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Defence Policy

The short answer is yes, and we continue to go around that discussion with some of our allies and the rest of NATO. We have been having that debate for some time. Who can turn up to do what? Will they turn up, and if so, when, and when will they pay for it? Rightly in a sense, the United States is saying, "Well, that's what we think we are doing. If we are going to do something that is comprehensive, we need assistance as well." The fact that the United States is saying that is useful and long overdue. It is saying, "We need help." It is beginning to recognise that there is no monopoly of decision making about such issues either in Washington or London, or in any one place. My hon. Friend is quite right: an international contribution will make the difference. I noticed that the Secretary of State talked about security space and then about reconciliation, which is absolutely key. I noticed that the shadow Secretary of State talked about auxiliary forces. We need to have a careful discussion about how we do such things. There was a misunderstanding in the United States—some of it was still there when we spoke to people last week—about what the surge in Iraq was all about. Apparently, it was all about sending all those extra troops. As we were quite rightly told today, it was not just about that, but about a combination of activities that came together at the right time, and opportunities were taken. Mostly, however, it was about local people making a different determination about their political and security future and deciding to enter the discussion differently. Local concerned citizens and organisations were involved. We still have a difficult argument about whether we were arming insurgents and stacking up another problem for the future. We cannot solve all problems at the same time. After all, it is their country and their future. That is the other side of the argument, and that is the debate with the Afghans themselves in a sense. I do not think that they shy of that—the ones to whom I have spoken are not shy of it—but they are wary of how it is done and who is doing it for them. At the end of the day, the right questions were asked about our expectations. Afghanistan will not look like either New Hampshire or Hampshire, and there will be difficult, long-term work. To those in America who told me, "Oh, we're done with Iraq now," I said, "Really? I don't think so." These are generational issues; they will last for some time. We will have to deal with the situation in the area for generations to come, as we have done for generations past. We do that well; we do it badly. I do not say that Obama should make a decision tomorrow. Clearly, given his own political imperatives, he will have to make a decision before Thanksgiving, because that is the way that the political clock turns in America. The decision may well come before the NATO Ministers' meeting next weekend—I do not know—but it will come sometime soon because the opportunities are clearly perishable on the ground in Afghanistan. We are all stuck with the fact that the Afghans have a voice as well. We might not like their election or its result. We certainly do not like some of the people who probably participated in the election. That is not the point. We have asked them to engage in a process. In an odd, negative way, the Taliban were very actively engaged in that process and produced a result that no one seemed to expect. The security for the election took the form that we all hoped it would—there was not great bloodshed—but the election was not something that people looked to. There is an elephant in the room all the time. When I go to Afghanistan, I talk to Afghans as best as I can in those circumstances, and they know that they have traditional ways of doing things that do not fit. This is not just about the imposition of Jeffersonian democracy; they have helped to build a construct in respect of their political solution, and it will not endure. At some point, it must be reformed, and we must find a way to do so that involves them and lets them come to their solution. It might not be one that we like, but if it has resilience and fulfils our other requirements of giving them security, allowing girls to go to school, letting the Afghans say, "We can be part of the international community in a proper way," giving us confidence that we have security and contributing to the broader geographical solution that is required in the area, it will be what we have to accept. We cannot say that we will dictate what is success, but we need to develop that understanding and those tools to understand what success for us might be. I have concerns about the Territorials. We saw the field hospital from Wales at Camp Bastion when we visited last year. Major Andy Morris is a good friend of mine, from my local community and involved in the mountain rescue team—all the things that go to make up a good TA man. He contributes to the whole community, as well as to the military. Those are the people whom we need to protect, and I am not sure that the decision to curtail training is correct.