It is time we start learning from the mistakes of the past over Afghanistan

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Taliban fighters at Kabul airport (AFP via Getty Images)

In the dog days of New Labour, when the bright torch of hope had become dull reality, Gordon Brown proclaimed: “There can be only one winner in Afghanistan: a strong democratic state.” At the same time a Russian general, a veteran of the conflict in the 1980s, was asked by a British documentary maker what advice he had for the west. He said ruefully: “Find the quickest route home.”

I asked my soldier son, who has done several tours in the Hindu Kush, what he thought. He said they were the most prescient words spoken by an invading army commander since Alexander the Great warned 23 centuries before that Afghanistan was easy to march into, but hard to march out of.

I wondered if today’s political leaders might avoid past mistakes, but my son replied: “Not a chance!”