Former UK commander in Afghanistan warns of ‘greatest danger’ from Daesh

A former commander of the British forces in Afghanistan has warned that the UK faces the “greatest danger from terrorism” since the Daesh militant group is “at its height”.

Colonel Richard Kemp, a retired British Army officer who served as the commander of Operation Fingal in Afghanistan from July to November 2003, said in a radio interview on Sunday that the UK is now in an “extremely dangerous” situation following the drawdown of its forces from Afghanistan.

"The complete nation is now rolled over and controlled by the Taliban, which is a terrorist organisation."@COLRICHARDKEMP, former commander of British Forces in Afghanistan, says we are now facing the greatest danger from terrorism since Islamic State at its height.@iamradzi pic.twitter.com/ztWuI2ISmM

— Times Radio (@TimesRadio) August 29, 2021

Kemp’s statement came in the wake of multiple bombings in the Afghan capital on Thursday, claimed by the Daesh militant group, which left more than 170 people dead, including 13 US service members.

The former British military commander expressed concern that the Taliban will allow and probably encourage Takfiri terrorists to "pour into the country from around the world, who plan, meet, prepare, train, organize, and carry out strikes against the West from Afghanistan”.

His remarks were echoed by Tobias Ellwood, a British conservative lawmaker, who suggested that “terrorism will raise its ugly face again”, while emphasizing that unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) strikes alone were not enough to tackle the threat of terrorism.

It comes after The Sunday Times cited an unnamed government source as saying that there was no intelligence to suggest Daesh posed a greater threat to the UK in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover in Kabul.

The report claimed that the Afghanistan branch of the Takfiri group opposed the Taliban and that there was “no evidence they have the capacity to launch attacks outside Afghanistan's border”.

US officials have warned that there is “a specific, credible threat” of more attacks in Kabul, after a US drone strike allegedly killed two “high profile” members of the Daesh terrorist group.

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US vows that it is “highly likely” for it to stage another attack on the Afghan soil, despite the Taliban’s condemnation of an earlier such strike.

On Friday, the White House acknowledged that there was a breakdown in the security process that failed to thwart the deadly bombings in Kabul Thursday.

Foreign policy disaster

Last week, after the Taliban laid siege to Kabul, forcing the US-led allied troops to expedite their withdrawal from the country, Kemp said it was the “greatest foreign policy disaster” that he had seen “of any nature from any Western country”.

“It is -- has unbelievable strategic consequences well beyond Afghanistan itself. And I think, you know, people often compare Vietnam and Saigon in 1975 to the things they are seeing on the television now. I think it is worse than that,” he said in an interview to Fox News.

He also warned that the ignominy brought by the defeat in Afghanistan has “re-energized the threat” to the West, which he said is “worse now than it was before 9/11”.

US occupation over, Afghanistan no longer a battlefield: Taliban in 1st presser

The Taliban militant group says the 20-year-long occupation of Afghanistan by the US-led forces has come to an end, and that no one is after the continuation of war in the country.

“The American forces have not been destroyed nor have they been defeated on the battlefield. But they have been humiliated by their president and the whole of the United States of America, and the Western world has also been humiliated. And it goes beyond that as well, the NATO alliance,” he noted.

Diplomatic recognition for Taliban

The final evacuation flight of the UK left Kabul on Sunday, the British Ministry of Defense announced, regretting that they had not been able to evacuate everybody.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson praised the evacuation of Britons, while urging the Taliban to prevent the nation from becoming a base for the Daesh.

He also expressed regret over the manner of their withdrawal from Afghanistan, asserting that “we would not have wished to leave in this way”.

Johnson has suggested that London would consider diplomatic recognition for the Taliban if they meet certain conditions, including the provision of safe passage for those who wish to leave Afghanistan, and striving to prevent the nation "from again becoming an incubator for global terror".

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