Marines to be pulled out of Afghanistan after three months

The Royal Marines are to be withdrawn from Afghanistan, three months after they were dispatched on their mission to help to root out al-Qa'ida and Taliban fighters, the Government announced yesterday.

Downing Street confirmed the withdrawal after reports that a statement on the subject was to be made to the Commons by Geoff Hoon, the Secretary of State for Defence, today.

In his statement, Mr Hoon is expected to confirm that Britain's contribution to the international security force guarding Kabul will be scaled down from today after command is handed to Turkish troops.

The 1,700 members of 45 Royal Marine Commando based at Bagram air base are likely to be back in Britain by mid-August. Their mission has been dogged with controversy, amid claims that their role had been exaggerated. They had little contact with terrorist fighters. Many al-Qa'ida and Taliban fighters are thought to have fled across the border to Pakistan.

Yesterday the Prime Minister's official spokesman confirmed the troops would be leaving but insisted the region was still important to Britain. "We will not walk away from Afghanistan. If there are practical problems [with aid] we will look at those," he said.

He paid tribute to the British commandos, saying: "The predictions that they were going into an impossible situation, that they couldn't combine peace-keeping and fighting a war at the same time have proved to be wrong."

The Conservatives seized on the announcement as evidence that Britain's forces were overstretched. Bernard Jenkin, the shadow Secretary of State for Defence, said: "It is clear that the shrinking military under Labour is now too small for the Government to maintain their commitments.

"This underlines the Government's confirmation in the House of Commons on Monday that they have scrapped the pledge to increase the Army by 3,300 men, which was promised in the 1998 Defence Review.

"The Army's strength presently stands at 100,900 – a shortfall of nearly 8,000. The Government originally intended a military commitment to Afghanistan of only three months. We are now in the sixth month and we are likely to become committed to hundreds of troops in Afghanistan for months and possibly years to come."

But the Ministry of Defence insisted the withdrawal was in line with Britain's original three-month deployment. A MoD spokesman said: "We have said since they first deployed in April that they would be deployed for three months or so. So three months later, they are returning."

About 1,000 of the 1,300 British troops with the International Security Assistance Force are also expected to be withdrawn once the handover to Turkey has been completed. Fewer than 500 troops will remain.

The first British troops were sent to Afghanistan in November when 100 members of the special forces were sent to help to secure the strategically important Bagram base.

The MoD maintained that the marines' mission had been successful, pointing to the destruction of a series of munitions dumps and the clearing of cave complexes used by al-Qa'ida and Taliban fighters.