Examination Witnesses (Questions 140-159)
DR BARRY
POSEN, PROFESSOR
CHRIS BELLAMY
AND MR
PAUL BEAVER
4 JUNE 2003
Q140 Jim Knight: Do you think our
kit could have done it, given that it is a nice tarmac road up
to Basra, and airfields were not such an issue as they could have
been?
Mr Beaver: Airfields were not
really an issue where we were once that operational requirement
had been met. It was more the sustainability of it. We have yet
to get into service the wheeled tanker vehicles that the government
announced the order for a couple of months ago, so we would not
have had that level of logistical sustainability.
Professor Bellamy: As it turned
out, the British ended up working with the US Marines which was
very fortunate because doctrinally and in many respects the British
Armed Forces are closer to the US Marines than to the Army—indeed,
the British Armed Forces are about the same size as the US Marines—so
that was a fortunate accident, I think. We are able to operate
much more easily with the US Marines than we are with the US Army.
Q141 Mr Hancock: In the planning
stage when northern Iraq was still a possibility and it was down
to us to do it, have you picked up any indication at any time
at all that there was serious consideration given to allowing
Turkey to occupy at least part of northern Iraq as part of a deal
to go in from the north, or was that definitely never on the agenda?
Mr Beaver: I always thought there
must be a deal. I could not see why Turkey would want to allow
that to happen unless they got something out of it. I could not
see what the Turks were going to get out of the deal unless there
was something there, but I think politically even the most hawkish
people in the White House would have seen the flaw in that. In
terms of providing perhaps flanked protection or some rear area
support, however, certainly there would be room to work with the
Turks but crossing the border in would have been very difficult
because it would have alienated the Kurdish population.
Q142 Chairman: You talked about an
affinity between the British Army and the US Marines. What happened
between 1991 and now because the original plans, as far as I recall,
with Schwartzkopf was that the British Army would be working with
the Marines and then we objected because the US Marine Corps does
not operate alongside us in NATO and the reason we argued why
we should go along with the American Army was because we in NATO
had worked more closely with them. What has happened to reverse
the argument, because you are now saying we are closer to the
Marines Corps?
Professor Bellamy: What has happened
is that the Cold War, when we were lined up alongside the American
Army in Germany, is over and we have a new doctrine of expeditionary
warfare—
Q143 Chairman: More exercising?
Professor Bellamy: Yes, with a
lot more close discussion with the US Marines, and now on doctrinal
matters we take our lead from Quantico and the Marines so things
have changed in that 10/12 years.
Dr Posen: There is another bit
of symbiosis here between the Marines and the British in that
the Marines operate on a somewhat shorter bankroll than the rest
of the American military, so there may be some closer technological
relationship of quality and quantity. I do think there is a set
of questions you want to ask down this line about the British
capability to go north, had they been asked. Part of the question
is, as we have said, about line of communication, it is just the
ability to get material up there, but I think it is noteworthy
that the Americans had essentially a corps headquarters commanding
two divisions. Now, you do that because you are trying to bring
in lots of very high level information: you are trying to co-ordinate
a terrific amount of combat power outside of divisions—rocket
supports, helicopters, all this kind of stuff—and this generates
a big tail. This is a big thing to run, this intercorps headquarters,
which at least to the naked eye appears to be a rather small force
package, and what would be useful is to try and figure out how
much of that capability that the Americans dragged along with
them is there in your institutions, and do you have these capabilities
at all? For example, the American Air Force proudly claims to
have used the product of almost fifty different space satellites
for this war, and it is at corps level where you have the ability
basically to bring all this intelligence from the outside together.
Is this capability there in the British military deployable and
able to go 200 or 300 miles and still do this operation? These
are questions you want to ask. They are not necessarily capabilities
that Britain wants but I think you want to ask whether you have
these capabilities.
Q144 Rachel Squire: Can I pick up
on some of the points you have made about doctrine? You talked,
Professor Bellamy, about the end of the Cold War and the move
towards expeditionary warfare and how the US Marines and the British
Army were in many senses more compatible. My original question
was how compatible are British and American war fighting doctrines,
but I would extend that now to ask is the reality that the war
fighting doctrines are more compatible in different sections of
the Armed Forces of the United States and the United Kingdom than
in others? Taking your comments about the US Army, for instance,
I made a memorable visit not so long ago to the National Army
Training Centre at Fort Irwin which was very impressive but with
rather a different outlook, a very "mass combat" outlook,
from the one we are used to, so I am interested in your views
on the doctrine compatibility between British and America in respect
of all three main armed services.
Professor Bellamy: The United
States Armed Forces are so much bigger than ours that jointery—to
use the current jargon term—is far less advanced within
the American Armed Forces as a whole. The United States Navy,
Army and Air Force all approach things in quite different ways,
still. The United States Marines has within it ground, sea and
air elements. Talking about compatibility, remember it was the
United States Marines who bought the Harrier. The United States
Marines are also the same size as the British Armed Forces. If
one were to be extremely radical and looking as reorganising the
British Armed Forces as one force the United States Marines might
be a very good model, but I do not want to get into that. That
is the reason why British defence doctrine, to use the title of
the slim volume which has recently been published, has much in
common with the approach of the US Marines. The US Marines, of
course, also have a long history of expeditionary operations and
those are the type of operations that the British increasingly
expect to be involved in. It is not surprising that they are the
people to whom we now feel the closest, although that was not
the case 12 years ago.
Q145 Rachel Squire: Is there any
indication with the other services it is becoming more compatible
with the British Forces or less so, the relationship between the
US Navy and the British Navy or the US Air Force and the Royal
Air Force?
Professor Bellamy: The US Navy
and the British Navy have worked together, particularly in the
submarine area, a great deal. There are also similarities between
the particular services of the two countries. In terms of day-to-day
operations it was helpful, and this has been a comment made by
many people who served in the late Gulf War, that we were working
with the US Marines rather than with the US Army. I have no doubt
that we could have worked with the US Army, of course.
Q146 Rachel Squire: To what extent
do you think the friendly-fire incidents that occurred were the
product of either incompatible doctrines or incompatible equipment?
Mr Beaver: There are a number
of incidents which happened and in my mind at least two of them
were completely avoidable and are as a result of a complete lack
of good discipline, professionalism and training on the United
States' part. The destruction of a Tornado GR4 by a Patriot battery
when that aircraft was using the very latest IFF, Identification
Friend or Foe technology, transmitting the right frequency in
the safety corridor in case the transmissions were not picked
up, talking to the AWACS aircraft, that was talking to the ground
command and still the US soldier pressed the button. I believe
that is outrageous. I believe that the A10 aircraft, which twice
strafed a British convoy, even though soldiers were carrying aloft
the Union flag, I presume that was because the Americans were
not trained in that. The thing that the British Army discovered
on 6 January, which alarmed the British Army enormously, was the
fact that the American Air Force had not been taught British vehicle
recognition before this operation. They had been taught to recognise
their own vehicles, hence when British vehicles were kitted out
with recognition symbols. All of our vehicles were marked as American
vehicles, in that way it was hoped there would be a way of trying
to decrease the risk of friendly fire. We have to also point out
it was not just them hitting us, they managed to destroy three
of their own combat aircraft, an F16, an F15 and an F18, probably
a helicopter, they lost a Patriot missile system because it tried
to engage one of their own aircraft, who just retaliated—probably
the thing most of us would have done. We are four years away from
having a technical means on vehicles that can talk to vehicles
or aeroplanes. The problem we have with it is although there is
the solution and the chairmanship of that Working Party is UK,
the four nations: Britain, France, Germany and the United States,
have to agree and there are two nations at the moment that do
not want to talk to the other two nations about doing it because
they have different political views. The system is perfectly feasible
but you have to remember at the end of the day a British Challenger
engaged another British Challenger and there was no way of stopping
that, no technical means of stopping that. We had tired, exhausted,
possibly frightened, tank crews, they saw what they thought was
the right target. It is still under investigation, we do not know
all of that, we only know that the vehicle was completely destroyed.
The result of friendly fire—I do not like the term because
I cannot believe any fire can be friendly—blue-on-blue engagements
in my mind is something which has happened throughout history
and will continue to happen because at the end of the day there
are people involved and we are as human beings sometimes fallible.
Q147 Rachel Squire: I can accept
that point but when you were talking about equipment identification
earlier surely was that not one of the lessons to be learned from
the friendly fire incident of 1991?
Mr Beaver: There has been a programme
since 1991 which has not had perhaps the funding from her Majesty's
Treasury that those involved in it might wish to see. I believe
about six months ago Chairman, there was a Committee who looked
at combat identification.
Q148 Rachel Squire: It is not just
a United Kingdom issue, it is also a US issue.
Mr Beaver: It is an issue of coalition.
If we are going to be fighting in a coalition, which we are undoubtedly
going to be doing, we must make sure that the systems are compatible.
At the moment we do not have the capability of talking on the
radios to each other. The classic example was four years ago in
Kosovo, where British paratroopers were being flown in by Royal
Air Force Chinook helicopters and they were escorted by Apaches
from the US Army. They actually did not expect the Apaches to
be there, they could not talk to them and they were really worried
when they put down the forces that they could not tell them where
they were going and the fact they were friendly forces. If we
cannot get that right it is going to be a while before we get
combat ID right. Combat ID is a major concern but it has to be
done on a coalition-wide basis, it has to be done so that at least
the British and Americans talk together. Who knows, we may well
be going to war in a coalition or going on operations in the Congo
with the French, so we have to be able to talk to the French as
well.
Ms Squire: In their language!
Chairman: This is the question
that will get you all on television tonight and Mr Jones as well
I suspect.
Q149 Mr Jones: The issue of weapons
of mass destruction, to what extent was the finding and securing
of weapons of mass destruction part of the actual campaign? Two
other brief points, why do you think the coalition have failed
to find significant evidence of the WMD to date? What will be
the fallout, do you think, if there are not significant finds
of WMD in terms of the legitimacy of the overall campaign operation?
Mr Beaver: This is a difficult
one. Can I start the ball rolling? How much was it part of the
military campaign? I do not believe it was a major part of the
campaign at all. I believe the military planners had a job to
do and that was to get to the enemey's centre of gravity and destroy
the enemy. War fighting is a really nasty business, we are talking
about, to use the old parlance, closing with Her Majesty's enemies
and killing them. Looking for weapons of mass destruction on the
way, yes, maybe, possibly but it was certainly not the primary
or I would imagine the secondary thought in General Franks's mind.
Q150 Mr Jones: I accept that the
main purpose was to secure Baghdad, was it part of the plan in
terms of Phase III or Phase IV?
Mr Beaver: It must be part of
Phase IV. There were 87 sites that have been identified that have
all been visited. I still have that sort of feeling that it is
still a bit soon, it has only been two months. After all we are
still finding relics of the Second World War 60 years later in
Germany, Britain and the Low Countries. I have a distinct impression
we have given Saddam Hussein so much notice that something is
going to happen that any sensible dictator would have put his
weapons of mass destruction—if he had them—out of
harms way in another country, in such a location we have yet to
find them, a variety of places. I think it is early days to say
there are no weapons of mass destruction. I would like to have
seen some from the point of view of the justification. In terms
of legitimacy I think the soldiers that I have talked to who have
come back believe they did a good thing, they destroyed an appalling
dictator and they were able to rid that country of that person.
In terms of the legitimacy I am not too sure. I think I would
leave it at that from my perspective.
Dr Posen: For this meeting I was
reviewing some of the briefings from the war and several times
this question was asked directly and senior briefers said, our
notion of the war is we fight the war first and we look for weapons
of mass destruction second. I credit what Paul has said, fighting
a war is a pretty hard business and doing this kind of thing along
the way may have seemed complicated. I think if you take seriously
WMD as the rationale for the war then they should have tried to
do this complicated thing regardless. The purpose of this war
was to make sure that these weapons do not end up in the wrong
hands, they could just as easily have ended up in the wrong hands
in the middle of the chaos of a war in which they were not picked
up at the right time as Saddam Hussein deliberately giving them
to somebody. I personally think while I understand why they made
this calculation this is another part of the plan I would have
considered to be under resourced.
Q151 Mr Jones: I accept it was not
part of the campaign in terms of the main substance, the main
purpose. Have you come up with any evidence that, for example,
there were certain sites that were either targeted or it was imperative
they got to very quickly because they thought WMD was there? If
it was going to be used it would be very important to destroy
those sites or get there very quickly?
Dr Posen: In the light of what
they said and what they have not said. What they do not talk about
very much is special operations. We know there was a big special
operations component in this war. One would be entitled to suspect
that special operations people were trying to get to sites that
intelligence suggested were promising. That is a question that
you would have a better chance of getting an answer on than I
would.
Q152 Chairman: No, we would not.
Dr Posen: I said a "better
chance". The second thing is that if you look at the list
of targets they were concerned about what they thought might be
promising delivery systems for chemical and biological weapons,
particularly everything they thought was associated with a missile,
and they claimed they were going after those things. I credit
them with their word but I think it is pretty striking if you
look at what has been said in these briefings about when short
range surface-to-surface air missiles were still fired and when
large stocks of them were discovered they were being fired fairly
late in the war which does not say they did not try and get these
things, it may say they did not put as much effort into it as
they implied or it may just be these are very, very hard things
to find. I tend to think they are just very, very hard things
to find. The inattentiveness to the WMD sites while the fight
was going while understandable in a pragmatic strictly military
sense it is not understandable in terms of the larger strategic
logic of the war. I personally think there is some kind of issue
there. On the failure to find weapons of mass destruction already
I think it is a bold person indeed who is prepared to stand up
and say, they are never going to find any because there are not
any. It does seem to me there is something else that you can say
that is fair, if these systems are hidden away as well as they
would need to be hidden to have evaded our search so far the adversary
had no intention to use them during the war. I am not sure we
will ever get an answer as to why that was so but I think that
bears on the original political calculation for the war, because
the original political calculation for the war suggested that
the other guy, Saddam Hussein & Co were extremely ferocious,
they were holding these weapons for some last ditch defence and
if he has them this is certainly not the way they were organised
to be used. That raises some questions.
Professor Bellamy: I have very
little to add to that. I go back to my previous reference, you
shoot the wolf nearest the sledge. Your aim is to win the battle,
to capture the centre of gravity and you are very, very wary that
the Iraqis might launch chemical weapons at you, therefore you
go for surface-to-surface missiles, you go for multiple rocket
launchers, you go for artillery, you go for anything that might
launch weapons of mass destruction. Bunkers and storage sites
where WMD might be stored but which are not obviously being deployed
to be used are a secondary priority and you would isolate such
a site, secure it and then go and inspect it later. I think that
is the approach that was used.
Q153 Mr Jones: There has been a lot
of discussion recently about the chain of command in terms of
the Iraqi Armed Forces, about how they would be used? That was
possibly one of the reasons why they were not used. Have you come
across any evidence that orders were given or there was some kind
of break down in command?
Professor Bellamy: I understand
that Saddam's son Uday was placed in charge of weapons of mass
destruction forces. The same question was raised in the previous
Gulf War, did they not use them because they were deterred or
because they were overrun so quickly. I think if the Iraqis had
had any intention of using weapons of mass destruction they would
probably have been able to get a few off, but that is speculation.
Mr Beaver: They managed to fire
16 surface-to-surface missiles in Kuwait. If they wanted to do
it that would have been a target that they would have been able
to use.
Q154 Patrick Mercer: The thing that
used to puzzle me about all this, and I wonder if you have a view
about it, why was their nuclear, biological and chemical warfare
protection kit so far forward and why was it in the trenches with
them? I assume they knew we did not have the capability. What
is your thought on that?
Mr Beaver: I remember seeing footage
of it as far forward as Nasiriyah and certainly in some areas
in Basra they had the equipment there. If we put our own experience
on to that then you have that equipment because you believe the
enemy has it or because you are going to use it yourself. There
was some talk about the United States using CS gas, if you use
CS gas you would use a respirator, you would not need to have
a full chemical suit. I just wonder how long that equipment had
been there. It would be interesting to see the sell by date on
it perhaps.
Q155 Mr Hancock: I am interested
in the ideas that you might have of why they did not use them
if they had them?
Mr Beaver: I personally do not
believe that Saddam Hussein had any intention of using them. If
you look at the way he used them before, he had used them against
his own people, he had used them in one part of the campaign in
the far peninsula, when Iranian forces were so close to Basra
that it seemed they were going to overwhelm them. That was a different
sort of war, he was using everything in that war, he was using
his artillery, he was using his helicopters dug in and firing
from static positions, there was a sort of last ditch stand. I
did not see anything in his military planning or his military
execution that indicated anything like the defences that were
put in place in 1980 to 1988.
Q156 Mr Hancock: That poses the question,
one of the lessons of Kosovo was that nobody really had got to
grips with the psyche of Milosevic, do you think we were equipped
well enough to understand the senior echelons within Iraq and
once again the security and intelligence service did not really
know their enemy well enough?
Mr Beaver: One of the problems
we had was a lack of human intelligence because of the nature
of the regime. Normally in regimes you would normally expect there
to be people in place you could use, there would be sleeping agents,
there would agents of one sort or another and you would be able
to get good human intelligence that would give you the ability
to be able to profile these people properly. I am not saying somebody
sitting watching a video of them saying, he is not looking too
good today and not knowing if that was actually today's video
tape. There was a lack of human intelligence. We found that before,
that is not the first time that has happened.
Q157 Mr Hancock: That happened with
Milosevic. In such a short period of time it appears we have fallen
into the same trap again.
Mr Beaver: Is it a trap we can
do anything about or is it something we have difficulty in dealing
with?
Q158 Mr Hancock: You were not finding
weapons of mass destruction but you were surprised or the American
and British troops on the ground were surprised when they found
mass graves of people who we knew had been killed 12 years ago,
presumably he had to bury them somewhere, but we seem to have
spent a lot of time digging up the bodies of people we knew had
been killed—for all the right humanitarian reasons. It appeared
to me, and I am sure to a lot of people, this was once again a
distraction because they were unable to find the weapons of mass
destruction?
Mr Beaver: I wonder whether it
was the fact there were television pictures of them, and it was
something that was televisual and we were able to see it?
Q159 Syd Rapson: Would you also agree
that if our troops were encumbered by protective suits and that
was very difficult in the heat and the Americans, the British
and the journalists were suffering by putting on this kit every
five minutes thinking there was going to be an attack the military
planners believed 100% that there were weapons of mass effect
available and could be used, they actually believed that, and
they were not playing a game of knowing it was not true but playing
to the audience?
Mr Beaver: Certainly all of the
people I know in the military and certainly in terms of what I
have seen there was a perceived and real threat that would be
chemical or biological. I do not think there is a nuclear threat,
there may be a radiological concern from a terrorist perspective.
Everybody that I have talked to sincerely believes that there
was a threat. A lot of time and effort was spent in training to
do that. Journalists were made to go through the training process.
Several were removed from theatre because they did not do it and
did not think it was necessary and they were taken out of the
embedded system.
| 
