General Stanley McChrystal: Enough fighting – so let's try talking to the Taleban

Published on Monday 25 January 2010 21:46

NATO'S top commander in Afghanistan has raised the prospect of a negotiated peace with the Taleban.

Ahead of a major London conference on the future of the country, US general Stanley McChrystal said there had been "enough fighting" and that he wanted to see a political solution to the long-running conflict.

His comments came as another British soldier from 3rd Battalion The Rifles died in Helmand province – the 251st British military death since the Afghan campaign started in 2001.

Gen McChrystal used a newspaper interview to say that members of the Taleban could play a role in governing the country.

He said: "As a soldier, my feeling is that there's been enough fighting and that what we need to do – all of us – is to do the fighting necessary to shape conditions where people can get on with their lives, and everybody can make a decision where fighting's not the direction that it needs to go in.

"I believe a political solution to all conflicts is the inevitable outcome. It's the right outcome."

His view was supported by General David Petraeus, the head of the US Central Command, who said: "The concept of reconciliation, of talks between senior Afghan officials and senior Taleban or other insurgent leaders, perhaps involving some Pakistani officials as well, is another possibility."

Gen McChrystal said there was a "huge rank and file" in the Taleban that saw al-Qaeda as "essentially something from which they get no value and a tremendous amount of pain". He added: "It's not my job to extend olive branches, but it is my job to help set conditions where people in the right positions can have options on the way forward."

The general has secured an extra 30,000 US troops and several thousand more from Nato countries to provide more security in the country. On Sunday, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the Afghan government needed to bring the Taleban into the political system, saying the "vast bulk" of those labelled as members of the Taleban were not linked to al-Qaeda.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown is hosting the London conference on Afghanistan, which starts on Thursday and is being attended by countries with troops in the country as well as Afghan and United Nations leaders.

Meanwhile, British and other Nato troops are to launch an offensive to take back areas of southern Afghanistan, it emerged yesterday.

Major General Nick Carter, the British general in charge of forces there, said that the operation would "assert the control" of the Afghan government in parts of Helmand province now controlled by the Taleban.

He said: "Helmand is very much a work in progress, with parts simply ungoverned. If they're governed at all, it's by parallel governments provided often by the Taleban."

He added: "If we're going to win the argument on behalf of the Afghan government … then we need to assert the government's control over those areas which are, at the moment, ungoverned."

He declined to say when the joint Nato/Afghan army operation would begin. It is expected to include parts of central Helmand that have not been under Afghan central government control for months, or in some cases years.

He said there were signs that Afghans in the area were taking a greater role in operations.

'NEED TO WIN MORE PUBLIC SUPPORT'

A FORMER colonel with the British Parachute regiment has criticised the British government for failing to counter the "body-bag syndrome".

Stuart Tootal, who led a battalion in Afghanistan, said Westminster and the MoD must make improved efforts to win over public support.

Col Tootal, now a defence commentator and author, said: "The body-bag syndrome will start to have a very negative effect.

"We are clear what we are trying to achieve. That may not be articulated publicly to the best of the (British] government's ability.

"They need to explain the rationale of being in Afghanistan, what we are trying to achieve and how we are going to achieve it in a way that makes sense to the people of this country.

"If we lose in Afghanistan, the reason will not be on the dusty plains of Helmand or Kandahar, but in the capitals Washington and London, a la Vietnam