Mark Sedwill: The cabinet secretary's path from Afghanistan to Whitehall warfare

The most powerful official in government had been building up to the role for 30 years – then a string of secret briefings saw him become the third senior diplomat to be forced out since Johnson and Cummings moved to Downing Street. Kim Sengupta reports.

Mark Sedwill, the then-top civil servant at the Home Office, leaves the Houses of Parliament in 2014 (Reuters)

While in Afghanistan as Nato’s civilian chief, Mark Sedwill used to stress the need for trust and teamwork, “watching each other’s backs” and ensuring “top cover” from governments back home to chart a path through a very violent war and destabilising political turbulence in the region.

Those precautions served him well in forming an effective partnership with his two military counterparts, the formidable generals Stan McChrystal and David Petraeus, at a time of constant Taliban attacks which triggered a “surge” of US-led international forces to 140,000, while also searching for a way out of the long and bloody conflict.

Sedwill was viewed as having a “good war” and those of us who used to know him in Afghanistan watched with interest how smoothly Sir Mark, as he became, went on to rise through Britain’s diplomatic, security and political ranks to hold the job of both Cabinet Secretary and National Security Adviser (NSA).

That came to an end last week when it was announced he would leave both the posts after a sustained campaign of poisonous secret briefings by people in Downing Street with the aim, it appeared, of ensuring that the most senior jobs in Whitehall go to Brexiters.

Appearing before the National Security Strategy Committee, Sedwill wanted to make clear the circumstances surrounding his departure. Asked why he had resigned from the posts, he responded: “I haven’t resigned. The prime minister and I agreed I should step down, by agreement.” The reason, he said, was because Boris Johnson and he agreed it was time to split the two jobs. He was not asked why he did not stay on in one of the two posts.

Sedwill was asked about the briefings against him, especially the attempts to blame him for the failings in handling of the coronavirus pandemic. “It is never pleasant to find oneself, particularly as an official, in the midst of stories of that kind. We appear to be in an era where some of us are fair game in the media and I’m afraid it goes with the territory now,” he sighed.

“I don’t think it is ever pleasant in government, whether it is against ministers, between them and particularly against officials, when you have briefings to which you cannot really reply, particularly those that are off the record and sniping away. But it is a regrettable feature of modern politics, I’m afraid.” Sedwill was not asked who he thought the briefings came from.

David Frost, the chief negotiator with the European Union, and a Brexiter, will be the new National Security Adviser.

Sedwill had been permanent secretary at the Home Office and NSA at a time of repeated and lethal terrorist attacks, the Skripal poisoning, and the programme to rebalance the military. He was asked about comments that the “new National Security Adviser may not have the degree of security experience that you may have yourself” and also to describe “occasions when it was particularly useful ro you to have that security experience”.

Sedwill replied: “I am probably the worst person to ask because it sounds as though I am going to give myself a reference here,” before pointing out that he had spent 30 years preparing for the job and was the “first NSA to have run a big domestic department”. He did not need to remind the MPs that the Home Office was in charge of MI5.

David Frost, Sedwill pointed out, has diplomatic background as an ambassador [to Denmark] and that he will have a strong team behind him. He mentioned the reassuring factor of the strong team twice more in his evidence. In any case he will be there, he said, until September in the transition period while Frost continues with Brexit negotiations.

Lord King, the former defence secretary, wished that Sedwill would continue to provide his experience and expertise in security after leaving his job. Sedwill replied he would do so, as others have done, if required. But said: “I am only in my mid-50s, there are other activities I want to get involved in.”

Sedwill will be made a peer after leaving government service in September. The prime minister, he said, has asked him to chair a panel on global economic security when the UK assumes the G7 presidency. There have also been reports that Boris Johnson would push him as a candidate for the post of next Nato chief. However Jens Stoltenberg, the current Secretary General is not due to retire until 2022. And the post normally goes to former prime ministers or senior cabinet ministers. The last person to hold the post from the UK, George Robertson, was a former defence secretary.

Sedwill’s removal, and the manner in which it was orchestrated, was publicly condemned by a number of senior military, security and diplomatic figures. General Sir Richard Barrons the former chief of Joint Forces Command who served in Afghanistan, Iraq and Northern Ireland, told me “this has been presented by people in this government as a great move towards diversity. But it is not; it is a move for ‘chumocracy’. Someone in Boris Johnson’s inner circle is being moved higher up the inner circle. David Frost was a middle-ranking ambassador. He also dealt with strategy at the Foreign Office and so he will be good at taking a strategic view. But when it comes to matters of security, his knowledge is zero, and that is a matter of concern.”

Sir William Patey, who succeeded Sedwill as ambassador in Afghanistan, and was also ambassador to Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Sudan, said “It is totally unfair if some people are trying to blame Mark Sedwill and the civil service for what went wrong with the handling of coronavirus, and if that is being used in any way for Mark’s departure. That’s entirely self-serving and wrong.”

Sedwill is the third senior diplomat who has left public service since Cummings and Johnson entered No 10. Sir Kim Darroch, a former national security adviser, was effectively forced to resign as ambassador to Washington after diplomatic messages from him, critical about Donald Trump, were leaked, and Johnson failed to stand by him when he came under attack from the US president.

Sir Simon McDonald, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office is leaving in September. He too was the subject of negative briefings. None of the three sang enough from the government hymn sheet, in the view of some in Downing Street. Sedwill made a point of strongly defending Darroch when he was under pressure and after he resigned.

Sedwill is out and Cummings, who is taking a keen interest in reforming the security sector, has, it has emerged, been to the headquarters of MI5 and MI6, and will be meeting Ministry of Defence personnel, those from the SAS and SBS, and the military research laboratories at Porton Down.

At the end of the day, it appears that Sedwill simply did not get the “top cover” necessary to survive in the current deadly round of Whitehall warfare.