Afghanistan 'could destroy Nato'

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said a sceptical European public needed to be convinced the fight in Afghanistan was part of combating the worldwide terrorist threat, and cautioned that if other countries did not contribute to the mission it could spell the end of Nato.

“We must not – we cannot – become a two-tiered alliance of those who are willing to fight and those who are not,” he told a meeting of the world’s top defence officials in Munich last night.