Des Browne, defence secretary, has rejected any correlation between the deaths of 14 British military personnel in this weekend's air crash in Afghanistan and concerns that the troops are under-resourced in the country.
The crash, allied to yesterday's intense fighting in southern Afghanistan, will provide further ammunition for critics who accuse the government of badly mishandling the military engagement in the country.
The RAF Nimrod MR2 crashed on Saturday, killing 12 air personnel from 120 Squadron based at RAF Kinloss in Scotland, a Royal Marine and a soldier.
An inquiry has been launched into why the reconnaissance aircraft came down. But Mr Browne stressed yesterday that the RAF had an ''exemplary'' record when it came to maintaining its aircraft and the Nimrod had a very good safety history.
The defence secretary stressed the crash appeared unrelated to the pressures on troops in Afghanistan, saying "from the earliest time that we knew of this accident, the indications were very clear that this had been some sort of tragic accident".
He accused the Taliban of "propaganda" in its claims that it had shot down the Nimrod. "The Taliban regularly lie in response to events in Afghanistan," Mr Browne told the BBC.
Group Captain Chris Birks, station commander at RAF Kinloss, said the safety limits on flying hours were being adhered to in Afghanistan. Stressing the good track record of the Nimrod, he said the crash appeared to have been caused by a technical fault.
The apparent accident came a day after a soldier was killed in Afghanistan's Helmand province following an attack by insurgents. It brings the total number of British troops killed in Afghanistan since 2001 to 36.
Critics of the government's handling of the military campaign in Afghanistan argue that the 5,500 British troops in the country were sent on an ostensibly peace-keeping mission, to maintain stability after the defeat of the Taliban in 2001, as part of the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force.
Now the troops are being pitched into battle with the Taliban, in one of the most violent areas of the country at the heart of Afghanistan's opium poppy area.
Mr Browne insisted that the government had always been aware of the dangers of the Afghanistan operation, in spite of his predecessor John Reid's prediction that the troops might be able to return home without a single shot having been fired.
He said: "The nature of the troops and the configuration of those troops we've put on to the ground in Afghanistan and the support that we've given them [are] I think very clear evidence that we understood the danger of this [mission]."
