Posted on 10/28/2007 5:12:17 AM PDT by Flavius
Gethin Chamberlain in Basra is given a simple and stark message from a senior British officer in Iraq: 'We have got it wrong'
It was as astonishing an admission as any that has emerged from the lips of a British officer in the four and a half years since the tanks rolled over the Iraqi border. The British Army, said the man sitting in a prefab hut in Britain's last base in the country, were tired of fighting.
Not only that: their very presence in Basra was now the problem.
"We would go down there [Basra], dressed as Robocop, shooting at people if they shot at us, and innocent people were getting hurt," he said. "We don't speak Arabic to explain and our translators were too scared to work for us any more. What benefit were we bringing to these people?"
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
The first article that I quoted, saying the target for handover was the end of 2006 was a press conference featuring Tony Blair and Nouri Al-Maliki. I think Maliki would be considered part of the Government of Iraq...
"Mar22: He [Dep MoD] said Iraqi commanders in southern Iraq were “surprised by the British announcing they would pull out 1,600 soldiers from Basra,” and responded by moving forward by several months a timetable to bring a new brigade of about 5,000 Iraqi soldiers into the southern city."
I note you didn't source this quote, but when I google it, it seems that you have only partially quoted what the story and the Iraqi Defence Minister actually said to give it a more negative spin.
"Iraq's defense minister said Wednesday his commanders were surprised when Britain recently announced plans to withdraw some of its troops from Iraq, but that his country's forces will be ready to replace them.
.....During his news conference at the Iraqi Embassy in London, Jassim said 2007 will be a crucial year for the ongoing training of Iraq's army so it can operate independently, without the routine support it now requires from coalition soldiers, artillery and air forces.
He said Iraqi commanders in southern Iraq were "surprised by the British announcing they would pull out 1,600 soldiers from Basra," and responded by moving forward by several months a timetable to bring a new brigade of about 5,000 Iraqi soldiers into the southern city.
But Jassim also said Blair's government has made it clear that "the departure of the British is dependent on the readiness of the Iraqis."
Of course this was just in reaction to an initial drawdown of forces, not that handover of Basra. That was actually delayed from April until September:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6986536.stm
"Brig Bashall, the commander of 1 Mechanised Brigade, said that after the six-month Operation Sinbad to impose security on Basra was finished in April "we could have come out and done the transition completely".
The decision to stay on longer was a result of "political strategy being played out at highest level," he added.
'Forces ready'
A spokesman for the MoD said the handover took place only once Iraqi forces had been fully trained.
He added: "The decision to hand over Basra Palace was part of a conditions-based transition, developed in consultation with the Iraqi government and our coalition partners.
"We handed Basra Palace over this month only when the conditions were right and the Iraqi forces were ready to take over.
"The government of Iraq decided in May it wanted to keep Basra Palace, and it then took time to form and train the Iraqi Palace Protection Force to the point that it could take over Basra Palace."
Like I said, the UK forces reductions are faster than the IA expected. The 14th was not scheduled to be formed until mid-2008. Not by GoI/MoD, MNF-I or MNSTC-I. Forces are being diverted. They have to divert combat units from combat zones to deal with the criminal problems in Basrah. The Iraqi MoD elements that are willing to comment make it clear that they did not expect the UK draw-down to be this fast.
The UK politicians are saying Basrah is ready.
The Iraqi Army is saying they are not.
Which is more authoritative about the IA? Some politicians in London or the IA?
I have been expecting UK pull out for over a year. To fill out forces in Afghanistan. UK just does not have a large enough Army for it’s commitments. That is what happens when you take too much of a peace-dividend. Same thing happened to the US which is why we are expanding our military...
No. I am far from ignorant on this subject. I track OOB and force developments for “The Long War Journal”.
UK politicians have been commiting the Royal Army to more than they have the forces to cover. Somebody in MoD finally got the politicians to decide which obligations were more important. Afghanistan and NATO won the decision. Not a real surprise there. Makes sense.
If you have been tracking OOB in Iraq and Afghanistan, then you know that overall UK commitments to Iraq have dropped about the same amount that UK commitments have increased in Afghanistan. Not a real surprise there. Makes sense.
The pace of the shift in forces and the apparent lack of coordination with the Iraqis at the operational level (vice political) is the surprise...
“gutless, ignorant freepers”
PS It is a dead give away that someone does not believe in their argument or position, when they resort to personnal attacks. Thank you for advising all readers that your position is untenable...
Until my company went in there. Then we wondered what all the fuss was about.
The US has also made pragmatic deals with former insurgents to further security.
It had to happen eventually. And it's paid off immensely.
You have my absolute respect, Sir, for your service.
My mistake.
Tagged the wrong person to reply to.
OK, just a mistake, then I take it back.
“Like I said, the UK forces reductions are faster than the IA expected.”
And I’ve already showed you how Al-Maliki initially envisaged the handover being at the end of 2006. Maybe he kept it secret from the Army, and they don’t watch the news.
“The UK politicians are saying Basrah is ready.
The Iraqi Army is saying they are not.”
Here’s a thread from the start of the month with Al-Maliki announcing the final handover of security responsablities ib Basra Province by the end of 2007:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1905365/posts
“We are prepared to take over security of Basra within two months and we will,” al-Maliki said, after the meeting in his Green Zone office. “Basra will be one of the provinces where Iraqi forces will completely take over security”
“Military leaders hope that Britain will remain in charge only of training Iraq troops and border guards, securing key supply lines and responding to emergencies when called on by local commanders.”
“The Iraqi MoD elements that are willing to comment make it clear that they did not expect the UK draw-down to be this fast.”
Who are these people and where are they commenting? Or are we just talking about anonymous ‘military sources’ cited in MSM reports? Probably along with the spin stories about Basra being in the grip of Shiite militias and death squads.
I’m not sure that I agree with your statement. Primaries are ugly... this one more so than most that I have seen... and that has been many seasons.
LLS
British troops give the US lessons in peacekeepingDespite their assurances that they would show the backwards Americans how it was done they ultimately came around to doing it our way.
By Michael Evans, Defence Editor
A TEAM of British Army counter-terrorist specialists has been giving America’s toughest warfighters in Iraq special lessons in the art of softly-softly peacekeeping. After a formal request from US Central Command, the team of 14 officers and senior non-commissioned officers visited all the key American divisions in Iraq to expound the British way of winning hearts and minds. The acknowledgment from the Americans that they might have something to learn from the British experience of dealing with internal security operations, like Northern Ireland, is not expected to lead to an immediate change in strategy.
Until now, the Americans, most of whom serve in heavyweight armoured divisions which fought in the conflict, have maintained their warfighting appearance, wearing helmets and flak jackets for protection.
Critics of the American approach to postwar peacekeeping in Iraq have claimed that the perceived hostile attitude of the US troops has antagonised the Iraqi people. They also point out that since the war officially ended on May 1 more than 50 American soldiers have been killed in almost daily attacks by pro-Saddam gunmen, compared with six British troops shot dead in one incident in southern Iraq in June.
The British team, now back from five weeks of instructing American officers in Iraq, tried to outline different options for dealing with the country’s internal security, described as the “non-lethal” approach. One member of the team from the Operational Training and Advisory Group (Optag), attached to the Army’s Land Command, said: “We gave advice about adopting a lower profile in internal security operations, such as trying the handle of a door before putting your boot in. It’s a different way of doing things.”
Lieutenant-Colonel Angus Loudon, 43, the second-in-command of the Optag team and a veteran of Northern Ireland, said that the object of the training courses was to pass on British “best practice” in handling patrols, vehicle checkpoints and house searches, after 35 years’ experience in Ulster, the Balkans, Afghanistan and now Iraq.
Most of the American troops in Iraq had not served on peacekeeping operations in the Balkans, Colonel Loudon said. Generally, America’s lighter forces had been deployed on such operations. But it was the armoured units, without experience in winning hearts and minds in post- conflict missions, which were deployed in Iraq.
Colonel Loudon dismissed suggestions that there was any direct link between the tough approach adopted by the Americans in Iraq and the casualty toll that they had suffered since May 1. There were many different factors involved, he said, not least that the Americans were responsible for a largely Sunni population, the same ethnic group as that of Saddam Hussein. The British were in the South, dominated by Shia communities.
During the special “softer-approach” courses, attended by about 550 American military instructors, the British team visited the 1st US Armoured Division in Baghdad, the 4th Infantry Division in Tikrit, the 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment in al- Ramadi, and the 101st Airborne Division in Mosul. Colonel Loudon and his fellow instructors taught how British troops in Ulster and other internal security operations carried out house searches, combining “friendliness with thoroughness”, and also urban and rural patrols, using low-level, not high-profile, tactics.
Colonel Loudon who described the British approach as “the non-use of lethal force”, said: “We were not saying the Americans had got it wrong. Every environment is different although there are common denominators . . . what we were offering was a wider choice of options.” He said that the Americans who attended the courses appeared to have found them useful:, “The US has a stronger requirement for force protection and soldiers are mandated to wear helmets and flak jackets. The British strike a different balance (soldiers started wearing berets once the conflict was over).”
Colonel Loudon said: “I know we do bang on about Northern Ireland, but our tactics in Ulster have been tweaked and adapted after our experiences in Bosnia and Kosovo, and also Afghanistan and Iraq. Obviously you can’t just take your Northern Ireland experience and drop it in Iraq.”
The team of 14 instructors included two members who took part in the war in Iraq, one serving with the 1st Battalion Royal Irish Regiment and the other with 16 Air Assault Brigade.
In a sign of growing frustration among American commanders over the continuing Iraqi attacks on US forces, Colonel David Teeples, of the 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment, said that it was virtually impossible to stop escalating booby-trap and bomb attacks on convoys. He said that about 25 hardcore Baath party officials in al-Ramadi, Falluja and Habbaniya were financing the attacks.
“We have been attacked by subversive elements and I believe that these subversive elements are young males that can be paid a lot of money and receive weapons from former regime loyalists,” he said.
“Gethin Chamberlain in Basra is given a simple and stark message
from a senior British officer in Iraq: ‘We have got it wrong’ “
Well, the old WWII term “defeatist talk” certainly still applies.
Even if not related, Gethin is certainly the spiritual offspring
of Neville Chamberlain.
Not ugly at all. I have not heard any personal attacks and that’s what makes a campaign ugly.
Please don’t attack Britain and British forces because of the jingoism of the British press. I think that all countries media like to praise their own militaries. This is no different in the US. The British forces cited in your article weren’t there to gloat but to try and help the Americans.
“Colonel Loudon dismissed suggestions that there was any direct link between the tough approach adopted by the Americans in Iraq and the casualty toll that they had suffered since May 1. There were many different factors involved, he said, not least that the Americans were responsible for a largely Sunni population, the same ethnic group as that of Saddam Hussein. The British were in the South, dominated by Shia communities”.
US forces under Petraeus have taken on board the classic counter-insurgency doctrine of hearts and minds and minimum acceptable force. It seems to have really paid off. The US military seems to have been astoundingly flexible and adaptive these last few years.
1. I have never said anything about the militias and Basrah. I have made it clear that I consider the problems in Basrah to be principly the criminal side (primarily smuggling gangs, think Chicago during prohabition). And that the early hand-off of Basrah is forcing a diversion from the combat provinces.
2. The ones that have commented adversly include Deputy MoD, IGFC Dep CoS, and the new General commanding Basrah Operational Command. The MoD and uniformed side are the ones that are scrambling on this. You know, the ones that actually have to do the job. As I said: “operational” side vice “political”.
3. The PM of Iraq may have the job of CINC but, he is not Iraqi MoD and he is not IA. The PM has been saying much and not necissarily doing the same. He is a politician and you know how you tell if a politician is lying? His lips are moving. A classic example is how he always says that he did not authorize a raid on JAM in Sadr City when all ISOF raids work from a target list that he approves. The PM is playing “good cop” to the MNF-I “bad cop” in public and much of what he says is BS.
4. The announcement of plans to turn over a province are meaningless until it actually happens. A year ago all 18 provinces were to be turned over by end year. Karbala was to turn over in Jul, then Aug, then Sep and now it to turn over on Monday. Ninawa was to turn over in Aug, Sep and they are still debating it. I have seen Anbar listed as due to turn over by end-year. The announcements of provincial turnovers are wrong more often than they are right. (Note: Basrah is listed as “partially ready” for turnover in the last Quarterly report. Link is in previous comments.)
5. Does the UK and Iraqi PMs want the turnover ASAP?
- Yes, the politicians want the turnover.
That is a very different question than: Is Basrah ready for turnover?
- Not according to the Iraqi Army and MNF-I. They need to clean up the IPs and finish getting the 14th IA Division on line. And they are diverting combat units from primary combat zones to do that. The Iraqi Army and Ministry of Defense was not planning to stand up the 14th Division until mid-2008 as of seven months ago and are scrambling to fix the mess that the politicians (UK and Iraqi) have dumped on them.
All of your cites go to politicians with an adgenda that wants to hand off Basrah. I a refering to the personnel that actually have to do the job.
The IA in Basrah, the third largest city in Iraq was all of one brigade until the 5-10 formed in Apr and the 5-10 is green. This compares to Mosul’s 2nd Division (4 experienced Bdes) with 3rd Divison (3 experienced Bdes and 4th planned) supporting. Basrah is not that much smaller than Mosul and clearly has insufficient forces.
Since the IA started jugling forces to cover this premature political move:
- the 1-10 Bde (corrupted) has been replaced with one of the only three cat 1 brigades (3-8 from Wasit),
- one of the three heavy brigades in the IA has been sent from Baghdad (3-9 Tank Bde from Baghdad),
- the headquarters assets from new forming 12th (Salahadin) have been diverted to the 14th,
- ISOF assets have been pulled from Ninawa, Anbar and Diwaniyah to form a new ISOF battallion in Basrah,
- a very senior (corps level) General has been sent from IGFC staff and has stood up the Basrah Operational Command,
- 3-14 IA Brigade has been moved up in que to be formed by end-year (vice Bde for Kirkuk), and
- A new IP Chief of Police has been appointed to clean up Basrah IP.
I am looking at this from the operational standpoint and you are quoting politicians. Politicians always ask for the impossible and then blame the operators when they do not get it...
P.S. I am not an amature at gathering information. I spent 22 years as a USN Intelligence Specialist and used to joke that I should get pro-pay for understanding “army-ese”. Much of my time was in the mid-east.
“I am looking at this from the operational standpoint and you are quoting politicians. Politicians always ask for the impossible and then blame the operators when they do not get it...”
But you’re not quoting anyone, and I’ve not been able to find any of the negative comments that you claim to have been made.
Of the military sources that I can find speaking on the subject:
http://www.usembassy.org.uk/iraq842.html
David Petraus:
“In the four southern provinces of Iraq under the British-led Multinational Division Southeast, the transition to overwatch is already well along, in fact. In three of the provinces - Dhi Qar, Maysan and Muthanna - the provincial governments have responsibility for security and Coalition forces are in overwatch. While there have been challenges and setbacks, most notably the tragic assassination of the Governor of Muthanna, Iraqis have generally been able to deal with the challenges with minimal acceptance - or minimal assistance, although help has been provided on occasion.
We expect the final province, subject to good coordination with the Iraqis and negotiations and discussions, also with those here and obviously in Multinational Division Southeast, but the final province, Basra, to transition later this fall or in the winter, though elements of the security structure, including establishment of an Iraqi special operations force unit which is ongoing, deployment of an Iraqi mechanized battalion and the swap of an Iraqi army brigade still need to be completed; and various political issues, including of course the Governor’s status, need to be sorted out as well.
But at this point, in all four southern provinces, Iraqi security forces, with limited Coalition assistance, are providing security in the face of militia challenges and Iranian efforts to achieve greater influence. There does appear to be a reasonable way ahead emerging, albeit with important work to be done.”
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,,2161451,00.html
General Mohan al-Fireji:
“Iraqi forces are already deployed and concentrated in the palace. “The Iraqi forces are ready to take security responsibility in Basra.”
Perhaps you could direct me to some of General Mohan’s more negative comments as a contrast?
Re-read your first quote. Notice the waffles.
“...subject to good coordination with the Iraqis and negotiations and discussions, also with those here and obviously in Multinational Division Southeast,...”
“...though elements of the security structure, including establishment of an Iraqi special operations force unit which is ongoing, deployment of an Iraqi mechanized battalion and the swap of an Iraqi army brigade still need to be completed; and various political issues, including of course the Governor’s status, need to be sorted out as well.”
Those collections of caviates are where the problems are and have been. Problems caused by 6-12mo acceleration of turnover. (Note, when a General Officer starts to waffle, things are nowhere near as good as they look. Otherwise, he would not be CYA’ing so much...)
Thank you for confirming my points...
“Problems caused by 6-12mo acceleration of turnover”
The turnover wasn’t accelerated. As repeatedly stated, it is actually 6 - 12 months later than originally envisioned.
“Thank you for confirming my points...”
I post multiple quotes from multiple sources, including the PM of Iraq, the overall commander of coalition forces in Iraq and the overall commander of Iraqi forces in Basra. You post zero quotes from anyone, but make some vague unsupported assertions that various people have spoken negatively. And this somehow confirms your point. Err, ok!
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