Should we be in Afghanistan?

The British government is fighting a war. No, not that one. This is a war about that war, a war of public opinion at home. It is a war they are losing.
As with America in Vietnam, when short term military intervention becomes long-term occupation, when reports of victories are few and far between but casualty lists grow ever longer and when the victory conditions appear unlikely or even unknown, public support starts to waver and eventually fail.

The government assures us that being there is very important in the War On Terror(tm), but is it?
Let's go back and look at the reason for starting this conflict. It was to destroy (or bring to justice) the terrorists sheltering and thriving in the Taliban-dominated country. Attacking them meant dislodging the Taliban and trying to get less extreme people in power.
Was that successful? Well, partially. We removed the Taliban from government and forced the terrorists either further into hiding or out to other remote places, such as the Afghan/Pakistan border or even further afield.
All well and good, except that then we shifted focus (and troops) to Iraq, which not only delayed progress in Afghanistan but also gave the terrorists a recruitment field day.

So, eight years after the initial invasion we are still there. Still fighting the Taliban and regional warlords who hold so much power in the country.
The government claims we need to be there to stop terrorist attacks, but is that true? Well, no. Strangely enough the terrorists have moved elsewhere and we don't seem in a hurry to follow them. Possibly because if history tells us one thing, it is that you can't win a war on terror with an army. Terrorists are extremists who use perceived acts of aggression against their state, people or religion to excuse their actions.
You only stop them by stopping the aggression itself or by changing the perception of it amongst the less-extreme members of that society.

Will the terrorists move back if we left now? Very probably, yes. But there is a problem. We are supposed to be supporting and facilitating a democratically elected government, enabling the Afghans to gain the stability they need to keep the Taliban out of power. Presumably if we manage this we can then remove our troops. But are we succeeding in that?
The large number of casualties suffered during Operation Panther's Claw was justified as supporting a fair and free election for the recent Presidential elections. But the results demonstrated that the incumbent President (Karzai) and/or his supporters had blatantly rigged the election results and therefore invalidated it. The solution was to remove enough false votes to force a second round with his nearest opponent, but now this has been called off and Karzai will become the de facto winner in a fixed election. Hardly the result British troops sacrificed themselves for.
the UN forces are rapidly training Afghans as Police and other security forces, but not only are these bodies riddled with corruption, they have also been infiltrated by the Taliban because the security checks on recruits are minimal. Police Chiefs bribe their way into their jobs and then recoup their money by having their troops take it from the public.

Despite government assurances, British troops are still obviously not given the equipment they need to be as safe as possible while they carry out a very difficult jobs. The high casualties they have suffered are mostly due to roadside bombs and these are effective because the lack of helicopter support (certainly in comparison to the US troops there) forces more road journeys when they go patrolling.
The fact that so many extremely senior ex-army chiefs of staff have spoken out against the government show they are clearly lying when they say our troops have all the equipment they need.

So, should we be in Afghanistan? I say no. If we had a credible Afghan government and police force and if we had sufficient funding to minimise the risk to our soldiers it would be a different matter, but as it stands we can't justify this continued operation.