More troops head for Afghanistan
Updated on 18 February 2009
Barack Obama has announced the dispatch of an extra 17,000 troops to Afghanistan, taking the number of foreign forces in the country to around 85,000.
Gordon Brown has already said that Britain will be sending up to 2,000 extra troops to Afghanistan this year. But America's huge surge in numbers will increase pressure on the rest of Nato to bolster their contributions as well.
British forces working in the south of the country have seized £50m worth of heroin in a drugs swoop. During the raid, 20 Taliban were killed.
Public support in Afghanistan fell even further yesterday when Afghan officials claimed 12 civilians were killed by US led air strikes - a claim refuted by the US military.
But, with UN figures showing a record number of civilians now being killed in this conflict and no end in sight for the ongoing war, defence analysts are now debating whether this could become Barack Obama's Vietnam?
