Daniel Korski

Do you know what your MEP is up to?

One of the major forces driving the public’s reaction to the expenses scandal has been the feeling that we, the voters, simply don’t know what our elected representatives are up to. But this goes well beyond claims for moats, bathplugs and so on. We the electorate actually know very little about what our MPs do.

Celebrating Marcel

Around the world workers are celebrating 1st of May. I too will be celebrating, but for different reasons. Today Marcel Rayman – my first cousin twice removed – would have turned 86. Born in Warsaw, he moved to France aged eight. A studious boy, he finished his exams in record time and went to work

Honouring the soldiers

This morning, while most of London rushed to work, a few hundred soldiers stood silently in the scorching sun of the Iraqi desert, as the names of their fallen comrades were read out. All 234 of them; 179 British and 46 allied soldiers. The Reverend Paschal Hanrahan led the prayers and said something which I

Deputy Sheriff Brown Unveils AfPak strategy

Yesterday Gordon Brown told the House about the UK’s new “AfPak” strategy, laying out what can best be seen as a companion piece to the US strategy unveiled by Barack Obama a few weeks ago. (Notice how the US took six pages to say what the UK needs 32 pages for). Britain will boost troop

Conway of Tehran

Where do disgraced Tory politicians go? Neil Hamilton hit the pantomime circuit, starring as the rear end of a horse. After serving half of his sentence in HMP Hollesley Bay for perjury and perverting the course of justice, Jeffery Archer has returned to book-writing. Jonathan Aitken, the disgraced former Cabinet minister who served a prison

The West needs to stop being taken for a ride by China

Over the last twenty years, Western leaders have believed that engaging China would help shape Beijing’s policies. When China cooperated, the West engaged. When China became obstructionist, the West engaged some more. This failure to push for genuinely reciprocal engagement has, as my think-tank colleagues John Fox and Francois Godement argue, allowed China to take

Mitchell takes on the pirates

One of the more frequent charges against the Tory frontbench is that it lacks depth and breadth. Once you have played your Cameron, Osborne, Hague and Gove there is not much left in the hand. Or so the argument goes. Yet, to my mind, this argument was always overdone and – as the Brown government

NATO’s new man at the helm

Danish PM Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s bid to succeed Dutchman Jaap de Hoop Scheffer as head of NATO finally succeeded at yesterday’s summit.  Up until the last minute, the Turks were refusing to sanction his appointment because of his refusal to apologise for a Danish newspaper publishing those Muhammad cartoons.   The Danish press is full

Leaving behind an uncertain Afghanistan

I am now leaving Afghanistan, heading towards the glitzy skyline of Dubai where many Afghan warlords have built holiday homes alongside their narcotecture in Kabul. I finished my trip with a visit to Afghan Defence Minister Wardak and US General Richard P. Formica, who heads something called CSTC-A, the US operation charged with building the

The tragedy of Afghanistan is that the Taliban has a better co-ordinated political and military strategy than we do

Two words that are repeated everywhere you go in Afghanistan are “comprehensive” and “integrated”. The thinking is that the international community must act in a comprehensive and integrated manner, ensuring that military and civilian activity work together. From the NATO commander’s intent down to every visitor’s presentation, these words are repeated ad nauseam. Even President

How the Germans can makes themselves useful in Afghanistan

I am in the north of Afghanistan today, visiting the German troops stationed here. Their camp is the most immaculate headquarters I have seen in this dust-covered country. The German office in charge of ISAF’s northern flank, Brigadier Jurg Volmer is focused and knowledgeable. He is keen to impress upon his visitors how much his

Karzai is no longer part of the solution in Afghanistan

Kabul Hamid Karzai has been steadily losing international support. It started last year when the Afghan leader scuppered the appointment of Paddy Ashdown to head the UN operation in Afghanistan. Then came a few choice leaks from Richard Holbrooke, criticizing Karzai, while Vice-President Joe Biden is said to have stormed out of a meting with

The three Talibans

Stereotyping the Taliban is easy. The toppled Taliban Emirate was misogynist and repressive. Then, like now, its leadership partnered with Al Qaeda and acquiesced to Osama Bin Laden’s murderous programme. Then, like now, it committed horrific crimes on and off the battlefield, including ethnic massacres and teenage-cide. Faced with this kind of medieval barbarism, stereotyping

The problems with a larger Afghan security force

Kabul They look very impressive, marching around a rain-soaked square while their US-trained Master Sergeant sends a punishing salvo of parade instructions their way. These new recruits in the Afghan army represent Afghanistan’s proudest post-2001 achievement. I spoke to dozens of them from all of Afghanistan’s ethnic groups, saw their commander and watched several live-fire

Dealing with the drugs problem in Afghanistan

Kabul It took two hours of briefing by a senior NATO commander in Kabul before the issue of drugs came up. And it only came up when I asked. The US officer immediately began talking about the links between the insurgency and the drugs trade. NATO estimates that between 150 and 400 million US dollars

Paving the way for a civilian surge in Afghanistan

Kabul After an adventurous journey from the Emirates—which seemed to include our pilot getting lost on the runway at Dubai airport—I have finally landed in Kabul. In Kabul, I attended briefings by General McKiernan, the commander of the almost 70,000 NATO troops now deployed, and his closest staff. Everyone here seemed to be saying the

Can you ever beat insurgents?

Counter-insurgency is a complicated thing. It used to be easy to tell whether you were winning a war. Either the enemy was retreating or you were. In counter-insurgency, things are more blurred. Some say you are winning if the insurgents take on asymmetric techniques – road-side bombings, assassinations, suicide bombings. Others argue that counter-insurgency has

Obama’s “mini surge”

President Obama’s decision to deploy 12,000 more combat forces and 5,000 support personnel to the Afghan mission has drawn huge attention. USA Today’s front-page headline blares “Obama’s war: Deploying 17,000, the president raises the stakes in Afghanistan.” But the US soldiers were already planned to rotate into the theatre and, though the White House is

Learning the Basra lesson

With a heavy heart, it may be time to acknowledge that the challenge in Helmand seems too hard for the British to carry alone. The UK might have great soldier there led by a fine commander, Brigadier Gordon Messenger, and as someone who worked out there I have huge respect for those deployed in the

Who knows what Afghans think?

The political class loves polls. They tell them — or at least they think they tell them — what the public think. The hunger for polling data has now spread to post-conflict situations. Want to know how things are going in Afghanistan? Commission a poll. So this week David Miliband has been hitting the airwaves