Con Coughlin

British soldiers on patrol in Sangin, Helmand (Photo: AFP/Getty Images)

It doesn’t matter how we dress it up, the decision to withdraw our forces from the bitterly-contested town of Sangin later this year looks as though we’ve admitted defeat, and are leaving it to the Americans to sort out the mess.

I fully understand the military logic advanced by Dr Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, for the decision, which will see American Marines assume responsibility for Sangin. By moving the 1,000-strong force we have deployed in Sangin to central Helmand – currently 40 Commando Royal Marines – we can increase our force density in central Helmand, which will afford greater protection for the various agencies involved in the reconstruction effort, which is crucial to the country’s future stability.

But it still doesn’t look good. Even… Read More

Don’t be fooled by all the tributes that are pouring out following the death in Beirut  at the weekend of Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, the so-called spiritual leader of the radical Shi’ite Muslim militia Hizbollah. The U.S. State Department’s classifaction of Fadlallah as a terrorist was spot on, and when you look back at his track record you can see he was right up there with other infamous terror masterminds, such as Abu Nidal and Carlos the Jackal.

One of Fadlallah’s last acts before he died was to issue a fatwa authorising the use of suicide bomb attacks. The mystery here is why he waited so long. For as a founder member of Hizbollah – he sat on the organisation’s ruling council – Fadlallah gave his personal approval to the massive suicide truck bomb attacks that levelled the American Embassy and Marine compound in Beirut in 1983, killing more than… Read More

A Pakistani police officer stands guard in Lahore Photo: AP

The devastating suicide bomb attacks on a popular Sufi shrine in Lahore, which have killed at least 42 people and injured more than 200, summon images of the appalling sectarian violence that took place in Iraq at the height of the Iraqi insurgency in 2005-6.

But the obvious difference between Iraq and Pakistan is that the Iraqis were fighting against what they perceived as the American occupation of their country, while the Islamist militants who attacked the Sufi shrine have no such justification. The groups behind this bombing are affiliated to the Pakistani Taliban, and are trying to overthrow the democratically elected government. Many more attacks like this and Pakistan will soon be a country with its own civil war… Read More

William Hague is to be congratulated for his tour de force this morning when he set out the coalition government’s priorities for Foreign Policy. The last time a British Foreign Secretary made such a bold declamation on Britain’s foreign policy goals was Robin Cook’s much-derided ethical foreign policy speech at the start of the Blair era back in 1997. I very much doubt that Mr Hague’s contribution will suffer a similar fate.

Given the straitened economic circumstances in which we live today Mr Hague is to be applauded for the breadth of his foreign policy vision. The big departure from the previous government’s approach to global affairs is that Mr Hague wants much of Britain’s effort in future to be focused on addressing the world’s shifting economic power base.

The emerging economic significance of countries such as China, India and Brazil should be as much a priority for British policy-makers a… Read More

They might not have comprised the most glamorous spy ring the world has ever seen, but the 11 people arrested in the U.S. for spying for Moscow is yet another chilling reminder that modern Russia, for all its protestations to the contrary, is no friend of the West.

Only last week Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian President, received a personal gift of an Iphone 4 from Apple magnate Steve Jobs when, during a visit to Silicon valley, he proclaimed the joys of close commercial cooperation between Russia and America.  No doubt Russian technicians are now busily dismantling the new device to see how best they can copy it profitably for their own companies’ use.

Mr Medvedev might present the happy, smiley face of Russia to the outside world, but only a fool would be taken in by this ploy. In London the Russian Embassy runs as many agents in Britain as it did at… Read More

British Royal Marines fire on the Taliban in Afghanistan (Photo: EBA)

General Sir David Richards, the British Army chief, is spot on when he says talking to the Taliban is the only way to end the conflict in Afghanistan. The Nato mission might enjoy overwhelming military superiority – especially after the arrival of thousands of extra American troops to support the new “surge” strategy – but I doubt there is a single soldier serving in Afghanistan who believes we can win this war by military force alone.

Take the British, who have been fighting for four years in Helmand and are still trying to achieve battlefield superiority. When I first visited Helmand with the Army in the summer of 2006, senior officers estimated there were about 1,000 dedicated Taliban… Read More

I hear disturbing news from my contacts in Lebanon that Hizbollah, the Iranian-backed militia that is committed to Israel’s destruction, is trying to get involved in the Gaza blockade saga.

Much to the consternation of the U.S. and other major world powers, a new fleet of “aid” ships is preparing to mount a fresh challenge to Israel’s maritime blockade of Gaza, which has been imposed, partly, to prevent Iran smuggling arms to Hamas that can be used to attack Israeli residential neighbourhoods. Yesterday the U.S. government issued a statement urging the ships, which are due to set sail from Lebanon for Gaza, to “behave responsibly” and not to provoke the kind of retaliation from Israel that last month resulted in the deaths of nine activists.

Now I hear that Hizbollah has its own plans to get involved in the new flotilla with the sole aim of  heaping further international condemnation on Israel. Incredible though… Read More

President Obama with General Petraeus (R) at the White House today (Photo: AP)

It gives me absolutely no pleasure so say “I told you so”, because I have the highest regard for General Stanley McChrystal who has been an outstanding soldier and a brilliant strategist, particularly in prosecuting the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan (he even captured Saddam Hussein, for God’s sake!).

But my confident prediction in my blog yesterday that President Barack Obama would fire him was drawn from my personal knowledge of the deep-seated tensions that currently exist between the military professionals who are charged with trying to achieve success in Afghanistan, and their political masters who – in London, as well as Washington – are looking for any excuse to pull the plug and withdraw… Read More

Oh dear,  I fear General Stanley McChrystal will be making a one-day trip to Washington after U.S. President Barack Obama summoned him to Washington to explain his less-than-flattering remarks about the Obama administration that are due to appear in this week’s edition of Rolling Stone magazine.

 In the interview Gen McChrystal, the Spartan commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan who survives on one meal and four hours sleep a day (he also jogs eight miles),  says he felt “betrayed” by Karl Eikenberry, the U.S. Ambassador to Kabul, while his senior aides were openly disparaging about Mr Obama and his senior White House officials

Gen McChrystal has already apologised for the remarks, but that has not saved him from Mr Obama’s rage. There are still many misguided souls in this world who still believe that the American president is fundamentally a nice guy, who doesn’t get involved in petty political in-fighting.

Well, they… Read More

The new government has barely been in power a month, but already a bitter battle of wills is taking place between David Cameron and his Defence Minister, Dr Liam Fox. Like most people, I had half expected strains within the coalition over defence and security policy to divide along traditional Tory and Liberal Democrat lines. It is therefore surprising, and somewhat disturbing, that, au contraire, it is two Tory heavyweights who appear to have engaged in mortal combat over how best to handle defence issues.

The background to this unseemly spat dates back to Mr Fox’s failed attempt to claim the leadership of the Conservative Party for himself. Since Mr Cameron emerged victorious in the 2005 leadership contest, Mr Fox has carefully positioned himself as the standard-bearer for disaffected right-wing Tories, an aspiration that he continues to maintain to this day. Not surprisingly, Mr Fox’s obvious political ambition does not play well with… Read More