Four British soldiers killed in Afghan crash
Updated on 24 June 2010
Four British soldiers died when their armoured vehicle drove into a canal in Helmand province, taking the number of military personnel killed in Afghanistan to nine in the last week as David Cameron warns of a difficult summer ahead.
The four soldiers, part of a police advisory team, were killed when their Ridgeback armoured vehicle rolled off the road and ended up under water in a canal near Gereshk, Helmand.
The vehicle rolled into the Nar-e-Bughra canal on Wednesday night. Reports have suggested that the driver may have been night vision aids while driving without headlights in an area prone to insurgent bombs. Enemy action is not thought to have been involved, the Ministry of Defence said.
Three soldiers from 1st Battalion The Mercian Regiment were killed along with a soldier from 1st Battalion The Yorkshire Regiment. Their families have been informed.
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The deaths took the number of British fatalities in the country since operations began in 2001 to 307. Eighteen soldiers have been killed so far this month, nine of whom died in the past seven days alone.
To date 38 soldiers have died from accidents, illness or have yet to have their cause of death confirmed.
The bloodiest month for the UK mission in Afghanistan was June 2009, when 22 British troops were killed, including eight in just 24 hours.
Difficult summer ahead
The prime minister, David Cameron, paid tribute to the soldiers but warned it will be a difficult summer.
"Obviously we are paying a very high price for what we are doing in Afghanistan, but I remain absolutely committed to making sure that we build up the Afghans' own capability and security so that they can take responsibility for their country and we can come home.
"There is no doubt that we have had a difficult few months in terms of casualties and it will be a difficult summer," continued the Prime Minister, "I have no doubt about that."
But he has insisted that the UK remains "absolutely committed" to the military campaign despite the sacking of General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of Nato in Afghanistan.
US President Barack Obama announced yesterday that General David Petraeus will take over the role following a magazine article in which McChrystal and his advisors criticised the White House.
Will trouble at the top slow Afghan progress?
It was a pretty harsh move, designed perhaps to cure the impression that Obama is a soft-touch, indecisive, slow to move, writes Asia Correspondent Nick Paton Walsh.
Even Robert Gates, the defence secretary, counselled against it. But in the end McChrystal had to go. The logic is there: how can allies and Afghans listen to US policy if the face of it's military moves has so openly rubbished - or allowed his staff to rubbish - everyone who's not actually under his command.
The swift appointment of Petraeus - and you can count on the Hill giving him, as McCain said, the swiftest confirmation in history, the Republicans perhaps salivating at seeing a possible presidential candidate for them in 2012 being so squarely thrown into the fray - was meant to cure fears of a caesura in this, the most delicate time yet in America's longest war.
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Downing Street dismissed concerns that McChrystal's departure would undermine credibility for the strategy. The Prime Minister spoke to Obama on the phone last night "and again made clear that the UK and US Governments remain absolutely committed to the strategy in Afghanistan", a spokesperson said.
Cameron paid tribute to McChrystal for his contribution to the counterinsurgency campaign and expressed approval that he would be replaced by Petraeus.
Nato's British deputy commander in Afghanistan, Lt Gen Nick Parker, will take charge temporarily until Petraeus's appointment is cleared by Congress. Cameron told the president that Parker was determined that the mission in Afghanistan "would not miss a beat" during the changeover.
