the Daily Mail acknowledged,
“Senior military officials are desperate for it not to
be seen as an admission of defeat or a retreat after
the fiercest fighting for British soldiers since the
Second World War.” The withdrawal underscores the criminal destruction
of life as a result of this dirty, imperialist war.
Media reports paint a devastating picture of the
situation that has faced the troops, year after year.
By the time of their departure, 104 British soldiers,
almost a third of the 337 British soldiers killed in
Afghanistan, died in and around this small town. Under the headline, “Sangin: at last we’re leaving
hell”, the Daily Express noted in addition
that in the first four-and-a-half years since the 2001
invasion of Afghanistan, five British soldiers were
killed. The vast majority have died since early 2006
and the redeployment of British troops to Helmand. In
April a report in the London Times stated
that more than 10 percent of the daily casualties
suffered by occupation forces were being taken by the
UK 3 Rifles Battle Group in Sangin, even though the
group represented only 0.8 percent of the total NATO
force in Afghanistan. The British Army was under attack, even as the
handover ceremony took place, with the Daily Mail
reporting “fierce fire-fights...just 800 metres from
the main base in the district centre”. As could be expected, politicians and the media had
nothing to say about the thousands of Afghans who have
been killed or injured. Instead, Prime Minister David
Cameron took pains to insist that, “The soldiers who
lost their lives in Sangin did not die in vain”. Such statements only demonstrate that, behind their
rhetoric about supporting “our boys”, the ruling elite
have nothing but contempt for those they have sent to
die in Afghanistan. Cameron believes their deaths are
a price worth paying, but he cannot tell the truth
about why this is. The Afghan invasion was sold to the British and
American people on the basis of a pack of lies.
Presented as part of the war “against terrorism” in
the aftermath of 9/11, it was supposed to eliminate
the regime harbouring Osama Bin Laden and providing
the main base of operations for Al Qaeda. US military
and intelligence officials have subsequently admitted
that there were less than 100 Al Qaeda members in all
of Afghanistan. The occupation was then supposed to
bring about democracy by deposing the Taliban. Instead
it resulted in the installation of the despised puppet
regime of Hamid Karzai, which is defended by US
military force and presides over unspeakable
conditions for the masses of people. In reality, the occupation of Afghanistan has been
carried out on the basis of the predatory
geo-strategic aims of Washington and London and was
planned before the destruction of the Twin Towers
provided the necessary pretext. For the US, the issue
at stake, as with the later war against Iraq, was to
establish its control of the entire “Eurasian” region
and above all else the majority of the world’s oil and
gas reserves located in the Middle East and Central
Asia. Britain both hoped to secure a share in the
spoils, while trading on its political and military
alliance to project its own interests on a global
scale and offset the challenge of its European rivals
Germany and France. Twice now, the cost associated with this has forced
a humiliating military retreat on Britain, first in
the southern Iraqi city of Basra, and now in Sangin.
The Independent acknowledged last week, “The
British could, theoretically, have divested themselves
of Sangin, and the losses which came with it, earlier.
But here a sensitive chapter in Anglo-American
relations came into play. There is little doubt that
senior officers in the US military were critical of
the way UK forces conducted themselves towards the end
of their deployment in Iraq...and then withdrawing
altogether when Washington was requesting that they
stay on”. The British withdrawal, despite official claims to
the contrary, has occasioned bitterness and
recriminations from the US Army. Ultimately, this only
signifies that Britain’s travails are also a political
setback for Washington. Britain was the only force
maintaining the pretence of an independent military
role in the occupation. The abandonment of this
posture means that today, more than ever, this is
America’s war. In addition, claims that US control over Sangin
will result in a strengthening of overall control of
the region are without foundation. Describing the
enormous popular opposition awaiting the US, the
Daily Telegraph grimly predicted, “Sangin
handover: only the nationalities on the tombstones
will change”. The US faces a deteriorating military and security
situation throughout Afghanistan and rising opposition
to the war at home. These were the conditions under
which the Obama administration announced the
30,000-troop surge into the country last December, in
an attempt to drown the resistance in blood. But
despite this, the US has been unable to quell the
massive resistance. With the September 21 deaths of
nine US troops in a helicopter crash in Zabul
province, southern Afghanistan, 2010 became the
deadliest year for NATO forces since the 2001
invasion. At least 529 NATO troops have been killed so
far this year. Meanwhile, sections of the US military are becoming
more vocal in their opposition to a “phased
withdrawal” of troops beginning in July 2011, which is
President Barack Obama’s official aim. According to a September 21 Wall Street Journal
article, senior military heads are “seeking to lower
expectations of rapid progress in Afghanistan” and
forecast “few new significant gains in the war before
the end of the year”. The Journal continued
that rather than withdrawing “entire battalions or
brigades”, the draw-down will focus on “thinning out”
front-line troops and sending home small company-size
units. The Afghan occupation is a foul venture based on
the brutal subjugation of an impoverished nation of
fewer than 30 million people. Regardless of the
conduct of this or that soldier, whether heroic or
base, the military and political elites are guilty of
an unspeakable crime. Working people internationally
must demand an end to the war and the immediate
withdrawal of all US, British and other foreign
troops. Those who planned and executed this war of
plunder should be brought before a war crimes tribunal
and the court of world public opinion. Comments 💬 التعليقات |