Finally, the book sets out my conviction that the Afghanistan project can be brought to a successful conclusion, but only once America is prepared to talk direct to its enemies, and then to devote unprecedented political and diplomatic resources to leading an international effort to devise and deliver an internal and regional political process. Whether the American Republic is confident enough to do that remains an open question. There must be doubts too about whether America will be willing properly to finish the job, now that the demon who first drew us into Afghanistan – Osama bin Laden – has finally been exorcised. And it may well be that the moment for negotiating a well-ordered exit from Afghanistan for NATO forces has passed, as the political pressure mounts for having our troops leave the battlefield by the end of 2014 more or less regardless of conditions on the ground.
None of this is to say that military success won’t be achieved or proclaimed. Nor that a political framework for withdrawal won’t in the end be negotiated, in something of a rush, to meet Western not Eastern timelines. But, without the West taking the initiative, it risks being suboptimal and, in the great sweep of Afghan history, short lived. In time historians may point to the parallels with earlier imperial scuttles, with the baneful consequences of which the world is still living.
Inevitably, the book is written from the perspective of a diplomat, based in Kabul, and then in London, over three years from 2007. It does not cover the tragic diversion of attention and then resources from Afghanistan to Iraq from 2002, or the British Government’s fateful decision to take on Helmand in 2006. It is not about the ground war in Helmand. It focuses on the means diplomats and their political bosses use to understand and influence. It describes the work of an embassy and an envoy, in circumstances that were highly unusual in many respects, but typical in many others. What made the Embassy in Kabul different was that we were operating in a war zone, alongside and in support of a massive military effort. But the work of reporting and analysis, of entertaining and influencing contacts, of international consultation and co-ordination, resembled normal diplomacy in other capitals around the world. In Kabul, however, it mattered more than it did in most places.
In putting this story into print, I have had no access to the extensive records I lodged in London of almost every significant official interaction I had over more than three years. Instead, I have relied on memory, and on four daily lines of scribble in a rough and ready diary, telling me where I was, but not what I was really doing or thinking. The book does not therefore pretend to be a full or authoritative account of what happened: rather it is a reflection of my evolving understanding of what we were doing in and to Afghanistan, and of what Afghanistan was doing to us.
As a former official, I asked myself whether publishing an account of my experiences so soon after I had left the public service was consistent with my obligations to my former employer. But Diplomatic Service Regulations state that ‘The FCO welcomes debate on foreign policy … The FCO recognises that there is a public interest in allowing former officials to write accounts of their time in government. These contributions can help public understanding and debate … there is no ban on former members of the Diplomatic Service writing their memoirs … but obligations of confidentiality remain …’
What is at stake in Afghanistan is not trivial. It is not an issue of ideology. Nor is it a question of political allegiance. It goes deeper than diplomatic nicety, and beyond the pride of individuals or institutions. Few aspects of this story are truly confidential. It is a war in which the West has invested vast quantities of blood and treasure – and reputation. After nearly a decade of conflict, getting it as right as is now possible is a major national interest, for us, for America, for our allies and, above all, for millions of wretched Afghans who have suffered too much and for too long.
So if, in its small way, this book helps us correct some of the mistakes, of both strategy and tactics, that we may be making, it may do some good.
PART I
BEGINNINGS
If the task is arduous, the mission is noble.
President de Gaulle’s sole instruction to the new Government Delegate in Algiers, November 1960
Chapter 1
An Offer I Couldn’t Refuse
Monday 30 October 2006 – the Ambassador’s Office, British Embassy, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: I was sitting sleepily at my desk after lunch, catching up on reading. I had returned only the night before from a family holiday in Egypt. My secretary came in: could I have an urgent word on the secure phone with a senior official in London?
Of course I could, I said, wondering with the usual mixture of excitement and dread what this could be about. The silky tones of the senior official soon cut to the chase. ‘Ministers’ had decided to upgrade Britain’s civilian effort in Afghanistan, to try to keep pace with the huge increase in military resources being pumped into Helmand. They thought that I was the right person to take charge of what would become one of the largest and most unusual British diplomatic missions in the world. There had been pressure from the British military for a ‘heavy hitter’ to be sent as ambassador. I would be working on the standard terms of six weeks on, two weeks off. I would see more of my family than if I remained in Saudi Arabia to complete my tour there. I would go to Kabul for a year or so to start with, but, naturally, it was hoped I would stay for longer. The whole thing was still very secret (hence the secure line), not least because the incumbent in Kabul had not been told. Was I interested? Like the fool I am when flattered, I said of course I was interested. I would need to talk this over with my wife, but I knew this was just the sort of challenge I relished. The senior official sounded relieved. London would be back in touch in due course. In the meantime, not a word to anyone – apart of course from my immediate family.
Weeks, and then months, passed without my hearing anything more. I wondered if I had been dreaming, or if the senior official had changed his mind – as he was prone to do on personnel matters. I managed to persuade a worried family that this early move made professional sense. I had already completed three of the four years I had been due to spend in Saudi Arabia. Privately, I thought, without being too pompous, that much of my career had helped prepare me for this. I had been opposed to the invasion of Iraq. But I had believed that we had had little alternative to joining the Americans in toppling the Taliban from power in Kabul in October 2001, when in the wake of 9/11 they had refused to hand over Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants. Like President Obama and many others, I had an instinctive sense that Afghanistan was the good campaign (in 2006 it was not yet evident that it was a full-scale war), in which much had been achieved for the long-suffering people of Afghanistan.
Moreover, I knew the job would involve working with the military. Ever since as a small boy I had manoeuvred my battalions of Britain’s toy soldiers around the sandpit at home, I had been interested in matters military. I enjoyed dealing with soldiers. I knew their jargon, and admired their can-do style. I was in awe of their confidence and efficiency. And, at least since I had followed the great counter-insurgency campaigns of the 1950s and 1960s (Malaya, Algeria, Aden, Northern Ireland, Vietnam above all) through the pages of the Illustrated London News my grandmother had sent me each week, I had been interested in strategy and tactics. I had read widely about counter-insurgency. At Oxford, my best subject had been Roman military history. My favourite historians were those great chroniclers of ancient wars, Tacitus and Thucydides.
At least as important, my years in different parts of Arabia, and my fluent but flawed Arabic, had given me a sense of what mattered in the Muslim world and made it move. Working in a part of the Islamic world where people prayed in Arabic, but spoke or thought in other languages, had enormous attractions – especially one with as much history and geography as Afghanistan and the North West Frontier of Imperial India.
But what really decided me was a sense that, unlike so many British ambassadorships, this