UK minister blames Obama for dwindling support for Afghan war
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
London, Nov 25, IRNA -- Britain’s Defence Secretary Bob Ainsworth has put part of the blame on US President Barack Obama for the dwindling domestic support for the war in Afghanistan.
Ainsworth publicly criticised the Obama administration for its delay in deciding whether or not to send more troops to the country, suggesting the hesitation made it more difficult to win support for the eight-year old war.
Giving evidence to the parliamentary Defence Select Committee, he also suggested that the rising British death toll and debacle over Afghan elections were also factors that has led to a majority of Britons calling for the withdrawal of UK troops.
"We have suffered a lot of losses; we have had a period of hiatus while (General] McChrystal's plan and his requested uplift has been looked at over a period of some months, and we have had the Afghan elections – which have been far from perfect,” the minister said.
“Let us say – and all of those things have mitigated against our ability to show progress,” he told the all-party committee of MPs on Tuesday.
"The prism through which this is all seen, in the United Kingdom, is the deaths in theatre and that tends to wipe out in the public mind and does damage to people's perceptions of the success that we are having in Afghanistan," Ainsworth said.
Recent opinion polls have shown that most of the British public want an early withdrawal from the war, which has cost the lives of 235 British soldiers, including 98 alone so far this year.
Ainsworth is Britain’s fifth defence secretary since the start of the Afghan war in 2001. Shortly after taking over the post, he warned in July that “both courage and patience” would be needed to succeed against the Taliban.
"More lives will be lost and our resolve is going to be tested,” he warned. The path was “hard and dangerous” and success will be achieved only “incrementally," he said.
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End News / IRNA / News Code 811024
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