Examination of Witness (Questions 320-339)
AIR MARSHAL
BRIAN BURRIDGE
CBE
11 JUNE 2003
Q320 Jim Knight: In
summary, this phase 4 work, which is not complete by any means,
certainly the transition from war fighting into this sort of area,
is an area where we can look particularly carefully for lessons
learned. There are gaps and things we could do better.
Air Marshal Burridge:
Sure, both in capability terms, the doctrinal aspects, intellectual
aspects, yes.
Q321 Jim Knight: And
across the coalition.
Air Marshal Burridge:
Yes; sure.
Q322 Mr Hancock: I
was interested to read about the Americans having oil workers,
engineers to secure the oil fields and have them working again
fairly quickly and they were actually in Kuwait prior to the action
taking place. I am a little surprised that someone did not anticipate
that the water and electricity supplies would be fundamentally
important to getting the local population on the side of the coalition
forces and that there were no people available, engineers, for
you. If they were there to get the oil fields working pretty quickly,
why was it not part of the planning of the immediate aftermath
to make sure the right personnel were available to get the water
and electricity working again?
Air Marshal Burridge:
If I may just correct you about oil, there were contractors there
ready to deal with oil fires, but there were no contractors there
ready to deal with the regeneration of oil production. That was
handled by the same overarching contract.
Q323 Mr Hancock: I
have read quite recently and I am sure I saw on a television broadcast
close to the end of the war that these engineers to work in the
oil fields were actually in Kuwait waiting to go into Iraq and
went in fairly quickly after they were secured. They were not
flown from the States or from Europe, they were actually there
waiting to go.
Air Marshal Burridge:
I am not aware of that. In order to get power running in Basra,
we had to get oil moving because there are three major power stations:
one is operated by crude oil direct from the oil field; one is
operated by gas and one is operated by diesel and gas. So we had
to get a refinery going and be able to pump crude oil. There was
civilian expertise available to do that, but I am talking a couple
of people, not huge numbers. We simply did not know how bad the
infrastructure was, how bad the electricity supply was and how
bad the water supply was.
Q324 Mr Hancock: Did
your intelligence tell you that you would not have had the support
of the local population early on because of what had happened
to the infrastructure and that they were going to be significant
problems for the local population?
Air Marshal Burridge:
The major problem for the civilian population in southern Iraq
was in 1991, the fact that they rose up with the expectation of
coalition support which was not there and they suffered the consequences
in a very bad way. That was the major driver as far as the people
of Basra were concerned.
Q325 Mr Hancock: I
have just been passed a note; this is not a trick question. The
suggestion is that engineers were there but the security environment
was too dangerous for them to operate in and that there was some
nervousness about whether or not they could be properly protected;
cars were being stolen and shot at, etc. Is there any truth in
that, that engineers to do the work were actually there but we
could not properly protect them?
Air Marshal Burridge:
I am not aware of that; no, I am not aware of that.
Q326 Chairman: Perhaps
you could find out and drop us a note.
Air Marshal Burridge:
I am not sure I have the competence to answer that question.
Q327 Mr Hancock: Were
you not faced with the dilemma of not being able to protect engineers?
Air Marshal Burridge:
Sorry; I can answer that question. I thought you were asking for
numbers of engineers.
Q328 Mr Hancock: No,
I am asking whether you, as the senior British officer, were asked
to protect these people and your advice was that you could not
do that?
Air Marshal Burridge:
No. I can answer that now. I was not asked specifically about
oil contractors, but the mission was to provide a secure environment
and we had PowerGen come over and advise us on the electricity
system at about this time.
Q329 Mr Hancock: Within
your command area you had no engineers capable of putting on the
water or electricity supplies faster than they did and if they
were there the reason they did not do it was not because you could
not guarantee their security?
Air Marshal Burridge:
No, security was not the issue.
Q330 Mr Hancock: It
was not an issue.
Air Marshal Burridge:
No; no.
Q331 Mr Howarth: Turning
to the situation in Basra, to what extent was the UK assigned
Basra because we could not have logistically sustained a force
at a greater distance from Kuwait?
Air Marshal Burridge:
A number of factors applied when it came to designating an area
for UK forces. The first was that original planning had assumed
a northern option. When we changed from a northern to a southern
option in early January, then our time lines for deployment changed
and the time it would take for us to arrive, bearing in mind that
we did not know when this was going to start because at that stage
the progress through the UN to a second resolution was indeterminate
really. So we had to construct a plan that would make full use
of our combat power, but would be sufficiently flexible not to
constrain timing. That is the first point. The second point is
that there is a limit to UK's logistics which yes, we could have
taken an armoured brigade further north, but it is a limiting
factor, there is no doubt about that.
Q332 Mr Howarth: Was
it ever a realistic proposition that we could have entered from
the north, given the length of the supply line we would have had
to maintain and, as Paul Beaver suggested to us, it would have
taken every Royal Engineer in the Army to sustain it.
Air Marshal Burridge:
From a logistics standpoint it would have been very challenging,
but the arrangement under which we would have gone there is that
the US would have provided most of the logistic support. It is
a very long line of communication through some difficult country.
Q333 Mr Howarth: It
was actually rather fortuitous that there was a change of plan
in January which put us in the south with that very much reduced
supply line.
Air Marshal Burridge:
It reduced the logistic risk.
Q334 Mr Howarth: You
told us that had the original plan been adhered to, then the United
Kingdom forces would have been supported by US logistics. That
would suggest that no problem of inter-operability was ever envisaged
between United Kingdom and United States forces, radios and communications
and all the rest of it. The idea that there was a problem of inter-operability
was not one of the reasons why the UK was assigned Basra on its
own.
Air Marshal Burridge:
That is correct.
Q335 Mr Howarth: You
were perfectly confident throughout the operation that inter-operability
was working well.
Air Marshal Burridge:
Yes, because provided you use your forces to make them a sufficient
size, a division is ideal, then most of the inter-operability
problems are internal, because you are a national division that
is not a problem. If you try to mix and match units within a brigade,
for example, then you are giving yourself the most testing circumstances.
Q336 Mr Howarth: Is
there not a message for us arising out of this, which is that
because of our logistics capability, there is a limit to the kind
of operations in which we might be able to take part in the future?
Air Marshal Burridge:
Sorry, could you say that again?
Q337 Mr Howarth: Our
limited logistics capability—great people, it is not their
competence, it is the size of them—could be a serious limitation
in the future when conducting such operations.
Air Marshal Burridge:
No, I do not see it as a serious limitation. It is a factor you
use when deciding what tasks you are going to do and how you are
going to do them. The area that I believe is lacking in our logistic
set-up as it stands is this business of asset tracking which I
mentioned earlier. From the point of view of balancing logistics
with combat power, then they are reasonably well balanced. The
two shift around as different things happen, but there is no suggestion
that we have a degree of combat power which we cannot deploy anywhere
because we do not have the logistics to do it.
Q338 Mr Howarth: What
we are talking about here is something specific which is the lines
of communication of the logistic support. What you were saying
was that if we had come in from the north, we would in all probability
have had to rely on the United States.
Air Marshal Burridge:
Yes.
Q339 Mr Howarth: The
fact that the line between Kuwait and Basra was short enabled
us to do it on our own.
Air Marshal Burridge:
And indeed assist the Americans.
| 
