Chilcot-style inquiry into Afghanistan ‘unnecessary as conflict was a just one’
THE UK need not conduct a Chilcotstyle full public inquiry into its Afghanistan mission because the campaign was a just war, the head of the Armed Forces has said.
Gen Sir Nick Carter said the two-decade intervention did not face the same controversy as the Iraq War and did not require the same kind of long and costly public investigation.
His comments came after calls for a public inquiry into the campaign which cost billions of pounds and the deaths of 457 British service personnel.
Sir John Chilcot’s seven-year inquiry heard from 150 witnesses and looked at thousands of documents as it probed Tony Blair’s decision to go to war, as well as whether troops were prepared and how the aftermath was handled.
His 12-volume report tore into the planning, preparation and resourcing of the military campaign that left 179 personnel dead, and declared that it ended “a very long way from success”. Earlier this month, Lord Dannatt, a former chief of the general staff, said that now British troops had departed from Afghanistan, “the real audit must begin and a public inquiry along the lines of Chilcot’s into Iraq must be initiated”.
Tobias Ellwood, chairman of the Commons defence committee, has also called for a “a Chilcot-style inquiry so that we can learn the lessons of what went wrong”.
Sir Nick told The Sunday Telegraph: “One has to remember why we had a Chilcot inquiry. As I recall, it was because there were some big questions raised about the justness of the war in Iraq. I don’t think anybody is questioning the true justness of the war in Afghanistan.”
He said the military campaign had been backed by a UN security council resolution and Nato members had invoked the alliance’s mutual defence pact after the 9/11 attacks.
“It was very clear why the international community went to Afghanistan to do what it did and nobody has questioned that. So I think we need to put in perspective the reason why we might have a public inquiry and I don’t think anybody would criticise the decision for people to be involved in Afghanistan.”
While there were “lots of good lessons that can be learned from the way the campaign was conducted”, he said, “I am not sure that necessarily needs to be done as a public and probably very expensive inquiry. Rather I think it should be a sensible, transparent exercise conducted within government.”
The Taliban has swept the Afghan government from dozens of rural districts since Joe Biden announced his troop withdrawal. Sir Nick said the militants had overextended and Afghan forces had consolidated.
He said: “If Kabul stands together in a united fashion and if can they manage to supply the Afghan army and sustain it so they can retain the key provincial capitals, then I don’t think that the rag tag and bobtail effort that is the Taliban insurgency is likely to be able to achieve its effect.”