Examination of Witnesses (Questions 940-959)
LIEUTENANT GENERAL
JOHN REITH
CB CBE, MR IAN
LEE AND
REAR ADMIRAL
CHARLES STYLE
CBE
9 JULY 2003
Q940 Mr Hancock: Both of you then,
but I would like to hear what the insider, in the MoD, has to
say as well?
Lieutenant General Reith: The
intelligence-gathering, clearly, there is a resource available
and you direct it at your priorities, and the priorities clearly
were looking at winning the combat battle, and that was where
most of the resourcing was going. We had some sources within the
local population, and clearly one gets conflicting messages. What
we did not know, and we did not understand, was quite how repressed
the population were and quite how much their anger would show
as soon as that repression was taken away, and I do not think
anybody could have assessed that. In terms of the policing, of
course, what happened was, as soon as the Ba'athist control went
then all the security organs disappeared, went underground. We
found subsequently that, for instance, all the oil installations
had been guarded by security forces, of one form or other, and,
as I say, the police disappeared. We worked very hard and very
quickly to find those people, to get the message across that we
understood that anybody wanting to be in any official position
had to be in the Ba'athist Party. That we were looking only in
terms of removing those people from positions at the very top,
obviously, who were linked directly with the regime, and all the
middle- and lower-level managers and the people on the ground
would be welcomed back. Subsequently, we have built it up, we
have got over 3,000 policemen operating in Basra City, for instance,
and the surrounds, and we have got more than we need in Maysan
Province at the moment. Also now we are building up the security
force which is used for securing the infrastructure, that is the
oil, power and water supplies, to guard those against potential
terrorists. Also we are building up, for instance, what is called
a Border Riverine Service, which now is patrolling the Shatt al
Arab and dealing with the smuggling and other things that are
going on. So those things are coming back very quickly. I think
we need to put into perspective here that from when we crossed
the border we are talking of only three and a half months, and
a lot has happened in that period and we have made huge progress.
To take down a country the size of France with the speed we did,
and then to get as far as we have got already, in terms of reconstruction
and putting things in place, I think is quite impressive. So,
yes, I agree that there were things which perhaps we could not
have perceived before we went in there, but we dealt with them
as quickly as we could once they happened.
Mr Lee: I will be very brief because
I only need to be, because John has covered most parts of this.
I think just one, simple point is that, if you are asking would
we have liked to know more about how Iraqi society would have
reacted once their system of government had been removed entirely,
and known that in advance, yes, of course, we would have liked
to know more. It is a difficult intelligence target to try to
understand in advance how a whole society will react, and I think
I agree with General Reith that it is not something which is knowable
in advance.
Q941 Syd Rapson: Can we move on,
because I think we have done a fairly good job on that, and well
investigated. There must be a frustration amongst the military
for lack of supplies and spares and bits and pieces you need at
any time, and `just in time' is getting a bad name, I do not know
whether that is true or not but it is beginning to, during our
investigations. We have also Urgent Operational Requirements when
suddenly there is a rush, something is needed quickly, and generally
they come under three distinct headings. Can I ask how many of
the UORs were for a) accelerating the existing procurements, b)for
new equipment and c) providing existing items of which inadequate
stocks were held, the three basic ones?
Lieutenant General Reith: If I
may, I am going to pass this over to Charles, because it is his
area, I just received them rather than actually directed them.
Rear Admiral Style: The systems
we have for procuring our equipment, in general, especially the
longer timescales, have to be well-regulated, ordered and responsible,
because they are complicated, we are spending a lot of money,
it takes a long time, and it is our obligation to make sure that
this is done carefully, and obviously we spend a significant proportion
of our budget on that. Equally, at the other end of the scale,
at any one time, there is shorter-notice equipment which we need
to procure in the event of an operation like this, which is fitted
to the specific threat which might be faced by the particular
environment, or is the very best that we can provide from the
very latest technology which might not have been available three
months or a year before. What we did with our 190 plus UORs, at
a little over £500 million, was a very remarkable, I think
very positive and successful, quick turnaround of some equipment
which was already in the programme when we brought forward. An
example of that is Storm Shadow, which was on its way and we did
a very good job to get some of those missiles into action earlier
than would have been possible. Some of them were bringing forward
equipment which we had already in the plan, and some of them were
answers to some very specific issues, of which just one example
would be the shallow water Mine Counter-Measures which were done
by the Navy, which our previous concept of operations had not
arranged for and we did a very fast procurement of something which
allowed us to do that.
Q942 Syd Rapson: Could you break
down the 190 items into the three categories, or would you send
us a note afterwards?
Rear Admiral Style: I will send
you a note to be precise with the facts.
Q943 Syd Rapson: We will follow that
up, to make sure.
Rear Admiral Style: I am so sorry,
could you just repeat the three categories?
Q944 Syd Rapson: One was accelerating
the existing procurement, new equipment and, finally, providing
existing items of which there were inadequate stocks. So one for
acceleration of procurement, new equipment, which Storm Shadow
comes under probably, and providing where there are inadequate
stocks. A note to us would help the report. You talked about £500
million, how does that compare with previous operations, with
the first Gulf War, for example, is it exceptional or about the
same?
Rear Admiral Style: It was a significant
UOR activity. The exact comparison in terms of the amount of money
that we spent, again, I could provide you the precise figure,
if you need that, in comparison with previous wars. It was a large-scale
activity and it was done, I think, by and large, extremely successfully,
to very tight time lines.
Q945 Syd Rapson: Was this the largest
cost for UORs?
Rear Admiral Style: We started
from the proposition that we assessed every candidate Urgent Operational
Requirement which came from the operational commanders, that went
through General Reith's Headquarters to make sure that within
his concept of operations the aspiring new equipment really was
required. Having done that process then we set out to meet every
requirement which was given to us. There was not, in any sense,
a limit arbitrarily imposed, in terms of the sum involved, but
it was a major effort, yes.
Q946 Syd Rapson: There were over
190 UORs issued; how many arrived before the combat operations
and how many did not make it?
Rear Admiral Style: There were
cases of equipment arriving very shortly before the start of operations.
I would emphasise that I think that is absolutely inevitable,
that the idea of the Urgent Operational Requirement process is
to make sure we give our people the very best that technology
or industry can provide us with, up to the last moment. As I said,
some of the UORs were very specific to the threat or to the particular
environment, and our process was extremely responsive. For example,
when the northern option ceased to be in existence, certain UORs
we did not proceed with, some of them we had to do more of because
of the different nature of the operation. If you are in that kind
of business. which, as I say, is to do with providing our troops
with the best, even at a very tight timescale, and I think a lot
of that was very successful, inevitably you will have equipment
arriving fairly close to the start time. Can I give you just one
statistic, you have seen it in the report I am sure, that in round
terms we carried out logistically about the same quantity of equipment
for this operation in half the time, by comparison with the Gulf
War of ten years ago.
Q947 Mr Howarth: Admiral, can I pursue
this point, because you said just now, inevitably, equipment would
arrive at the last minute, and one can understand that in respect
of certain Urgent Operational Requirements. We visited Fallingbostel,
a couple of weeks ago, where we met 2RTR and the Royal Scots Dragoon
Guards, and it is perfectly clear from what they told us that
they were desertising the tanks right up to the very, very last
minute, they came perilously close to not having the tanks ready.
We all knew, because we had been to Exercise Saif Sareea, you
all knew, that if we were going to deploy Challenger 2 tanks on
this kind of operation adjustments were going to have to be made,
modifications would have to be made to those tanks. What I want
to ask you is this. Given that, as military men, you knew this,
what pressure were you putting on the politicians to authorise
this work to be undertaken in a timely fashion, because, as I
say, you came perilously close to putting some guys on the front
line ill-prepared to do the task for which you were sending them
out?
Lieutenant General Reith: Can
I come in on that, if I may. We came perilously close, you are
right, but we did it, and we planned it that way.
Q948 Mr Howarth: You planned to come
perilously close?
Lieutenant General Reith: No;
let me finish, please. Within the process, we have what we call
RSOM, it is Reception, Staging and Onward Movement, and within
the planning we had made a conscious decision to up-armour and
desertise the tanks on arrival in theatre, because clearly the
decision to commit to war was the release to go to industry to
get the things we needed. Therefore, we moved the equipment by
sea, and while it was moving by sea we worked through contractors,
getting the equipment which was required delivered to theatre,
so that as they arrived there they could be fitted, and it was
part of that planning process. It was very close, but we did not
know until we went exactly when we were going to commit to the
conflict.
Q949 Mr Howarth: Indeed, and really
this is what I want to put to you, and I recognise it is a delicate
issue, because you two are senior military officers, you are a
senior civil servant in the Ministry of Defence, and you are having
to respond to politicians who have other pressures. It seems to
me that if the Government had made a decision at the back end
of last year that there was a very strong possibility that we
were going to be committed to military action, therefore this
kind of procurement should have been underway already, you would
not have found that those two units, in particular, would have
come to what you confirmed was perilously close. What I am saying
to you is this, surely, as military men, one of the lessons you
must have learned from this is that you cannot risk having the
professionalism of our Armed Forces tested so closely, because
you know that the fear in the Armed Forces is that there will
come a time when you cannot deliver, and that every time you do
deliver the Government says, "Well, there you are; fine,"
and Governments of all persuasions. Can I put it to you that perhaps
one of the lessons you should be drawing from this is to explain
to politicians that if you want to engage in this kind of activity
and not imperil your men you have got to be prepared to make those
decisions perhaps earlier than was so on this occasion?
Lieutenant General Reith: If I
could just comment that, clearly, as you say, it was perilously
close, but I would not have allowed our people to go into peril,
and the plan was flexible enough that if those two battle groups,
and we knew it was going to be tight-run with those two battle
groups, had not been operationally ready they would have been
held back and then committed later in the operation, and that
was within the plan. We used the words `perilously close' but
I can promise that I would not have allowed them to commit to
the operation if the operational commander had not been satisfied
that they were operationally ready.
Rear Admiral Style: Can I just
say that I feel our record, across the board, in responding to
lessons identified is not bad. In Kosovo, we learned a lesson
about the nature of bombs and munitions, imprecise as opposed
to precise kinds of munitions, and, against always a considerable
affordability challenge, we introduced Maverick, Paveway, and
so on, and Storm Shadow came on, as a direct consequence of lessons
identified. I could give you other examples. Our readiness, for
example, to deal with the mine warfare threat in the Gulf was
something we perceived and were able to deal with because of that,
SA80 safety-catches, and suchlike. In the equipment programme
process in which I am involved in the ECC, we always have a million
priorities and not enough money to allocate to them all. You would
say it was so obvious from Saif Sareea we had learned the lesson
that we should have done something about it. We did put money
into the equipment programme towards this in the last round, some
of that takes time to do, but, I think absolutely rightly, we
set a priority in the last equipment round, and it remains the
equipment programme priority to sort out, as you know, our network-enabled
capability. We have done some very important things, which in
a different sense add dramatically to our ability to deliver effect,
and, by the way, to look after our people as well and to co-operate
with the Americans. Although there were things about the delivery
of capability, and maybe the desertisation of Challenger was one,
which were fairly close to the wire, I do believe that will always
be the characteristic of a degree of our Urgent Operational Requirement
process and deliveries, and the proof is in the pudding. It was
there on time.
Q950 Mr Howarth: Yes, we understand
it was there on time. The point I am trying to make is, and I
think I speak for the Committee on this, that we have been impressed
by how damned close-run a thing it was. I would not like to have
been one of your senior officers having to tell the Secretary
of State, "So sorry, Secretary of State, but actually two
battle groups can't be deployed because they aint got the armour
stuck on the side of the tanks yet." I think you would have
found that extremely embarrassing. Therefore, these guys were
right up against it. I put it to you, it was not necessary, you
knew, we all knew, this Committee knew that you could not deploy
Challenger 2 tanks in that environment without doing the necessary
modification. We have been told when we have spoken to the guys
on the front line that they were right against the wire?
Mr Lee: I just want to say that
the background to all this, of course, is that throughout this
process of preparing the UORs, which takes some months from the
very first discussions with industry, and so on, during that period
we did not know what the date would be on which the conflict would
start and there was great uncertainty about that right the way
through. In a sense, the date when the conflict started was when
the forces were ready for it to start, and being ready included
having the various UORs fitted. So, by definition, deliberately
it was going to be a close-run thing, because that was when it
started, when we were ready for it to start, it was a conflict
which started at a time of our choosing.
Q951 Mr Hancock: You could get that
precariously close to the start date, could you not, only because
the Americans were there and they would have gone without us,
presumably, because they would not have been able to put it off?
The real lesson is, what do we do when they are not there to make
sure that we are covered? We wrote our report on Saif Sareea and
the Secretary of State gave evidence here about the specific issue
of desertification of these tanks, and it is obvious that there
was not a proper, capable plan to protect these tanks until very
near the time the tanks were about to leave the United Kingdom
or their bases in Germany. There was not an agreed, accepted plan
to do it, despite the fact that, Mr Lee, you know that we had
to have this after Saif Sareea, because we were told, the Secretary
of State said, "Don't worry, it's in hand," or words
to that effect, when effectively it was not?
Rear Admiral Style: Can I respond
to that. When this thing came up, it is true, we were not in the
process of desertising the tanks, physically, at the time.
Q952 Mr Hancock: The problem, Admiral,
was not that you could not do it but that you did not know how
to do it. The evidence we had says that there was not a recognised
scheme to equip these tanks for the desert which had been agreed?
Rear Admiral Style: All I can
tell you is that we had money in the equipment programme to make
sure that we did know how to do that. We did have a plan to do
it, and I would only suggest that the evidence of the speed at
which we did it, even if, yes, it was close, of course I accept
that, is indicative that we had our plans in a row, ready to execute
it. I am not suggesting, by the way, in taking the line I am taking
about the timescales being very close in some cases, that there
are not lessons to learn. We are deep into this process at the
moment. There is no doubt that the shape of the equipment programme
coming up that we are going to deal with now will reflect some
lessons from this operation, and some aspects, which I think you
have heard about already, about holding some equipment, our tracking
of resources, and a whole variety of things, we will pick up and
I am confident the process is detailed enough to deal with it.
I am not suggesting it was all perfect, but I do not accept the
suggestion that there was no plan to deal with the desertising
of tanks.
Mr Hancock: This was not a surprise,
Admiral, this was not a surprise. You should reread the Government's
response to our Report of Saif Sareea, and this was a priority.
Syd Rapson: It had better be, in future,
that the lesson is learned.
Q953 Mr Cran: Alas, we are not getting
off the topic which we were just on, because my colleagues have
mentioned the problems of Challenger 2 and you have been defending
manfully for the last hour. I do assure you, gentlemen, as we
have walked around, talking to the units which have been in this
action, there are widespread complaints about the lack of this,
that and the next thing. I just remember the note from the Joint
Helicopter Force at Odiham, `just in time' did not work for boots,
clothing, and all the rest of it. These are things which have
an effect on the morale of your men, General, and I have to put
it to you that, at least to me, you are beginning to sound slightly
complacent. You see, you have all said, "Actually, it did
work," and, of course, I have to agree with you, it did work
in the end, but just perhaps if we had had a bit more vigorous
an enemy it might not have worked. Therefore, as I recall it,
the First Reflections document says that the UOR process, which
I think is a `just in time' process, at least that is how I understand
it, involves risks, the risks that equipment is not going to be
there. Now the question is, are you going to look now at your
experience of this war to rebalance those risks, or are you just
totally happy with the risk factor as it is?
Rear Admiral Style: I think we
are examining all these lessons in a highly self-critical way.
I do not think we are complacent in the slightest.
Q954 Mr Cran: I said you sounded
complacent. You have got to try to convince me and the Committee
that, in fact, you are not?
Rear Admiral Style: I am sorry
if we do. The matter of boots and clothing, yes, there were shortfalls
there. There are major lessons to learn and we are examining the
holdings, as I think I suggested earlier, and looking at the whole
issue of tracking of assets delivery, and so on, but there was
a reason why we had that number, whether or not it was the right
judgment. This was reviewed, as you know, in the Strategic Defence
Review, and the matter of desert clothing, in particular, it was
settled in terms of all the balances of capability that we had
to spend our money on, that we provide for only the JRRF and the
spearhead battalion, that was the judgment, and we provided for
that. As Ian suggested earlier, we decided that, because we are
not constrained by those sorts of judgments, it is always a balance
of risk, this whole business is a risk business, we decided to
go for a bigger operation and so, yes, there were shortfalls.
That lesson must be addressed and of course we must consider our
balance of priorities, but there was a reason behind the levels
that we had, that is all I am suggesting in that area.
Q955 Mr Cran: You are the supplier.
General, you are the user, as it were, and, therefore, as the
user, were you satisfied with the delivery of not just the lessons
we got earlier but across the whole board of equipment?
Lieutenant General Reith: First
of all, can I say, I have never been complacent and I never will
be complacent when it comes to looking after our people.
Q956 Mr Cran: I just said, and I
repeat the word, you sounded it, that is all?
Lieutenant General Reith: I would
like just to make that point, just for the record. I go back to
this point about knowing when we were actually going to go into
conflict, to start with, and we did not know. We were working
on the basis that when sufficient forces from the coalition were
generated a decision would be made according to the circumstances
at the time, and, as I said before, if I had not been satisfied
that our people were properly equipped and ready to go I would
not have let them cross the line of departure. To pick up the
point you made, even if there had been more capable forces in
front of us, I can assure you that, with what we had with our
people, we were capable of dealing with them, and I was sure of
that, whatever we met we could deal with. There are lessons to
be learned here, you are absolutely right, and at the moment we
are going through a very big `lessons identified' process in the
MoD and we will identify those lessons and we will improve procedures,
we will improve everything we can to produce the best for our
soldiers. Turning to the clothing and the boots, I was not concerned
about that at all. The temperate equipment we have, the combat
clothing is designed up to 39 degrees centigrade and the boots
are up to 35 degrees centigrade.
Q957 Mr Roy: Over what period of
time?
Lieutenant General Reith: Any
period of time. You can wear them and work in temperatures of
that sort of level.
Mr Roy: For how long can you wear them?
If you have got a pair of boots on, with all due respect, for
half an hour, no matter how warm it is, that is fine, but if you
are asked to wear them for 36 hours then that is absolutely different.
I take exception to anyone trying to make that out as the normality.
We were told by people from 2RTR that there were men in tanks
wearing, and I quote, "flip-flops, trainers and even Iraqi
boots," because they did not have suitable boots.
Q958 Mr Cran: Let us hear from you,
General?
Lieutenant General Reith: I hear
that. What I would say to you is that the combat clothing and
textiles people have tested these things to death. They can be
worn in temperatures up to 35 degrees, and the highest temperatures
we had were just over 30, not as far as 35, in fact, the average
temperature was 31.
Q959 Mr Cran: General, I would not
suggest, and I do not think Mr Roy would suggest either, that
you had other than the best interests of your men at heart, I
wholly accept that is the case. I do say to you seriously that
you should go back and talk to some of the units which we talked
to, and I have to say to you that the experts may say what you
have just said but, at the end of the day, the user does not see
it that way, and that is the truth.
Lieutenant General Reith: I accept
that there is a moral component in this, and clearly there was
a perception amongst the soldiers—
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