As wars begin to end, arguments about their conduct begin. Such is the case with the
British campaign in Helmand. In a submission to the Foreign Affairs Committee, the former British ambassador in Kabul – and one of the best diplomats of his generation – Sir Sherard
Cowper-Coles blasted the Army:
But his strongest criticism was reserved for the Army’s strategy of seeing Helmand through the prism of the SDSR – looking to save brigades from being cut, not looking primarily to win the war.“Almost by definition, good soldiers are irrepressibly enthusiastic, unquenchably optimistic, fiercely loyal to their service and to their own units within that service, and not especially imaginative.”
Understandably, the military reaction has been swift and furious. The ex-diplomat has been called “maverick,” and General Richard Dannat even said Sir Sherard was “out of his lane.”
But while Sir Sherard is, at times, unorthodox and can be forthright – the idea that he is a “maverick” whose views should be disregarded is absurd. If he was a “maverick” then why did the FCO leadership appoint him to nearly all the top posts in the department – in Israel, Saudi Arabia and then Afghanistan? I’m afraid this criticism won’t wash.
The notion that there are things “outside his lane” is also absurd. Sir Sherard was the UK ambassador in Kabul and then the Special Representative for Afghanistan. To claim that the military effort was somehow outside of his purview is an affront to civilian control of the military and the cross-departmental cooperation that civil-military campaigns, such as that in Helmand, require.
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