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Donald Trump was “wrong” to diminish the role of Nato and British troops in Afghanistan, Downing Street has said, after the US president claimed allies stayed away from the front line.
Trump claimed that Nato sent “some troops” but “stayed a little back, a little off the front lines”, sparking outrage from veterans and their families.
The mother of severely injured soldier Ben Parkinson deemed it 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 in its history 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”.
Responding on Friday, the prime minister’s official spokesperson said: “The president was wrong to diminish the role of Nato troops, including British forces.”
He added that Nato troops made sacrifices “in the service of collective security and in response to an attack on our ally”.
Defence Secretary John Healey said the UK and Nato allies had “answered the US call” and that British troops who were killed should be remembered as “heroes who gave their lives in service of our nation”.
Carns, minister for the armed forces who served several tours in Afghanistan, said Trump’s comments were “utterly ridiculous” and that “the world rallied to the support of the US”.
Far from staying away from the front line, Britain and Canada placed troops in the most dangerous provinces of all – the Taliban heartlands of Helmand and Kandahar. In Helmand, the scene of the heaviest fighting, British troops were joined by Danish and Estonian soldiers. All suffered casualties in the heat of battle.
Most of the 457 British troops who died serving in Afghanistan over a period of nearly 20 years were killed in Helmand. Hundreds more suffered injuries and lost limbs.
Cpl Andy Reid, a veteran who lost both his legs and his right arm after stepping on an improvised explosive device (IED) in Afghanistan, said Trump’s words were “extremely disrespectful”.
“Not a day goes by when we’re not in some kind of pain, physically or mentally reflecting on that conflict,” he told BBC Breakfast.
Reid recalled working with American soldiers during his time in Afghanistan, adding: “If they were on the front line and I was stood next to them, clearly we were on the front line as well.”
Diane Dernie, whose son Ben Parkinson suffered horrific injuries when an Army Land Rover hit a mine near Musa Qala in 2006, said Trump’s words were “so insulting” and hard to hear.
She 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.
Government minister Stephen 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.
The BBC has approached the White House and the Pentagon for comment.
Speaking to BBC’s Question Time on Thursday, Labour MP Emily Thornberry called it an “absolute insult” to the 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: “457 British troops lost their lives in Afghanistan. Trump avoided military service five times. How dare he question their sacrifice.”
Trump received five deferments from a military draft during the Vietnam War – four for academic reasons and one for bone spurs, a calcium build-up in the heels.
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.
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.
