Sir Christopher Meyer, the UK ambassador to Washington from 1997 – 2003, has described the Afghan mission as a ‘waste of blood and treasure.’  In a new book Getting Our Way, Sir Christopher writes “A punitive expedition against Al Qaeda is one thing; but to seek, against the grain of history, to rebuild Afghanistan from the ground up, in the name of a western concept of democracy and human rights, is futile.”

Sir Christopher’s view is part of a seachange in thinking in how we handle our overseas missions. On Page  6 of Democracy Kills, I ask if our overseas missions are more about trying to create a mirror image of our own Western democratic societies than solving the problems of the developing world.

Click here: Democracy Kills