David Cameron has paved the way for troops to begin coming home from Afghanistan, saying Britain could not be so heavily committed for another five years.
The Prime Minister said the “very exciting prospect for bringing our troops home” was within sight as Afghans began to take control of security, but that the coming months would be critical.
Asked if troops would be home before the next election, he said: “Make no mistake about it, we cannot be there for another five years having been there for effectively nine years already.”
However, he said Britain should have a long-term relationship with Afghanistan “and all sorts of parts of Afghanistan long after the vast bulk of the troops have gone.”
Mr Cameron said he was committed to the timetable of President Obama, to review the current surge at the end of the year. British officials have made clear they would like to see sufficient progress training the Afghan security forces so that the Government can make the case for troops to start coming home when the surge ends next summer.
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Aides travelling with the Prime Minister insisted that he was not setting a deadline or target for the withdrawal of UK troops, or committing himself to a timetable of any kind, which the UK regards as secondary to the development of conditions on the ground.
But his comments give an insight into the way he envisages events unrolling in Afghanistan and suggest he is keen not to go into the next election with an ongoing military presence in the country.
Mr Cameron’s surprise prediction came on the day an influential think tank said Britain’s Armed Forces could lose 30,000 soldiers, sailors and airman over the next four years if the Government decided to cut the defence budget by up to 15 percent.
Discussing Mr Obama’s preference for beginning a drawdown around July next year, Mr Cameron said: “I prefer not to see it in strict timetables.
“I want us to roll up our sleeves and get on with delivering what will bring the success we want, which is not a perfect Afghanistan, but some stability in Afghanistan and the ability for the Afghans themselves to run their country so they can come home.”
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In a separate interview with ITV News, Mr Cameron acknowledged that the British troops can expect tough opposition from the Taleban over the coming months.
“It will be a difficult summer, there is no doubt about that,” said the Prime
Minister.” But (that’s) partly because we are doing so much more with the Americans in Helmand province, with hundreds of thousands of troops rather than the few thousand we used to have and it’s making a big difference. “It will be a difficult summer, but we are getting to a period where parts of Afghanistan can now be run by the Afghans themselves. That is a very exciting prospect for bringing our troops home.”
A revised assessment by the Royal United Services Institute following this week’s emergency budget noted that quick savings are difficult to obtain through ditching expensive equipment programmes, blamed for much of the military’s financial woes. This makes personnel particularly vulnerable even though Britain is at war in Afghanistan.
Professor Malcolm Chalmers, author of the report, said: “It is therefore projected that there may have to be a reduction of around 15 per cent in total Ministry of Defence (MoD) personnel numbers, including cuts of 30,000 in military personnel and 13,000 in the number of MoD-employed civilians.”
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The assessment, “Prognosis for defence spending after Budget 2010”, forecast that total personnel numbers, including military and civilian staff at the MoD, would fall from 283,000 to 240,000.
“If spread proportionately, this would lead to a 30,000 cut in military personnel numbers, together with a reduction in civilian personnel numbers of around 13,000,” said Professor Chalmers.
* The names of four British soldiers who drowned in southern Afghanistan when their armoured vehicle rolled off the road and into a canal were revealed tonight on the eve of Armed Forces Day.
Private Alex Isaac, Private Douglas Niall Halliday and Colour Sergeant Martyn Simon Horton of 1st Battalion The Mercian Regiment and Lance Corporal David Andrew Ramsden from 1st Battalion The Yorkshire Regiment died on Wednesday night as they responded to an incident at a nearby checkpoint. It was the biggest loss of British life in a single incident in Afghanistan since November.