Downing Street has delivered a rare public reprimand to a member of Donald Trump’s administration, saying Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, was “wrong” to suggest that most non-American Nato soldiers in Afghanistan did not do any fighting.Hegsth made the comment in a speech at the University of Tennessee, where he recalled serving in Afghanistan himself. He said: double quotation markI was a captain in Afghanistan and we would go to the headquarters in Kabul and there would be 50 flags at the headquarters. It was a beautiful thing to see, 50 different countries contributing to the Nato alliance and the Isaf [International Security Assistance Force] mission there. Except there were maybe five that contributed.
It was actually closer to one or two that by the end were actually involved in kinetic operations. In fact the patch Isaf, we joked it meant ‘I Saw Americans Fighting’. Asked about Hegseth’s comment at the Downing Street lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson said Hegseth was “wrong” in what he said about the Nato operation in Afghanistan.The spokesperson explained: double quotation markThe facts speak for themselves when it comes to the UK’s and Nato’s contribution to Afghanistan. Thousands of British and Allied families made huge sacrifices to play their significant part in that war and uphold our values, and more than 450 British personnel never returned.
Their sacrifice and that of other Nato forces was made in the service of collective security and in response to an attack on our ally. We are incredibly proud of our armed forces and their service and sacrifice will never be forgotten, and it is wrong to diminish their role. While the UK government disagrees with much of what Donald Trump and his team say and do, there is normally a reluctance to criticise them in public. However, this does not seem to apply when the reputation of British servicemen and women has been impugned.
Keir Starmer tried hard to maintain a good personal relationship with the US president, but when Trump made a similar claim about Nato allies avoiding frontline fighting in Afghanistan, Starmer condemned what he said as “insulting and frankly appalling”.Pete Hegseth. Photograph: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
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