Operation Overstretch: Armed forces are at breaking point as tours of duty get tougher

"A member of Britain's special forces told me recently that in 2006, he had been on operations something like 269 days out of 365," said Adam Holloway, Conservative MP for Gravesham and a member of the Commons defence committee.

"People like him have been incredibly busy ever since the build-up to the Iraq war more than four years ago, but they can't do it forever. Not surprisingly, his marriage has cracked up."

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The past fortnight has seen a rush of announcements which emphasise the far-flung nature of Britain's military commitments since the start of the century. Tony Blair - who had earlier stayed away from a Commons debate on Iraq - told Parliament that the long-awaited withdrawal from the south of the country would begin with the departure of 1,600 troops this spring. A day and a half later, Des Browne, the Secretary of State for Defence, announced that 1,400 more troops would be sent to southern Afghanistan, where British forces had to fight desperately last summer to avoid being overwhelmed by the Taliban.

Mr Holloway, a former army officer, said his old regiment, the Grenadier Guards, was in the process of returning from Shaibah logistics base, once the centre of British operations in southern Iraq, which is due to be handed over to Iraqi forces by the end of this month. But the regiment had already been told that it would be sent to Afghanistan in six months, underlining the extent to which Britain's front-line forces are being stretched.

It was against this background that Mr Browne's next announcement - that Britain would pull out more than 600 peacekeeping troops from Bosnia - was viewed. The soldiers, mainly from the Welsh Guards, will leave the Balkan state by the end of April. If even a contingent of this size could not be spared, it appeared that the demands on Britain's armed forces were becoming unsustainable. One officer countered this, however, saying: "Bosnia has been known for some time as a 'sunshine and skiing' tour. The country is a lot more stable than it used to be."

Indeed, the British drawdown was part of a general reduction of peacekeeping forces in Bosnia, where Mr Browne said there were indications of "a security situation approaching normality". But Louise Heywood, head of the British armed forces programme at the Royal United Services Institute, the military think-tank, said the demands of Iraq and Afghanistan made fewer British soldiers available for UN "blue helmet" peacekeeping operations.

"I would say that we are stretched as far as we can go," said Ms Heywood, a serving Territorial Army officer. "But it is not so much a question of troop numbers as of capabilities. If you put boots on the ground, you need Chinook helicopters and armoured vehicles to make them capable of doing the job."

This is where the strains became most visible during the intense fighting last year in southern Afghanistan's Helmand province, where the majority of Britain's 6,000 troops are stationed, and where most reinforcements will go. In many places it was too dangerous to send in road convoys, and the small contingent of Chinook and Merlin helicopter pilots was stretched to the limit to resupply and reinforce beleaguered troops in places such as Musa Qala, Now Zad and Sangin, often under fire. Britain sought civilian helicopters to free military helicopters for front-line duties, and took away the only Chinook in the Falklands for use in Afghanistan.

Along with the extra troops for Afghanistan, Mr Browne announced that four Sea King helicopters, another C-130 Hercules aircraft and four more Harrier GR9 jump-jets, which provide close air support, would be deployed. The Hercules fleet in particular is a vital link in the transport chain, but the hand-to-mouth nature of much of the Ministry of Defence's operational spending was highlighted last week by the BBC's discovery that of the 48 Hercules aircraft flown by the RAF, only seven have so far been fitted with explosive-suppressant foam that prevents an aircraft blowing up if its fuel tanks are hit by ground fire.

An inquiry into the deaths of 10 servicemen in Iraq two years ago, when a Hercules was shot down, said they might have lived if the aircraft had had the foam. The MoD has promised that the entire fleet will have the foam by the end of the year, but so crucial are C-130s in Iraq and Afghanistan that it is difficult to take them away for a refit. Nigel Gilbert, a former Hercules pilot quoted by the BBC, said the delay means that 50 or 60 people could be lost in another such incident.

Similar rows over spending priorities have accompanied the gradual replacement of vulnerable "snatch" Land Rovers by Bulldog armoured vehicles. Last week, however, Mr Browne addressed another grievance: forces' pay. While other public service workers are being squeezed, the lowest-paid soldiers will see their pay rise by 9.2 per cent, more than £100 a month. On top of the tax-free £2,240 operational allowance announced in October, the "separation allowance" for being deployed away from home longer than 10 days will go up by 3.3 per cent. Higher ranks will be less well-rewarded, with a salary increase for major-generals and above of only 2 per cent.

But pay is by no means the most important factor in recruitment or retention of soldiers. According to the MoD, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have not harmed recruitment; in November the National Accounting Office (NAO) reported that the Army had an overall "manning balance", though there were shortages in many specialised fields, such as mine disposal.

It is among such specialists, including special forces, that "overstretch" affects military personnel most acutely. Demand in Iraq and Afghanistan means they are deployed more often, and for longer, than is considered desirable. That makes them more likely to quit: an NAO survey of men and women who had recently left the forces found nearly half had done so because of the impact of service on family life. Other factors were too many deployments (28 per cent); quality of equipment (32 per cent); and a feeling of not being valued (33 per cent).

"The biggest problem is among some young officers," saidMajor-General Patrick Cordingley, now retired, who commanded the 7th Armoured Brigade, the Desert Rats, in the 1991 Gulf War. "They have done a couple of tours, and to some extent the glamour has gone out of it. They want to meet someone and get married, or they have young wives, and want a more settled family life. The short interval between tours is very disruptive."

The most damaging impact on the Army, he added, was to training. "There should be two years between tours, 12 months of which is spent in training. People say, 'Surely they can train on operations?' but that's wrong. Bad practices creep in, which could be dangerous in the future. How long can this kind of pressure be sustained, before we see harmful effects from lack of training? A couple of years at the most."

The pullout from Iraq is slower than military commanders would wish, but even if it was completed by October, as the Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell recently demanded, it would not ease the pressures.

"Everyone tells me that we need at least 5,000 more troops in southern Afghanistan," said General Cordingley. He is among several commanders, both serving and retired, who believe the only solution in the longer term is an expansion of the Army from its present strength of just under 105,000.

"We need an army of about 120,000, including a lot more infantry soldiers," he said.

Rifleman who gave his life for £15,000 a year

Rifleman Daniel Coffey: killed in a roadside ambush:

The family of Rifleman Daniel Coffey, who died in Iraq last week, have labelled the war "stupid" and "needless".

Rifleman "Beaney" Coffey, of 2nd Battalion, the Rifles, died from injuries sustained while protecting colleagues from an ambush on Tuesday. He was providing top cover for his patrol vehicle on its way back to the Shatt al-Arab hotel when it came under small-arms fire. He was just 21. His mother, Sally Prowse, who was in hospital for a knee operation, received a text from her son shortly before he died. In it Rifleman Coffey said: "Text me cos I am in Iraq but how are you now? Feeling better? Message me when you can ok. Dan"

David Godfrey said his grandson's death made him question why British troops are in Iraq: "What has been gained? The answer is nothing. This war should not be happening. It is a mess." The soldier's father, Nigel Coffey, told The Independent on Sunday: "We want people to know how we feel. My boy was killed in a stupid war that I don't agree with."

Rifleman Coffey was on his second tour in Iraq. The Exeter-born soldier called home last Saturday to say he would be back in three weeks. "The boy meant everything to me. He was my life," his father said.

The soldier's death, which takes the total number of British servicemen killed in action in Iraq since 2003 to 103, occurred in a week when it was announced that the lowest ranks would receive a 9.2 per cent pay rise, taking basic pay to between £15,577 and £26,664 a year.

Lauren Veevers

The General who may break ranks for £900,000

General Sir Mike Jackson, who retired as head of the Army last summer, was reported last week to have been paid close to £900,000 for his memoirs, due to be published in September. For that sum he will be under pressure to be very outspoken.

Despite his robust reputation - commanding the Nato move into Kosovo in 1999, he told US General Wesley Clark that he was "not going to start World War III for you" when ordered to prevent Russian troops taking control of Pristina airport - Sir Mike was criticised for not facing up to Tony Blair over Iraq. Nor was he heard to complain publicly about "overstretch", as his successor, General Sir Richard Dannatt, did so spectacularly last October.

Sir Mike took over as Chief of the General Staff on the eve of the Iraq war, and unquestionably knows every detail of the flawed build-up, as well as the failures that followed the military victory.

An inquest into the death of Sergeant Steven Roberts, killed when he was ordered to hand over his body armour to another soldier, heard a tape that Sgt Roberts recorded three days before his death, accusing Sir Mike of telling "a blatant lie" when he said British troops were ready for war in Iraq. Will the general shed any further light on issues such as these?

Although he has criticised the MoD since his retirement, it was in somewhat convoluted terms. In Michael Cockerell's current BBC series on Mr Blair, Sir Mike appears quite sympathetic to the Prime Minister's "frustrating" position as junior partner in the Iraq coalition.

Raymond Whitaker