The BBC reports that NATO wants the UK to send more troops to Afghanistan. Is this really such a good idea?

Sending a few more troops may win favour in Washington, the original source of the request, but will it make a difference on the ground?

Not without a change of strategy and mindset. Current political and military thinking is based on minimums. The minimum number of troops committed for the minimum amount of time. This is less about winning and more about not losing. Isn’t it time we stopped doing the same thing over and over again expecting something different to happen?

SPIN ZHIRA: Old Man in Helmand is the unauthorised, unvarnished and irreverent story of one man’s midlife crisis on the front line of the most dangerous district in Afghanistan where the locals haven’t forgiven the British for the occupation of 1842 or for the Russian Invasion of 1979. Of course, all infidels look the same so you can’t really tell them apart.

‘Brims with authenticity and dark humour.’
Patrick Hennessey, bestselling author of The Junior Officers’ Reading Club

‘First class’
Doug Beattie, bestselling author of An Ordinary Soldier

‘A must read.’
Richard Dorney, bestselling author of The Killing Zone

‘The best book by a soldier concerning the Afghan War that I have read’
Frank Ledwidge, bestselling author of Losing Small Wars

‘Five stars’
SOLDIER The official magazine of the British Army

‘Not just for soldiers’
William Reeve, BBC World Service and Afghanistan Correspondent

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