Sir, In your leading article (“The tests for Afghanistan”, Nov 7), you list terrorist activities against various countries but omitted to include the attacks on the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1998. The world seems to think that the big terrorist attacks began on 9/11. They did not: they began on August 7, 1998, in Nairobi.

These were among the first big attacks that preceded the 9/11 attack and brought Osama Bin Laden to American attention for the first time. In the Nairobi bombing, hundreds of people were killed and thousands injured — yet time and time again, it is left off the list of terrorist atrocities by the media and now the Prime Minister’s speech.

I was born in Kenya and grew up there, and along with other Kenyans feel aggrieved that the attacks in these two East African countries are forgotten. The message it gives is that terrorist attacks on African countries are just not important enough to warrant mention — no matter that many more people were killed and injured than in the London attacks in 2005.

Elizabeth Frost
Twickenham, Middx

Sir, We need to remind ourselves that the war in Afghanistan is a Nato operation. Those who urge withdrawal need to be clear whether they intend that Nato as an alliance should pull out, or only the British Forces — leaving our Nato allies to fill the gap that, in practice, would mean the United States. The problem is the lack of commitment of leading members of the alliance.

Those who were in positions of responsibility when the size, shape and equipment of our present-day Armed Forces were decided would do better to direct their venom towards nations not pulling their weight than at their own Government which has, for laudable reasons, overcommitted these forces.

David McCann
Bracknell, Berkshire

Sir, Christopher Daniel (letter, Nov 6) quotes his great-grandfather to the effect that foreigners and their benefits are not welcome and people must be left to their own customs. As a soldier in the Indian Army who served on the North-West frontier, it was instilled into me and my fellows that such customs must be observed. Corruption, for instance, is seen as a normal practice in all transactions, personal or commercial. Without it many would starve.

“Green shoots”, it would seem, are now appearing as Gordon Brown has dropped corruption from the list of conditions that President Karzai must accept in order to secure our support. Unless the Afghans have changed since my day, these conditions are unattainable.

Colonel Charles Wilson
Framingham Earl, Norfolk

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