In Kosovo, troops could be overheard; some resorted to mobiles.Liberal Democrat Paul Keetch was criticised for disclosing some of the failures in the Commons during the statement on the MoD’s deployment of British forces to Afghanistan. The Independent on Sunday has learned the Commons select committee on defence will deliver a full report to the Government on the troops’ complaints.The disclosures do not mean British troops will be at greater risk in Afghanistan. With the onset of winter, British troops in Afghanistan will be issued with arctic kit, and their new-style SA80 rifles.This is not the first time that British military equipment has been found wanting. A national Audit Office said after the Kosovo conflict that troops were dogged by a shortage of weapons, insecure radio communications and poor quality living conditions.

There were also reports that the RAF ran short of laser guided bombs in Kosovo.The Chancellor, Gordon Brown, has guaranteed to meet the cost of all the extra defence spending as a result of the Afghanistan conflict, but the findings of the select committee, supported by Defence ministers, could add billions to the bill for Britain’s defence. They are insisting that, as the threat from international terrorism is now the priority, long-term plans for defence, laid out in the last strategic defence review, will have to be revisited.Ministers will tell the Chancellor that accounting tricks, such as delays to equipment purchases, to reduce the cost of defence, must end. They are more convinced than ever that they will need two new 50,000 tonne aircraft carriers – twice the size of the Illustrious currently deployed in the Gulf area – and a new assault ship to act as a floating base for future operations.. Norton Fitzwarren is the stuff of picture postcards: a cluster of listed medieval cottages, barns and churches.

But today its residents wait for the unpredictable consequences of a war thousands of miles away. Norton Fitzwarren is the stuff of picture postcards: a cluster of listed medieval cottages, barns and churches. But today its residents wait for the unpredictable consequences of a war thousands of miles away.
The small Somerset village is also home to the 200 elite Royal Marines that will spearhead the allied assault on the Taliban and Osama bin Laden’s camps from the Allied taskforce now assembling in the Gulf.Despite the bright autumn sunlight bathing the village yesterday, the families and residents fear for their sons, brothers, husbands, neighbours – the young troops who make up the 40 Commando Royal Marines.For Jane, the mother of one 21-year-old member of 40 Commando, Tony Blair’s warnings that British troops will die are painfully real.”I am so worried about him,” she said yesterday. “I fear he may be dropped into Afghanistan and left on his own to scout out the area. Although he is well trained, I dread to think what could happen to him.”Jane lives a world away from battle-scarred Afghanistan – a country whose own rich medieval history and once-famous fruit groves have been obliterated by two decades of war.