Tory purge begins? Hammond among Brexit rebel MPs thrown out of Conservative party

British PM Boris Johnson appears to be purging his party after losing a no-deal Brexit vote in the House of Commons. Former Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond is the first on the chopping block.

Hammond was one of the 21 Tories who voted in favor of the motion, put forth by Sir Oliver Letwin and Labour MP Hilary Benn on Tuesday evening, to debate an extension of Brexit to January 31 and take the no-deal option off the table. Johnson threatened them all with expulsion from the party, and appears to be making good on that threat.

All 21 "rebels" have been thrown out of the Conservative Party, the BBC reported citing sources inside the government on Tuesday evening. This includes Hammond, Ken Clarke, Greg Clark, David Gauke, Justine Greening, and Nicholas Soames, among others.

Soames, grandson of Winston Churchill, said he will not stand in the upcoming snap election, after being expelled from the party he represented for 37 years. He has been MP for Mid Sussex since 1997, and the MP for Crowley for nearly 14 years before that.

'Chaos unseen since WWII': UK parliament subverts democracy, leaves pre-Brexit Britain ungoverned

The step closer to blocking a no-deal Brexit "effectively takes the Brexit process out of the hands of [Prime Minister] Boris Johnson" and places it in the hands of the opposition and the Tory rebels, former MP and RT contributor said following the vote on Tuesday.

The 328-301 vote was not a victory for Johnson's government, and according to Galloway, a sign that tomorrow's vote could mark "two government defeats over Brexit in two consecutive days, largely at the hands of their own rebels."

The Parliament will vote on Wednesday to determine whether a no-deal Brexit will be permitted, and whether a general election will be held next month.

It is chaos in Parliament. Britain is effectively now ungoverned just weeks before we're supposed to leave the European Union... Not since Hitler was at the Channel ports in 1940 and Chamberlain was brought down and replaced by Sir Winston Churchill has Britain been in a more chaotic and precarious place.

Meanwhile, the pro-Remain Parliament is almost guaranteeing they'll get the worst possible deal, journalist Neil Clark told RT, noting that "it's just basic common sense that if you're going to any negotiations...and you tell the person you're negotiating with that you will in no circumstances leave without a deal, then you're not likely to get a very good deal, because there's no incentive for the other side to make concessions."

Clark sees the conflict as a clash between direct democracy - the 2016 referendum that gave the country Brexit in the first place - and the indirect democracy of a pro-Remain Parliament.

"Time after time in our history, and particularly in recent years, we've seen Parliament actually subverting what the public wanted, whether it's war with Iraq...whether it's privatization, issue after issue Parliament has taken a different line on things than the public."

I think people have had enough in Britain. People are sick of this. People just want Brexit to happen... Even Remainers I think are the same - they just want this to be finished off now, it's gone on far too long.

While polls show Johnson's government is "not terribly popular, the opposition Labour party is even less popular," journalist George Szamuely told RT. As long as the Conservatives form some kind of "tactical alliance" with the Brexit Party in order to avoid facing off against each other during the general election, Johnson is likely to come out on top - especially as he has "withdrawn the whip from everybody who has voted against the government" on Brexit, Szamuely predicted. "He's gambling everything on the general election."

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The deal, which took months of negotiations, still requires President Trump's approval, Reuters reports. Afghan President Ashram Ghani has been briefed on the accord and will reportedly look it over in detail before weighing in.

If signed, the deal will prohibit the Taliban from allowing militants to use Afghanistan to plan attacks on the United States or its allies, Reuters reported. The agreement also includes a provision for "intra-Afghan" talks to end the conflict between the Taliban and Kabul's western-backed government.

Ghani has met with special envoy for Afghanistan reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad and plans to "study and assess" the specifics of the agreement, according to Reuters.

A spokesman told reporters that "for us, a meaningful peace or a path to a meaningful peace is the end of violence and direct negotiation with the Taliban."

However, according to a report by the New York Times, some White House advisers have proposed secretly expanding the CIA presence in Afghanistan if troops are withdrawn. Some officials told the paper they want CIA-backed forces in the country as part of a counterterrorism force. They claim it could quell concerns that the US will be left with little ability to prevent terrorist groups from using Afghanistan as a base of operations. The Times said it based the report off interviews with a half-dozen of current or former officials briefed on the discussions yet neither the CIA nor the White House confirmed the reports.