Limiting the number of British troops sent to Afghanistan to the average number sent by other NATO countries (relative to their population).

Recent Media Mentions: Paul Judge: UK sacrifices in Afghanistan should be brought in line with others

The UK's security depends on its membership of NATO and the Ministry of Defence website states: 'NATO remains the cornerstone of UK defence policy'.  The following table shows the latest available (1st February 2010) number of troops deployed in Afghanistan by all 28 countries of NATO as shown on the website of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) which is run by NATO on behalf of the United Nations:

The table is in the order of the number of troops per million of population.  It can be seen that the UK has the highest number, 154 per million, of any NATO country.  In contrast France, Germany and Italy have a ratio of only 58, 52 and 52 per million respectively.  The average of this ratio for all NATO countries is 62.4 and if the UK moves to this ratio then it will lead to a 60% reduction, about 6,000, in the number of UK troops deployed, saving around £2 billion from the defence contingency budget. These 6,000 would amount to about 7% of the current total NATO forces deployed.  This could be made up by further troops from other countries or by reducing the area covered or the rate of training of the Afghan army.  Professor Malcolm Chalmers of the Royal United Services Institute, the military think-tank, has already said it would be feasible for 'the total size of the commitment to go down to around 5,000 by 2012'.

The table also shows the number of deaths in Afghanistan up to the end of 2009 for troops of the various countries since 2006 when NATO was redeployed.  Tom Coghlan said in The Times in January 2010: 'The force levels now being deployed show the catastrophic miscalculation that was made before the original deployment of 3,300 British soldiers in 2006; with the famous hope of John Reid, the Defence Secretary at the time, that they might leave in three years 'without a shot being fired' '.  It can be seen that at 3.9 deaths per million population, the UK has a death rate slightly higher than Canada and much greater than the US.  The UK death rate per million population is the highest with the exception of Denmark and Estonia, whose forces both suffered from serious isolated incidents, and is more than 10 times that for the troops from Germany, France and Italy.

If there is a threat to the West then every country of NATO should be deploying its troops similarly. However there seems no reason why the UK should provide more than its fair share of troops to the NATO campaign in Afghanistan.  This Proposal will limit the number of UK troops to the NATO average (relative to population) although for operational reasons during handover periods the government would be allowed to exceed this limit by 10% for up to three months.

This Afghanistan policy was shown in a YouGov poll to be supported by 67% of the electorate to 14% against.  There was particularly strong support from females (71%) and from those aged 55+ (75%).

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