Britain to Send 500 More Troops to Afghanistan

Britain will send 500 more troops to Afghanistan, Gordon Brown is expected to announce today, defying calls to reduce Britain’s presence there. The men will come with strings attached, however: “The prime minister will want assurances from military chiefs that the extra troops will be properly equipped,” a BBC correspondent said. “He’ll also expect Britain’s NATO partners to follow suit.”

The move is “quite a bold decision,” says one former commander in Afghanistan, where Britain already has 9,000 troops, mostly in the southern province of Helmand, a Taliban stronghold. But he added that “We probably do need more than that.” Conservative leader David Cameron also backs sending more troops, while Liberal Democrats are calling for a “political surge” instead. (More Britain stories.)