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Afghanistan: Provincial Reconstruction Teams

My Lords, I, too, congratulate and thank the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, for securing this important debate. I welcome the noble Lord in his new appointment. I hope that he listens very closely to the words spoken tonight, not least those spoken by the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown. The situation in Afghanistan is much worse than many people recognise. We need to face up to that issue, the consequences of strategic failure in Afghanistan and what that would mean for NATO. I will focus down for a minute and talk about the importance of the hearts and minds campaign, which is not just about PRTs or NGOs, but about putting the co-ordinated effort together. The newspapers and the media coverage inevitably tend to concentrate on the operational situation and not the overall situation. It is also difficult in a four-minute speech to pay full justice to the part played by the PRTs and the success that they have achieved. It is important to remember that the PRTs cannot work in isolation and nor can the NGOs. They must work within the overall campaign plan. They must be part of that plan. The importance of their role must be recognised, and in return they must be team players. In saying that, I am in no way criticising their bravery or their commitment. Indeed, it would make the whole thing much easier if the various NATO nations involved in Afghanistan had the same rules of engagement and did not have too many national caveats, which there are the moment and which makes the task of the general that much more difficult. Having said that, I do not see how you can make any real progress in Afghanistan and have a credible hearts and minds campaign while we still do not know what to do about the poppy crop. Here, I share many of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson. To me, this seems to be a very major weakness in our overall strategic plan. We need decisions and a comprehensive plan as a matter of the utmost urgency. It must involve all the key players, not only the military. Having said all that about the poppy crop, I also believe that we should look very closely at what the Senlis plan proposes and buy the poppy crop for medical purposes, because we seem to have no other option on the table at the moment. I recognise that this will not be easy, and it will be a major challenge both to police it and to administer it, but further delay will only increase our problems on the ground. I also know that it will mean challenging the warlords and the smugglers, which is bound to have security implications. It must involve intimately the Government in Kabul. At present, I sense tension in the relationship between the security forces on one hand and the PRTs and NGOs on the other. If we do not put that relationship on a better footing, we will make our task in Afghanistan all that much more difficult. I stress the point that was made all too clearly by the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, that we need to recognise that the situation—in my view, and I have recently been in Afghanistan—is much, much more serious than people want to recognise.