PRIME Minister Brown told MPs in the House of Commons yesterday that British forces are ‘winning the battle against the insurgency’ in Afghanistan.
Using more brave words he added that Britain and its coalition partners were ‘isolating and eliminating the leadership of the Taleban, not negotiating with them’.
Brown was answering the question of Tory leader David Cameron about a press leak that Brown was getting ready to tell the House of Commons that ‘It is time to talk to the Taleban’.
The question was an embarrassing one at a time when Brown was seeking to bask in the glory of the supposed British victory – the retaking of Musa Qala from Taleban forces.
In fact when the puppet Afghan army entered the town, the Taleban had already retreated. The town centre was taken without a shot being fired. This was not totally unexpected since the Taleban would be foolish to try and hold the centre of the small town where they could be bombed into smithereens.
The Taleban intend to return when the British troops leave the area, and retake the town, just as easily as the allied forces recaptured it.
Meanwhile, Helmand province will remain the opium capital of the world, with the British army ‘overseeing’ record opium production – the same opium production which had been banned under the Taleban government of Afghanistan.
Despite all the brave talk about victory, nothing will have changed. British youth will still be poisoned by opium from an area which is ‘overseen’ by the British army!
And the talking will still go on with the Taleban, by Karzai and others, the imperialists and their agents, who are seeking to avoid what their own strategists are predicting – a 30-year-long campaign in Afghanistan.
This is following the example of Iraq. There, the Anglo-US slogan was that there would be no negotiations with Ba’athists or terrorist militias.
Nowdays the Americans are seeking to arm and bribe the Ba’athists into joining the government, while the British army is able to stay at Basra Airport only because it has made a deal with the Mahdi Army.
In fact, Brown was startled at his press conference earlier in the week in Kabul, with puppet president Karzai, when a journalist asked president Karzai point blank, with the whole world watching, to confirm that he was talking to the Taleban including its leader Mullah Omar.
Karzai did not even try and answer the question – he just never heard it.
It also has to be remembered how the Taleban came to be occupying Musa Qala.
It took the town after it was surrendered to them by British forces who could no longer hold it, and had to negotiate a deal with the Taleban so that they would be allowed to leave the town unhindered.
Before the House of Commons debate took place yesterday, a leading British officer in Helmand spoke up on this issue.
Lieutenant Colonel Richard Eaton told the BBC: ‘Ultimately we are in an insurgency here and the solution to an insurgency is a political one.
‘I think there is always scope for negotiations and there will be some members of the Taleban who are reconcilable and there will be some who are not – it’s a question of striking the balance.’
Even in his statement to MPs, Brown urged Karzai to press ahead with political reconciliation talks with Taleban leaders.
The truth of the matter is that the imperialists are not as strong as they are trying to make out, otherwise they would not be talking to the Taleban, or contemplating a 30-year struggle.
All the posing about the so-called heroic taking of Musa Qala is just a comic act to try to disguise the weakness of imperialism.
British workers must call for the withdrawal of all British troops from Afghanistan and work to bring down the Brown government and to replace it with a workers government that will put an end to British capitalism and imperialism.
