December 12, 2008	Friday	Zilhaj 13, 1429

After more than five-and-a-half years, an end to the British military presence in Iraq is finally in sight. It is a measure of how uncomfortable the government remains about this war that the timetable for withdrawal was slipped out, rather than formally announced as the satisfactory conclusion to a successful mission. If all goes according to plan, the remaining British contingent of 4,000 troops, stationed at Basra airport, will return quietly, in accelerating stages, between March and June next year.Regrettably, this will not be the optimistic return to the Iraqis of the southern part of their country that had once been envisaged. Concern about security in the region remains such that the British will be handing over not to the Iraqi authorities, but to a substantial American force. It is, by all accounts, an arrangement that has had to be painstakingly negotiated with the Americans, and it places Britain among other countries that have withdrawn their troops early under domestic political pressure.

The difference now – and it is a difference – is that the new US president is committed to an early withdrawal of American forces and has been assisted in this by the agreement on the troops’ status concluded recently by the Bush administration and the Iraqi government. Seen in this light, the British withdrawal is just a stage in drawing the foreign occupation of Iraq to a conclusion – however welcome it might be to the many in Britain who fiercely opposed the war, but felt a responsibility, once the war had begun, not to leave Iraq in chaos.

Setting a timetable for the British withdrawal from Iraq, however, cannot be seen in isolation from this country’s other major military commitment. The security situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating. Barack Obama has already undertaken to concentrate US military attention there; it is a war, he says, that must be won. Once he takes office, Britain and other US allies can expect urgent requests for more troops.

Politically, this will create nothing like the dilemma for the prime minister that the Iraq venture presented to Tony Blair. British involvement in Afghanistan enjoyed public support from the start and has never drawn the level of public condemnation the Iraq war did, even as casualties have mounted. The chief purpose of the intervention – to prevent the country once again becoming a failed state and haven for terrorists – was understood, and remains valid, even as attacks on foreign forces have increased and mission creep has set in.

Even if an increase in the troop numbers in Afghanistan is tenable politically, the further question is whether it is feasible militarily. The chief of defence staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, last month expressed opposition to the idea that troops might simply be transferred from one theatre of war to another. Giving the clearest signal to date of military concerns about overstretch and too frequent troop rotations, Sir Jock said it was “crucial” to reduce “the operational tempo” for the armed forces.

It is possible that this week’s notice of a timetable for the Iraq withdrawal is intended not only to herald the end of that venture, but to signal to the military that there will be a pause between the two missions, and so reduce the resistance of the top brass to new deployments. Whatever lies behind the disclosure, everyone concerned – and that includes the troops and the British public – deserves a lot more clarity about the government’s intentions.—Dawn/The Independent