source: Al Jazeera
A key aide to Bob Ainsworth, the UK defence secretary, has resigned and criticised the UK’s mission in Afghanistan.
Eric Joyce, the now former parliamentary private secretary to Ainsworth, vacated his post on Thursday and said that there were “problems” with the handling of the war that needed “fixing with the greatest urgency“.
“I do not think the public will accept for much longer that our losses can be justified by simply referring to the risk of greater terrorism on our streets,” he said in a resignation letter.
“I think we must be much more direct about the reality that we do punch a long way above our weight, that many of our allies do far too little, and that leaving the field to the United States would mean the end of Nato as a meaningful proposition,” the former army major and legislator said.
He added that it was believed that within Nato, “Britain fights; Germany pays, France calculates; Italy avoids”.
