Blood, empire and peace in Afghanistan

Afghanistan has been the scene for some of Britain's greatest military disasters over the last century and a half. It prompted the poet of empire Rudyard Kipling to write:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains
And the women come out to cut up what remains
Just roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
And go to your gawd like a soldier"

George Galloway with singer Annie Lennox, Tony Benn and Bianca Jagger on Stop the War's Gaza demonstration 10 January 2009

Bitter and sardonic. But horrifically prophetic.

This is a war that some of us argued should not be fought eight years ago. For many others, however, it was the good war - in contrast to Iraq. Now, the national mood is turning. And no wonder.

As I write, the British death toll stands at 213 in the wake of what looks increasingly like a botched and unnecessary rescue mission of a journalist.

Less commented on is the reason the journalist was in that part of Afghanistan. He was investigating the deaths of scores of Afghans incinerated when NATO forces bombed two petrol tankers in their village.

It says everything for the contempt the occupying powers have for the people whose country it is that no-one seemed to have been worried about the inevitable consequence of blowing up several tons of petroleum in a populated area.

The issue is a growing scandal in Germany, where the party opposed to the Afghan mission, Die Linke, may do very well at the general election in two weeks, not least on account of that position.

Public opinion in Britain is turning too despite attempts by the government to cynically exploit the grief of the relatives of the British fallen. A clear and growing majority of people want either immediate withdrawal or the running down of troop numbers and a clear date for getting out.

So great is the shift in mood that the Tories and Liberal Democrats - who both continue to support the war - are engaging in all sorts of contortions to appear detached from the government.

David Cameron says the farcical Afghan elections should be rerun. The leader of the Liberal Democrats - not Vince Cable, the other one... you know, what'shisname - with little logic and great indecision says that the results are so flawed that there should be a second round to complete the process.

Their main difference with Gordon Brown seems to be that they favour a Carlton Browne of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office approach to the colonials rather than the delusions of Tony Blair's liberal imperialism.

All of this means, however, that the once-forgotten war and hidden casualties are fast becoming a central feature of British politics and of the unravelling of Brown's premiership. The field, therefore, must not be left to the likes of Liam Fox and leader-writers in the Sun to set the parameters of the national debate.

The coalition built by the anti-war movement needs to make itself heard. The Stop the War demonstration called for October 24 deserves the widest possible support. It is to be the springboard for a varied and imaginative campaign to exploit the cracking of the Establishment consensus on the war and create the political pressure to get out.

The lead-up to the demonstration will see rallies and meetings in towns and cities across Britain, especially in areas of high military recruitment.

The trade unions are an important part of the broad anti-war coalition. They may be asked this month to support a motion on withdrawal from Afghanistan at the Labour Party conference. I hope they do. Leaving aside the inherent justice of the position, it is just one of the policy reversals that, however unlikely, are the only realistic way in which Labour can stem Cameron's Old Etonian tide.

And whatever the machinations in the Labour hierarchy, there's every reason to believe that many MPs can be pressured into coming out against the war.

George Galloway is Respect MP for the Bethnal Green and Bow constituency. He is the initiator of the Viva Palestina convoy which collects aid for distribution in Gaza, which is under draconian Israeli seige. The second Viva Palestina convoy leaves Britain for Gaza on 5 December 2009.

Demonstrate: Troops Home Now
Saturday 24 October Central London
Marking the eighth anniversary of the invasion