The figures - gathered by a network of Afghan veterans - reveal the scale of what one former UK general calls a “betrayal” and a “disgrace”.

The soldiers fled to Pakistan, which now says it will expel Afghan refugees.

The UK says it has brought thousands of Afghans to safety.

Gen Sir Richard Barrons, who served the British Army in Afghanistan over 12 years, told BBC Newsnight that the failure of the UK to relocate these soldiers “is a disgrace, because it reflects that either we’re duplicitous as a nation or incompetent”.

“Neither are acceptable,” he said. “It is a betrayal, and the cost of that betrayal will be people who served with us will die or spend their lives in prison.”

  • @MataVatnik
    link
    3
    edit-2
    11 months ago

    Country invades other country, installs friendly government, invader loses interest and local government collapses under insurgency. Invader leaves local allies hanging after they were done using them. If that’s not a classic colonialist moment then I don’t know what is.

    • @TheGrandNagus
      link
      411 months ago

      Let me get this straight… you think Afghanistan was a UK colony?

      • @MataVatnik
        link
        111 months ago

        No, arguably worse. Because if it was a colony the UK would have at least governed and invested in the country. Instead they came in, wrecked shit for a couple decades and left.

        • @TheGrandNagus
          link
          711 months ago

          Right, so colonialism is when a country doesn’t give residency or citizenship to people that fought alongside British forces, officially or unofficially.

          You’re shoehorning a completely unrelated topic into this.

          • @MataVatnik
            link
            1
            edit-2
            11 months ago

            Did you read the comment you replied to? I literally said it wasn’t colonialism in that comment.

              • @MataVatnik
                link
                011 months ago

                My point is that it’s worse than colonialism. Bruh. Holy shit lol.

                • @TheGrandNagus
                  link
                  011 months ago

                  Lmao

                  Not giving foreign soldiers citizenship is worse than colonialism. Christ.

                  Someone’s never read a history book.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              111 months ago

              That’s a vassal state, not a colony. Under colonial rule, there is no ‘real’ government and there are strong economic ties between colonizer and colonized.