Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1500-1519)
REAR ADMIRAL
DAVID SNELSON
AND BRIGADIER
JAMES DUTTON
CBE ADC
3 DECEMBER 2003
Q1500 Mr Viggers: First Reflections
said "we expect to draw a number of lessons from the US experience
in using large carriers...in both the pre-combat and combat phases
of the operation." I wonder whether you have been involved
in the thinking about that and whether you have any thoughts about
the use of larger carriers or larger helicopter-capable ships?
Rear Admiral Snelson: One of the
main factors driving considerations in this operation was the
ability to launch enough ground combat power in fairly short order
for the Brigade, and having more decks and bigger decks clearly
gives you greater flexibility, in terms of helicopter assault.
Also, of course, it allows you to fly more fixed-wing ground attack
sorties, if that is what you are doing, so having those bigger
decks is exactly the sort of capability that is required to be
able to meet an enemy who might fight back perhaps with greater
determination than the Iraqis did on this occasion.
Q1501 Mr Viggers: Can I ask about Merlin,
which was embarked in RFA Fort Victoria. Are there any lessons
from Merlin of successful, heavy capacity?
Rear Admiral Snelson: Merlin was
particularly good in providing surveillance over the sea, looking
for small craft approaching the task force. The Merlin helicopter's
radar is good, its capability to provide the picture of what it
can see on data links back to the ships also is very good. It
requires further enhancement in the future, I think, in terms
of electro-optic, night-vision-type surveillance, and that is
something which is being looked at, and that would give it a better,
24-hour capability against a small-boat threat.
Q1502 Mr Viggers: Whilst we congratulate
you very much on what has been achieved, one has to think also
what might have happened. One thinks back to Atlantic Conveyor
and Spearhead. Where would the Marines have been without the Chinook
back-up?
Brigadier Dutton: We needed Chinook
very much. We have known for the past two, three, four years that
we need Chinook in order to operate effectively in almost any
environment. Having said that, the Sea King Mark IVs were superb
on Operation Telic, but they are now quite old, their lift is
less than the design lift when they first came into service. In
order to be able to move the sort of equipment around that we
wish to move nowadays, we need Chinook, which is why routinely
they deploy now as part of the tailored air group with any amphibious
force.
Q1503 Mr Hancock: If you had had another
platform available, would the aircraft have been available?
Brigadier Dutton: The Chinook
that operated on Telic did not only come by ship, some that self-deployed
to Kuwait so that there were a number of aircraft available, as
well as those which came on maritime platforms.
Q1504 Mr Hancock: If you had had another
platform, would there have been a role for the Chinook to have
been involved in that, of taking troops from that ship to land?
Brigadier Dutton: As the Admiral
said earlier, it would have given us more flexibility. Because
of the limitation on shipping space and spot availability for
helicopters, a high proportion of the Brigade deployed to Kuwait
by air, not by sea. It would have given us greater flexibility.
Looking to the future, of course, we might not always have Kuwait
for a similar, or indeed any other, future operation, so more
deck space, more helicopters, more landing spots is something
we would aim always to try to achieve.
Rear Admiral Snelson: It is perhaps
just worth saying, in the previous Afghanistan operation, HMS
Illustrious operated more Chinooks than did Ark Royal on this
operation, so it is possible to get that running. The afloat helicopter
deck and hanger, if you like, that a carrier provides had one
other benefit in providing a secure engineering environment in
terms of achieving greater availability of helicopters. Of course,
that is useful only while the helicopters are operating within
range of the ship, but for that period that they are then it is
an extremely useful asset.
Brigadier Dutton: If I could expand
on that slightly, because I think that is an important point,
about the engineering support. Even when we were quite a long
way from the ships, we had a routine of rotating the helicopters,
both the Sea Kings and the Lynx and Gazelle, through the ships
about every third day for their engineering support. The availability
rates showed the value of being able to do that in a very clean
environment.
Chairman: Thank you. Now Mr Hancock will
ask a question on Tomahawks.
Q1505 Mr Hancock: I would be grateful
if you could give us an indication of what you feel was the contribution
of the UK Tomahawk cruise missiles which were used and the capability
and the context of the conditions in which they were used?
Rear Admiral Snelson: First of
all, I should explain that my responsibility in terms of the Tomahawk
capability was as a facilitator, if you like, and the maritime
component acts as a place where the Tomahawks are kept and the
place from where the Tomahawks are fired. The business of deciding
what targets they are going to attack and when they are going
to attack targets will be worked between the Air Component Commander
and the Joint Commander. It is the same for fixed-wing strike
aircraft leaving an aircraft carrier, once they go into the air
into the battle then they become the responsibility of the Air
Commander. It is exactly the same for Tomahawks. However, although
we had only two Tomahawk-equipped submarines in the operation,
and, therefore, compared with the US rate of effort, a relatively
small number of Tomahawks, they became quite important. The US
ships, some were stationed in the Mediterranean, some in the Red
Sea and some in the Gulf and were able to fire Tomahawks from
different directions to reach all parts of Iraq. That is I think
a lesson for us, that if we had Tomahawk capability on surface
ships we would have greater flexibility in where we could provide
that precision strike from. However, for some of the time, political
constraints prevented Tomahawks being fired from the Mediterranean,
and indeed from the Red Sea, and only those Tomahawks that were
on ships or submarines in the Gulf could be fired. There was a
time when the number of Tomahawks available to the Commander actually
became quite low because quite a lot of the US surface ships had
exhausted their supply. The Royal Navy submarines were reloaded
more than once in theatre and at various times provided a significant
proportion of the Tomahawks available. They lend a particular
capability to the UK expeditionary effort, providing precision
strike in all weathers, without endangering aircrew, and are available
at short notice.
Q1506 Mr Hancock: How was the effectiveness
of what you were targeting assessed and the effect of the Tomahawk
on that target, and how quickly afterwards were you getting that
sort of information?
Rear Admiral Snelson: The process
is called `battle damage assessment' and it is done by a combination
of either satellite sensors or aircraft sensors, but I was not
directly in the command chain for targeting so I was seeing the
results as a by-product of the air components process. It was
almost always possible to assess the effectiveness by looking
at the damage that occurred to buildings, and overall the effectiveness
of our Tomahawk exceeded the design specifications. Again, I do
not have the precise figures to hand and they may well be classified
but they could be provided in closed form, but I know that their
effectiveness was better then that designed.
Q1507 Mr Hancock: How dependent were
we actually on the targeting for that and the approach information
on non-UK forces? Was it a decision made always by a US Commander,
or was that a decision on the targeting which came sometimes through
the UK chain of command?
Rear Admiral Snelson: I think
I would have to refer you to Air Marshal Burridge's response to
your Committee, Mr Chairman, because I think he described to you
how the targeting process worked. It was he and the Air Commander
who were responsible. I was only the provider of facilities, so
probably it would be wrong for me to provide direct answers to
those questions. I was not actually involved in the targeting
process. I had quite a lot of knowledge of it, I observed it,
but I was not involved in it directly.
Q1508 Mr Hancock: It did not come through
your chain of command?
Rear Admiral Snelson: No.
Q1509 Mr Hancock: Is your submarine capable
of delivering X number of Tomahawks in an hour's time on these
targets?
Rear Admiral Snelson: The requirements
on me were to make sure that the submarine was integrated into
the overall maritime effort such that it could be available to
the Joint Commander and Air Commander when it was needed to fire
Tomahawks. Actually, the strict command and control of the submarines
is done still from Northwood because of the command and control
systems involved in the difficult business of water space management.
We do not always do it from Northwood, it can be done from a deployed
headquarters like mine, but on this occasion it was done from
Northwood.
Q1510 Mr Hancock: You made what I thought
was a very interesting comment about the re-arming of our submarines,
and you said that both of them were re-armed more than once during
the deployment. Is that a difficult exercise, to re-arm submarines
with Tomahawks at sea?
Rear Admiral Snelson: You cannot
do it at sea. It can only be done in harbour. Then it involves
the business, obviously, of flying the missiles to the relevant
place and arranging the necessary carriage. It is something which
has been done overseas on previous operations, the Kosovo operation,
for instance, and so we are fairly practised at it. It is not
without its complications but we can do it, and did.
Mr Hancock: Fine. Thank you, Admiral.
Q1511 Chairman: How many Tomahawks did
we buy, was it 100, I cannot remember?
Rear Admiral Snelson: The original
buy, from memory, was 65, of which one was fired on the test range,
leaving us an inventory of 64. However, the numbers fired in the
various campaigns and the numbers that remain are not subjects
for open session, I believe, Mr Chairman, although those numbers
could be provided if necessary.
Q1512 Chairman: What I think we would
like to know, because the previous times they have been fired
we have tended to fire off a couple, and I am never sure whether
the contribution is merely political and token or whether we are
a serious addition to the inventory of firing missiles. Maybe,
when you drop us information, whether it is confidential or not,
I suspect the former rather than the latter, it would be useful
to have an explanation as to what the policy is actually of firing
Tomahawk missiles?
Rear Admiral Snelson: Perhaps
I will make two comments, Mr Chairman, although I will not comment
about actual numbers now. Certainly in the Kosovo conflict the
numbers were significant and were not just a demonstration of
being part of the operation, they were militarily significant.
In this operation, very definitely they were militarily significant.
That I can say, from my involvement in the process. The question
of numbers is something obviously for the Department to balance.
Q1513 Mr Hancock: Can I ask the Brigadier,
in your capacity, through your commanders on the ground, did you
call for a Tomahawk strike at any time?
Brigadier Dutton: Not specifically,
because the targeting process does not really work like that,
you do not ask for that particular weapons system. We had the
capability, as did all the Brigade commanders, to contribute to
the targeting process, to put those into the targeting process
at the Divisional Headquarters, which then went into whatever
the process was above that. Then weapons systems would be either
allocated or not.
Q1514 Chairman: When we do fire this
indeterminate number of missiles, do we write off to Tesco and
say, "Please send us another one to replace the one we fired"?
Has there been any strategy or policy of replenishment?
Rear Admiral Snelson: It is not
a question for me, Mr Chairman, I think it is a question for the
Ministry of Defence itself, the equipment capability area of the
Ministry of Defence, of how it deals with procurement of strike
weapons. Certainly it is a complex area because of the closure
of American production lines, and so on, but it is not one that
I am in a position to answer.
Chairman: Obviously, you have been through
the MoD course of training in how to avoid a question, but that
was an easy one to avoid so I did not test your avoidance skills,
at which, as a sailor, you are very adept, I am sure.
Q1515 Mr Cran: Two further questions,
I regret to say, on Tomahawk, really to get a bit more detail
on a question Mr Hancock asked you and also an answer you gave
to another question. The proposition has been put, I think, certainly
I have heard it suggested, that there is a fairly big constraint
on our Tomahawk capability because of the difficulties of reloading
when the submarine is away from the naval base. Is that the case,
or not?
Rear Admiral Snelson: It is not
the case. There was quite a lot of work to be done to make sure
that we could reload, but we had done it in a number of countries
on a number of occasions and it was not a significant constraint
from my perspective.
Q1516 Mr Cran: Could you trace why it
is not? Why have you become more practised, I think were the words
you used?
Rear Admiral Snelson: Because
requirements of successive campaigns have required us to be. I
think I am right in saying that the original concept of operations
was that, when we purchased it, Tomahawk would always be reloaded
only in the UK, and that is because it was bought on the basis
that it was a coercive weapon that is why the numbers the Department
bought were fairly limited. In fact, we have ended up using it
much more as a war-fighting weapon and expending greater numbers
than were envisaged. The campaigns in which we have done that,
used it almost as a war-fighting weapon, have required us to reload
overseas, and so the Navy and the Defence Logistics Organisation
know how to do it, and do it.
Q1517 Mr Cran: That has cleared that
up. In answer to another question from Mr Hancock, you said that
our Tomahawk capability would be, I do not know the words you
used exactly but certainly improved, would benefit from being
fired from surface warships. I suppose the question is then, how
seriously is the MoD looking at that, if it is looking at it at
all?
Rear Admiral Snelson: Again, it
is not an area I am involved in directly but my knowledge of the
situation is that the MoD is looking at it, and it is a potential
option, I think, for the type 45 destroyer, but I am not aware
of any decisions that have been made, whether to equip those ships
with Tomahawks. From an operational commander's perspective, clearly
it gives you greater options to have a greater number of platforms
that are so equipped. Submarines are very good with Tomahawk,
because you can introduce them into a theatre quietly, without
anyone knowing they are there, and then suddenly produce them
if necessary. Equally, surface ships routinely will go around
the oceans of the world with Tomahawks. It gives you many more
options in many different areas.
Q1518 Mr Cran: It would be fair to say,
would it not, that you would have preferred to have that capability
yourself in Iraq, but the mere fact that the Americans did traded
off that disability?
Rear Admiral Snelson: In this
particular situation, of course, there were sufficient weapons
to produce the effect, but in terms of the fact that all three
Armed Forces are trying to produce what we call joint effect then
it makes a great deal of sense for our ships, procured primarily
for maritime tasks, also to have a greater direct effect on the
land battle. At the moment, really it is only the Tomahawk submarines
and the carriers and the amphibious ships that have a direct effect
on the land battle. By equipping ships with Tomahawk then more
ships could have an effect on the land battle, but it is a question
of investment priorities, of course.
Mr Cran: Absolutely. Chairman, thank
you.
Q1519 Mr Jones: Can I turn to the operation
on the Al Faw peninsula and ask questions, first of all, in terms
of the assault itself, which I understand was mainly by helicopter.
Could you give us some understanding of the reason why that decision
was taken? Also, what role did close air support play, in terms
of supporting Marines on the Al Faw, particularly the relationship
with the Americans, who gave a lot of close air support, I understand,
both with fixed-wing and ground attack helicopters? Also, could
you touch on whether the lack of heavy armour in the early stages
had an effect, in terms of being able to execute in what was quite
a challenging environment, as I understand it?
Brigadier Dutton: The first part,
why by helicopter, because the beach gradients on any part of
the Iraqi coastline did not allow us to land by conventional landing-craft.
We did have a plan to open a beach on the Al Faw peninsula, Red
Beach it was going to be called, on one of the pipeline heads
as it was exposed just before going out to sea, running out to
the gas/oil platforms. We had a well-developed plan to land the
logistics, but also, importantly, the CVR(T), the Scimitars, from
the QDG Squadron that I had under command, using the American
heavy LCACs, the LCAC-Hs, the big hovercraft that will carry a
main battle-tank. Indeed, we had pre-loaded C Squadron of the
Queen's Dragoon Guards onto those LCACs in the USS Rushmore for
this eventuality. In the event, that beach was mined pretty comprehensively
and had a series of wire-fence obstacles and hedgehog devices
to stop exactly this. We were well on the way to clearing that
when the decision was taken that the risk to the LCAC heavies
was too great and they were withdrawn, so we had to find another
way of putting in those vehicles. We did so, in the end, about
18 to 24 hours later, on an LCU ferry-crossing just north of the
town of Umm Qasr, once 15 MEU had taken it. We did it by helicopter
because really that was the only sensible way of getting a large
number of troops there early on. It was a combined operation with
the US Navy SEALS, who had had the task of seizing the oil infrastructure
for some considerable time. In a sense we were in support of them
but we had been training with them and planning with them from
a very early stage, in fact, they joined 40 Commando in Cyprus
and sailed round with them. There was very close liaison in Kuwait.
The CENTCOM NSW Commander co-located his deputy and quite a large
headquarters, with a very considerable communications capability,
alongside my Brigade Headquarters in Kuwait, just south of Umm
Qasr, for the actual assault, and, of course, they were always
planning to do it by helicopter. We did have a `no fly' plan,
because I was always concerned that, when the decision to go was
taken, it meant then, not when the weather was nice, so we had
to have a fall-back plan. We did have a fall-back plan, which
would have involved using the Shatt al Arab and small, fast, raiding-craft,
not one that I would have wanted to put into operation, so I am
glad that, in the event, we could fly. You asked about close air
support. Because this was a combined operation with the Naval
Special Warfare Group, they came with Predator UAVs and I was
able to watch the Predator picture in my headquarters, where we
were co-located, so I could see the landing taking place. Also
they came with AC130 and A10s and with JDAMs dropped from F18s
in a short, sharp, fire plan just before H-hour, so we had full
access to those. Even when we set up a JSOA, a Joint Special Operations
Area, for about one hour only, which the US Navy Special Warfare
SEALs controlled, even though by then we were landing 40 Commando
with them, when we collapsed that JSOA the Predator and the AC130
remained available to me until about an hour before first light,
at which point the AC130 had to be withdrawn.
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