Campaign is casualty of war of words

"Coming in the wake of last week's empty-handed Operation Snipe, it appears the Royal Marines' latest attempts to capture or kill enemy holdouts in eastern Afghanistan is a bust as well."

This is not the remark of some disgruntled Bootneck from Arbroath at the latest failure of 45 Commando to close with the enemy in Afghanistan, but from the Stars And Stripes, the newspaper and main bulletin of the US Armed Forces.

To use a stockbroking term, US reporters based at Bagram airbase are accusing the British of issuing a false prospectus about their efforts to flush out al Qaeda and Taliban strongholds. Last Friday several hundred Royal Marines were reported to be "in contact with the enemy". By Sunday this was denied and anonymous sources purporting to be from the Ministry of Defence were reported by the Sunday Telegraph to be saying that Brigadier Roger Lane, the Royal Marines' commander, was "out of his depth" and "should be sacked".

Following a ringing endorsement for the brigadier by the Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon, it turned out the brigadier is to leave his post when the Royal Marines' operation ends next month. No, it wasn't a sacking, because the move had been gazetted at the end of February, a fortnight before 45 Commando deployed.

However, some marine officers admit privately that the brigadier might have "over-pitched things" in his presentations to the media. At an exclusive press briefing for a few selected correspondents yesterday, the brigadier's immediate operational commander, Lt General John Reith, Commander Joint Operations, put on record his admiration for Brigadier Lane's military abilities, but did not mark so high some of his media handling.

In the wake of the incident senior officers and politicians - the Prime Minister included - are trying to flick away the traces of flying mud. But some of that mud is beginning to stick with colleagues and allies, and it is the mud of the false hopes and prospectus raised by the hyping of British claims and policies in Afghanistan.

So what happens next? Many in Britain believe that the bulk of British troops should be brought home from Afghanistan rather than blundering around arid passes and empty cave complexes with most of the enemy across the border in Pakistan and no doubt happy to be there.

At the behest of the spin-men, we seem to be in danger of breaking one of the oldest maxims in the military handbook - don't reinforce failure. But withdrawal from Afghanistan is unthinkable in the long-term as this will merely prove a further invitation for al Qaeda and Taliban to rebuild their base there for exporting terrorism across the world.

However, the directors of spin, with their focus on short-term publicity gains, must now declare what Britain and its allies' long-term interests in the region really are, and what realistically we could do about it. Furthermore, they must spell out the options to the public of what the next phase in a truly longterm counter-terrorist campaign will be, and what we should all be expected to pay for it.