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He does not like to be reminded that his headquarters in Kabul is on the site of the British cantonment from which its entire strength fled in January 1842 after a tribal revolt against the British- imposed ruler.

Of the 16,000 soldiers, wives and children and camp followers, only one got away, the rest all slaughtered or taken prisoner. Only Dr William Brydon was deliberately left alive to tell the tale and warn people back home of the consequences of getting involved in Afghanistan.

Richards is in command of 9,720 Nato forces from 36 nations but by the end of next month he will also assume control of 7,000 troops in the south including the British in Helmand. By September, the 14,000-plus US troops of Operation Enduring Freedom to hunt out Al-Qaeda will have also come under his command. It will be the first time that American forces have served under the theatre-wide leadership of a foreign general since the second world war.

It is also the most important test to date for Nato, which has struggled to find a post cold war role and hopes Richards’s operation in Afghanistan will provide a blueprint for other conflicts worldwide. “Our global credibility is on trial here,” said General James Jones, supreme allied commander, Europe, while visiting Afghanistan last week.

But Richards is clearly relishing the enormous task. A highly charismatic man, he is no stranger to challenge, having commanded the British peacekeepers in East Timor and the task force in Sierra Leone. A great fan of the first Flashman book in which its hero gets caught up in the first Anglo-Afghan war, he says of Afghanistan: “I love it: it’s in the genes.”

Whatever the politicians might say in London, as the commander on the ground Richards has no doubt how he sees the mission in Helmand. “The primary purpose is to facilitate much more rapid delivery of reconstruction on the ground,” he said. “But to do that we must be prepared to fight hard and no one should have any doubt that this is the case as has already been proved by last Sunday.”

He is not surprised by the strength of Taliban opposition. “Previously the Americans had just 130 people in Helmand and now we’re putting in more than 3,000. If you were the Taliban you would think this spells curtains and fight like mad to protect your territory. That’s what we’re seeing now.”

On top of this, stepped-up pressure from London and Washington on neighbouring Pakistan to stop providing a haven has led to an influx of militants across the border into Helmand and the rest of southern Afghanistan. For the first time Pakistan has sent troops to those borders to prevent them crossing back.

With the escape routes thus cut off, on Thursday the US launched Operation Mountain Thrust to try to crush the Taliban in the south. British forces from 3 Parachute Regiment in Helmand are among the 11,000 taking part, as well as special forces from the SBS. It is the biggest operation since the fall of the Taliban almost five years ago but got off to a bad start when it was inadvertently announced before it had started, thus giving the Taliban 24 hours’ notice.

The biggest concern, expressed publicly by Liam Fox and privately by a number of former defence chiefs using expressions such as “mission impossible”, is that Britain is not sending enough troops for the size of the task, pointing out that Helmand is three times the size of Wales.

“It’s quite obvious that there aren’t enough boots on the ground to maintain security,” said Charles Heyman, a former infantry officer who now edits the Armed Forces of the United Kingdom handbook. “It makes you gasp when you realise what they are being asked to do.”

“If you look at the map the troops-to-task ratio looks horrendous,” agrees Richards. “But two-thirds of Helmand is desert. There’s Helmand river valley and outside that there’s no life. It’s like the Sahara. So while not necessarily disagreeing, this is not northern Europe where there are villages every two yards.”

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