Spectator debate: ‘We must quit Afghanistan now’

Chair – Andrew Neil
Proposing – Correlli Barnett, Simon Jenkins
Opposing – Charles Guthrie, Andrew Roberts

Farce very nearly visited the debate on Afghanistan on Tuesday. A parliamentary three-line whip prevented the MPs Liam Fox and Peter Kilfoyle from reaching the hall. So our ancient democracy threatened a debate on Afghanistan’s brand new one. The issue that kept them in parliament? Democratic reform.

Correlli Barnett proposed the motion and lamented that America’s ‘panic and rage’ had precipitated the war after 9/11. Accepting the consequences of retreat would be bolder than propping up the ‘posturing clown’ Hamid Karzai. We should leave by September. Rapid evacuations were achievable, he said, and cited Britain’s short-order withdrawals from Palestine and India in the late 1940s. As we leave we might spin the headlines in our favour by advertising the present surge in Helmand as ‘a victory for the Afghan forces’.