No subject

u'd never know that most British people want troops withdrawn by the end of=
 the year and only a minority have supported the US-led campaign for years.=
=20



The BBC in particular seems to have almost entirely abandoned any attempt a=
t neutral reporting of what is actually going on. Instead, its newsreaders =
and presenters sternly warn that "Britain's resolve is being put to the tes=
t" and speculate, surreally, about what might happen if public "support" fo=
r the war "were to weaken" (last Friday's 10 o'clock TV news and Newsnight =
programmes).=20



In the circumstances, it would hardly be surprising if public opinion had b=
een turned after what has been a barrage of state war propaganda, as embedd=
ed Kiplingesque reporting from the Helmand frontline, military parades and =
a new Armed Services Day have been used to try and translate sympathy for B=
ritish troops into support for foreign wars.=20



But it hasn't happened. Today's ICM poll for the Guardian and the BBC's New=
snight shows 56% want all British troops out of Afghanistan by the end of t=
he year, and 60% by 2011, against 36% who want them to stay until "they are=
 no longer needed".=20



That was interpreted by the Guardian's headline writer today as "public sup=
port for war is firm, despite deaths" =E2=80=93 on the assumption that the =
sharp increase in British casualties might have been expected to trigger a =
further drop in public backing for the eight-year-old Afghan occupation, an=
d because opposition to the war had fallen from 2006.=20



But given the media's increasingly intense emotional focus on British soldi=
ers' deaths during the current offensive =E2=80=93 today's Daily Mirror lea=
ds on last Friday's fallen " band of brothers " and the Sun on Gordon Brown=
's " this war is our patriotic duty " =E2=80=93 I would have expected the o=
pposite. In fact, the only time there was majority support in Britain for t=
he Iraq war was during the initial months of attack and occupation, when Br=
itish troops were seen to be in action and in greatest danger.=20



But, even if support for withdrawal is slightly down from last November's 6=
8% , 62% still believe British forces are either making no difference in Af=
ghanistan worse or making it worse =E2=80=93 and 47%, against 46%, say they=
 oppose the "British military operation" outright. And interestingly, given=
 what New Labour used to claim about social attitudes to the Iraq war, some=
 of the strongest opposition to the war comes from working class people.=20



Of course, British public hostility towards the Afghanistan occupation is m=
irrored in most countries in the world (in the US it is pretty evenly divid=
ed). Even in Afghanistan itself, where polling under conditions of foreign =
military occupation would be expected to be skewed towards the occupier, a =
recent BBC-sponsored poll in February found a majority saying they want for=
eign troops withdrawn within one to two years and negotiations with the Tal=
iban (pdf) .=20



But, hey, what does public opinion in either country count in a war for dem=
ocracy?