Madeleine speaks in the debate about Defence in the World

I spent this weekend preparing for today's debate. On the way up on the train, I read through the speech, had a quick read of 'The Times' and moved on to the ISTAR--intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance-report, which we are to look at tomorrow in the Defence Committee. Having read the ISTAR report and 'The Times', I rewrote the speech in my head. When I arrived at the Library, I looked at the speech again.

One thing that has been referred to a few times today is the disconnect from the public on the issue of defence and an understanding of the nature of defence and its broad and wide implications. Looking at today's edition of 'The Times', I felt that there was a lot there that addressed many of the issues of Britain and defence in the world.

The defence and security of our country is, for me, the primary role of Government. From defence and security comes the capacity to generate our economic wealth and the ability of citizens to engage with services such as health and education, which improve their mental and physical health, and in turn fuel our economic wealth. Hon. Members might say that that is a simplistic assessment of the role of Government, but behind that simplicity lie complex questions, which we face in the coming election and the next Parliament as we undertake the strategic defence review. Many of the questions that must be addressed were there in the articles in 'The Times'.

What is the nature of the relationship between the state, the public and the military? What is the responsibility of the state to the military? What expectations do the public have of the military, and what is their relationship to and understanding of the role of our defence forces in the world? What are the rights of our military, and what are the implications of those questions for defence, defence policy and planning for future conflicts?

There is a story in 'The Times' about the DNA testing of soldiers killed in 1916 and found in a mass grave in Fromelles. It made me think of my grandfather and the diary he wrote after being called up as a Territorial reservist in 1914. He sailed from Ireland about two days after war was declared. His diary details the excitement at the start of war, and the boredom punctuated by lots of football matches and exercises. Then there is a strange gap. The first battle of the Somme and the march south took place. Among the first things to be discarded were documents-the books used by the military for procurement. That was quickly followed, as people dashed for their lives, by the discarding of weapons.

When it was realised that the Germans were not pursuing, the troops stopped, turned and prepared to fight. They then discovered that they could not get new equipment, because they had to fill in a form in triplicate and hand back the faulty equipment. If they had thrown away the books and thrown away the guns, they had no way of getting new armaments. The Army has moved on and its procurement process is not as arcane, but clearly we have quite a torrid history of failing to address the needs of our troops at the front line and how we keep them appropriately armed to carry out their tasks.

In 1916, my grandfather records in his diary the fact that he finally received his first blanket, having slept without a blanket for the first year of the war. He was killed in 1917, and my father never knew him.

That war brought together a nation in looking at the issue of remembrance. Seeing the monuments at Thiepval and Ypres brings home the horror of war-the sacrifice and loss-most powerfully. We are struggling to address the issue of remembrance, and our failure to lead in that manner is leading to inappropriate demonstrations by the public, seeking to find a way to honour and remember. It is leading to the events at Wootton Bassett, which some find distressing, as I know from speaking to members of the armed forces while in Afghanistan. Some find that the events give a degree of succour to the enemy, who use the demonstrations to show how much we feel our loss and how, if the losses keep happening, there will be an opportunity for the Taliban and al-Qaeda to succeed. We have to find a new way of articulating remembrance that allows dignity and recognises sacrifice, but does not wallow, in a sense, in the loss of people who have sought to take on a role that most of us would back away from. It is important that we take a lead on that.

The generation that came back in 1918 did not talk about war. Indeed, my father did not talk about his experiences in the second world war-some experiences were too horrific for words-but we learned a great deal about mental health in both the first and second world wars. Today's military are encouraged to talk and share, but we still have not got it right. We know that more people took their lives following the Falkland war than died there, so setting matters right following Iraq and Afghanistan is critical. That is an area where we still have work to do, although I have been impressed by much that has been done to allow decompression, and by the use of a buddying system to allow people returning from the front to relive, reconsider and re-examine some of their experiences.

Page 3 of 'The Times' has an article about human rights for soldiers; there were comments about the fear of extending the protection of the Human Rights Act 1998 to soldiers fighting overseas, and about how that move would hamper battlefield commanders. Interestingly, the issue of the human rights of civilians was addressed in an article on the story of a family killed in a night raid in eastern Afghanistan. The family had rejected blood money and had vowed to carry out suicide attacks until the perpetrators were brought to justice. That raised many questions in my mind, including whether they would have threatened suicide attacks on the Taliban and al-Qaeda, and what effect such threats would have had.
The article also brings us to critical issues: the higher expectation on western forces to uphold human rights in war zones; the newly understood essential nature of engagement with civilians in war zones; their role in combating insurgence; and their vital role in providing intelligence and rebuilding the peace. The comprehensive approach-a new joined-up defence strategy, engaging foreign policy, international development aid and our armed forces in a multinational force for good-is a new concept. It brings new challenges and new ways of operating.
The eastern Afghanistan night raid also brings us an old problem in a new format. US officials have refused to identify the forces involved, breeding suspicion in Afghanistan and among our own public. Our public do not like it when they think that we have broken the law. They do not like it when we will not be honest and straightforward about what we have done in their name. The UN has been critical of the use of paramilitary groups to carry out night raids, highlighting the need for regulation and accountability when it comes to such forces.

The use of paramilitary groups in the past helped bring us to our current conflict in Afghanistan. The arming of Taliban insurgents and mujaheddin to fight the Russians in Afghanistan has brought years of war, generations of families avenging deaths, and tribal conflicts. There is an urgent need for the licensing and regulation of private security forces in conflict zones. I can understand the vital role that they play, but I feel that they need to be clearly accountable, and clearly regulated.

'The Times' carried an article about Mumbai, where the Indian police are said to have prevented an attack that could have jeopardised the Pakistan-India peace talks about Kashmir. There have been times when I have felt that if we could sort out Kashmir, we could sort out Afghanistan. Kashmir has been a training ground and a hideout for the Taliban, Islamist insurgents and al-Qaeda. Billions of dollars have been diverted from education, health, and infrastructure planning in India and Pakistan to fund the fighting in Kashmir. We are talking about two nuclear states with large parts of their armed forces concentrated on their borders, posing a risk to the rest of the world because of that conflict in Kashmir. It has resulted in both India and Pakistan facing the challenge of internal insurgencies. China sits on its border with Kashmir and, indeed, with Afghanistan, but it has taken no part in winning the war or in trying to build peace. How China's role in such conflicts will change is a key question for our future defence planning.

'The Times' details a successful attack by Pakistan's army on a Taliban school in south Waziristan. It was not a school as we know it-for education, reading, writing, and work skills-but a school teaching 150 to 200 boys how to slaughter, how to behead the enemy, and how to be a suicide bomber. It held out the promise not of a better job or a chance to improve the quality of life of the boys' families, but of a heaven, depicted in murals on the walls as a place of flowing rivers and swimming girls. How we combat such indoctrination-such fatalism-is a key task for our diplomats in engaging in dialogue and alliances, and for our aid workers in offering hope, new aspirations and new potential to young men who see martyrdom as a better future than the life that they face on earth.

Interestingly, the Pakistani forces used lessons learned from the British frontier warfare manual published in 1939 to win that battle in south Waziristan. Whether we have yet devised a successful manual for securing peace and rebuilding communities is a more complex question. For it is the return of civilians and the reconciliation and re-integration of ex-fighters that is the critical task that Pakistan's army now faces. It is no longer simply a case of one army facing another on the battlefield, with the winner taking all; it is about winning not just the war, but the peace.
The press tell us that the public are tired of war-of the relentless toll of deaths, and of seeing no possibility of success-but 'The Times' editorial today talks of the success of a more democratic future for Iraq after recent elections there. There were 38 people killed, and 136 attacks on polling stations; names were missing from the electoral register, and there was some intimidation by security forces. However, there was also the successful engagement of 62 per cent. of the Iraqi people. Sunni candidates stood, and there will be a Government, increasingly held to account by a people growing in confidence of their rights and in their awareness of the responsibility of Governments to their people.

The letters page held a great deal of discussion of the sort that we have had today-discussion about the equipment, training and funding of our armed forces. The Chief of the Defence Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, is quoted as saying:

"The equipment that our people are using is frankly the best that they've ever had in any of my 40 years of service and it's getting better all the time, so in terms of numbers, in terms of quality, both are increasing."

Other letters say that the quality of training, equipment and funding has not been right. The public are, for the first time, unsure who to believe, as our senior military personnel are increasingly seen as politically biased, which is an extremely dangerous position.

There has been talk of the role of the Defence Committee in this Parliament. I have been fortunate enough to serve on it for only slightly over a year, and I am still on a learning curve. I am deeply indebted to the other members of the Committee, whose knowledge is great. For me, the Committee's role in a future Parliament is to hold these senior officers to their statements when they are questioned about funding, training, and equipment. They cannot be allowed to say one thing when in the Ministry of Defence and another to the Committee. Evidence to the Committee must be truthful and straightforward if public trust is to be rebuilt and we are to know what our forces are doing, what they need and whether they are being successful.

We must understand the problems that we face and how we fight an enemy when our technology does not always offer the edge that we have grown to expect. Fighting in an international coalition, often under the overall leadership of the United States, brings difficulties, as it is hard for the public to understand how we can help ISTAR and not solve the problem of IEDs. New challenges, too, are coming our way extremely fast, as climate change gives rise to defence and security issues arising from food and water shortages, migration, the fight for mineral resources, and the growth of international criminality. Interestingly, 'The Times' carried an article saying that 18,000 people had been killed in the Mexican drugs wars in the past three years.

There are new ways of trying to deal with defence. Baroness Ashton, as High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, brings a new voice to the defence world. We are moving into complex times, in which there is a demand for greater transparency and openness in relation to defence training, spending and equipment. Each death heightens calls for the withdrawal of troops and prompts questions about why we are fighting. We must address how we meet those demands without providing information, propaganda and intelligence for the enemy.

There is increasing interest in our defence and security, and our military are under observation as never before. This debate is important, and it is one that the next Parliament must continue with even greater vigour.

The full debate can be found here, http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmhansrd/cm100315/debtext/100315-0004.htm#10031515000001