BRITISH MINISTERS were bracing themselves last night for an increasingly bloody conflict in Afghanistan as it became clear that a further eight British soldiers had been killed in 24 hours, the worst combat death toll since the war began.
Five soldiers were killed in a single incident after they were caught in a bomb blast while on foot patrol. Officials confirmed that 15 British personnel had been killed in the past 10 days.
With the UK government’s handling of the conflict under increasing scrutiny, British prime minister Gordon Brown was forced to defend the Afghan mission as he left the G8 summit in Italy. Before heading directly to a private briefing at the military’s operational headquarters at Northwood, Middlesex, he warned of a “very hard summer . . . It’s not over.”
Speaking at a press conference at L’Aquila before the latest deaths had been announced, with his voice faltering, Mr Brown voiced his sympathy for the families of those who had died.
“There is a chain of terror that runs from the mountains and towns of Afghanistan to the streets of Britain. Our resolution to complete the work we have started is undiminished.”
Bob Ainsworth, the UK defence secretary, said the conflict was “winnable”, but warned there would be no early end to the fighting. “I do believe that we are making progress and I do believe that this is winnable, but it is not winnable in the short term,” he said.
Yesterday began with the confirmation of two deaths in Helmand province the previous day. Later, a third soldier from the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment was confirmed as having been killed yesterday when the Viking armoured vehicle in which he was travelling was hit.
Then there was worse news as it was confirmed that five troops had died and others were injured in a bomb blast.
The deaths took the total number of British fatalities in Afghanistan to 184, five more than the total lost in the Iraq conflict.
As the death toll grew, there were poignant scenes at Wootton Bassett, Wiltshire, in the west of England, yesterday as five coffins draped with the union flag arrived at the Lyneham airforce base.
Bernard Jenkin MP, a member of the House of Commons defence select committee, said: "It is astonishing that we are fighting high-intensity operations the scale of Afghanistan on a peacetime budget without enough protection mobility and with fewer helicopters per head for armed forces than we had three years ago." – ( Guardianservice)