Maia Daviesand
Sofia Ferreira Santos
Donald Trump’s claim that Nato troops stayed “a little off the front lines” during the war in Afghanistan has sparked outrage in the UK from politicians and veterans’ families.
Government minister Stephen Kinnock told the BBC he was “disappointed” by the US president’s remarks, while Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch described them as “flat-out nonsense”.
The mother of severely injured soldier Ben Parkinson said Trump’s comments were the “ultimate insult”.
The UK was among several allies to join the US in Afghanistan after Nato’s collective security clause was invoked for the first and only time following the 9/11 attacks. During the conflict, 457 British service personnel were killed.
Article 5 of Nato states that an attack on one member is considered an attack against all.
But Trump told Fox News on Thursday that he was “not sure” the military alliance would be there for the US “if we ever needed them”.
“We’ve never needed them,” he said, adding: “We have never really asked anything of them.”
“They’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan,” he said, “and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines”.
Kinnock told BBC Breakfast Trump’s claim “doesn’t really add up” and his remarks “don’t really bear any resemblance to reality”.
“They put their lives on the line to defend our country. I am disappointed by President Trump’s comments,” he said.
Kinnock also praised the “strong words” of Lucy Aldridge, whose son William died in a bomb blast aged 18 in Afghanistan. She said Trump’s remarks were “extremely upsetting”.
“We live the trauma daily for the rest of our lives because of the contribution that our loved ones made. And they were absolutely on the front line,” she told the Mirror.
The mother of veteran Ben Parkinson, who was severely injured in Afghanistan, said Trump’s words were “so insulting” and hard to hear.
Diane Dernie said it showed “a childish man trying to deflect from his own actions,” adding: “I can assure you, the Taliban didn’t plant IEDs miles and miles back from the front line.”
Dernie has called on Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to “stand up for his own armed forces” and call out the US president.
Kinnock said Starmer would speak to Trump directly over his remarks.
Conservative leader Badenoch said the sacrifice of British and other Nato troops deserved “respect not denigration”.
“Trump saying Nato allies “weren’t on the front line” in Afghanistan is flat-out nonsense. British, Canadian, and Nato troops fought and died alongside the US for 20 years,” she said on X.
Speaking to BBC’s Question Time on Thursday, Labour MP Emily Thornberry called it an “absolute insult” to the 457 British service personnel killed in the conflict and said the remarks were “much more than a mistake”.
“We have always been there whenever the Americans have wanted us,” she said, calling Trump “a man who has never seen any action” but was now “commander in chief and knows nothing about how it is that America has been defended”.
Thornberry, who is chair of the foreign affairs select committee, said the US was the UK’s “friend” but its leader had “behaved in a way that is bullying, rude, that has deliberately been trying to undermine us, which has been trying to undermine Nato.”
Conservative MP Ben Obese-Jecty, a former British Army officer who served in Afghanistan, also rejected the US president’s comments, saying it was “sad to see our nation’s sacrifice, and that of our Nato partners, held so cheaply”.
He said he saw “first hand the sacrifices made by British soldiers” and wrote on X: “I don’t believe US military personnel share the view of President Trump; his words do them a disservice as our closest military allies.”
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey criticised the remarks on social media, saying: “How dare he question their sacrifice?”
Former Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick, who recently defected to Reform UK, said the comments were “offensive and wrong”.
The US president has repeatedly criticised Nato during his second term in office, often accusing its member states of not spending enough on defence.
Speaking to BBC’s Newsnight programme, Dutch foreign minister David van Weel rejected Trump’s remarks as “false”, saying “Europeans shed blood” in support of US troops in Afghanistan.
He said Rutte had rebuffed similar comments Trump made earlier, during a joint press conference the pair held at Davos on Thursday.
Calvin Bailey, a Labour MP and former RAF officer who served alongside US special operations units in Afghanistan, said the president’s claim bore “no resemblance to the reality experienced by those of us who served there”.
“As I reminded the US Forces I served with on 4 July 2008, we were there because of a shared belief, articulated at America’s founding, that free people have inalienable rights and should not live under tyranny,” he told the PA news agency.
“That belief underpinned the response to 9/11, and it is worth reflecting on now.”
The BBC has approached the Ministry of Defence for comment.
The US invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 to oust the Taliban, whom they said were harbouring Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaeda figures linked to the 9/11 attacks. Nato nations contributed troops and military equipment to the US-led war.
More than 3,500 coalition soldiers had died as of 2021, when the US withdrew from the country – about two-thirds of them Americans.
The UK suffered the second-highest number of military deaths in the conflict behind the US, which saw 2,461 fatalities.
