Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20
- 39)
TUESDAY 20 JUNE 2006
Rt Hon Adam Ingram MP, Lieutenant General Nick Houghton
CBE and Dr Roger Hutton
Q20 John Smith: No, but it is something
that I have been given.
Mr Ingram: It is useful to know
source. It may well be I have said, in the past, that is the figure
and then I am going to try and dissemble a wee bit. I make this
plea: let us not deal with anecdotes; where we can establish facts
let us give the facts. Is that measurable? If 80% of the attacks
are against security forces, you said, and 80% of the casualties
are civilians, I do not know whether, off the top of my head,
I could confirm or otherwise. I know I do not have anything in
my briefing.
Q21 Chairman: Minister, the answer
to the question is you do not recognise the figures.
Mr Ingram: I am trying, as I am
talking, to think if there is anything in my memory bank that
tells me that is accurate. If we can get best assessment then,
again, we will do that, and we may do that in a letter.
Lt General Houghton: What I would
broadly offer is that that sort of statistic is probably supported
when you aggregate up all the incidents across the whole theatre
of Iraq, but it differs from place to place. For instance, within
Baghdad itself there is little doubt that the vast majority of
the casualties are civilian ones as opposed to security force
ones, but that is not the same across the piece. There is no doubt
that certainly the Jihadist terrorists, as a policy, are going
towards incidents that try to trigger mass civilian causalities
as an attempt to forment inter-sectarian strife. So I do not know
what the authority for that figure is but I can recognise the
broad statistic.
Q22 Mr Holloway: Minister, to what
extent do patrols in Basra have an Iraqi face to them?
Mr Ingram: What is the mixture
between us on the streets with Iraqi—?
Q23 Mr Holloway: Exactly.
Mr Ingram: I could not give you
precise figures but, again, the CJO may be best placed to give
you an assessment of that.
Lt General Houghton: The reason
I am hesitating is that that figure will have changed significantly
over the last week or two. Since the introduction of a Prime Minister
Maliki-endorsed security plan for Basra, the requirement for a
security force presence to wear an Iraqi face has changed significantly
and there has been the introduction of a significant number of
Iraqi Army troops on to the streets of Basra. So it is certainly
nothing like 100% but the move in that direction is significantly
under way.
Q24 Mr Holloway: Do all of our patrols
have an Iraqi with them, for example, if not even an interpreter?
Lt General Houghton: They will
carry our own interpreter capability with some of them, not all
of them. It depends: foot patrols into certain areas will be joined
and will have interpreters; other patrols which might be mobile
ones going outside the city might not.
Q25 Mr Holloway: If we are patrolling
in someone else's country without a single Iraqi, does that not
look very bad?
Lt General Houghton: The aim is,
normally, to always attempt to accompany Iraqi police within Basra,
so that there is a police presence with them. What I am saying
is that there is an increasing Army presence as well to give the
whole of the patrol a more Iraqi flavour. What I am not saying
is that patrols which relate to convoy escort towards administrative
tasks, and all that, there are many patrols which go out without
an Iraqi presence within them.
Mr Ingram: The comment was: "Doesn't
it look bad?" I think (and you will know from your experience
as well) you have got to do what is realistic as well. The basis
of your question is, without doubt, desirable, but then we have
to deal with the real and evolving situation. So who knows where
that profile could end up, and unquestionably that would be the
desired objective. So, increasingly, you have that close engagement,
and that is what we will do no matter where we are; we will work
to seek to achieve that objective, but it may not always be practical,
and there may be different purposes being served by our patrols.
Therefore, we have to deal with the real environment we are in
and not against some notion of whether there is an ultimate set
of relationships, desirable though they may be. I do not think
it is bad, I think it is a reflection of reality.
Chairman: We are just about to come to
the capacity of the 10th Division, but before we do, Dai Havard.
Q26 Mr Havard: Can I just return
to this question of the Iranian border? Is the truth not, really,
that for Maysan province to be given control (which, really, ought
to come fairly soon) the one thing that needs to be done is confidence
has to be given to the United States and to General Casey, in
particular, and to the Iraqi Government, that this question about
border security in relation to Maysan is sufficient enough for
them to make that political jump and allow that to have its own
control? I think, personally, and I have talked to various people
about it, that is a doable thing, but is it not really the fact
that it is less to do with perceptions on the street and it is
more to do with questions about confidence, if you like, that
the process of control being handed over can be sufficiently maintained,
particularly given that Maysan is a border province?
Mr Ingram: Everyone who has a
share in the developing situation in Iraq, and it is positive,
will have a view as to what should happen next. That then is part
of the discussions that take place, and that is why I spoke, at
the beginning, about the confidence of the Iraqi security forces
in their own capabilities (our confidence that they can deliver),
and increasingly we are seeing that the other international partners,
not just the US but others who are working alongside us, also
have a right to say: "Well, if this happens what are the
implications?" if they are in a particular location. That
is the nature of those rounded discussions. Yes, everyone has
to have confidence in what we are seeking to do before you move
forward, and some people may have 110% confidence and some people
may have less than that. You do not make progress unless people
are buying into that process. So if someone is holding up a red
card and saying: "This is just not going to work" then
that has to be talked through: why is that being argued in that
particular way? What can we do to show that this is the desired
way forward? That, clearly, will happen in terms of the border
issue and in terms of Maysan. Everyone has to be assured that
if that is the next step, and we have said it should be (and I
would agree with you, the sooner the better because that is another
indication of good progress, but the sooner based upon best assessment
and best confidence), they will actually deliver and you do not
have a reverse. So that is the nature of the discussions that
have gone on at senior military level so that everyone has a full
appreciation, full understanding and full acceptance of the next
step in the process.
Q27 Linda Gilroy: In those positive
moves towards Iraqi control, what assessment have you made of
the availability of equipment, firepower and transport to the
10th Division? We had some remarks made to us about some significant
shortages and we did raise that with people we met in Baghdad,
but I wonder what is your assessment of that as a barrier to moving
more towards Iraqi control.
Mr Ingram: That, in a sense, may
be another technical question about what is happening specifically
on the ground. It depends who says this. Again, we are into if
someone says something you will get contacts—
Q28 Linda Gilroy: Can I clarify?
We met the 10th Division.
Mr Ingram: And they were saying
what? They were under-resourced?
Q29 Linda Gilroy: Particularly on
transport, there were issues about getting transport made available
to them that would enable them to continue along the path of taking
control.
Mr Ingram: Before General Houghton
replies, this goes back—
Q30 Linda Gilroy: Adam is reminding
me it was Polish armoured vehicles, particularly, that they were
expecting and they had not been able to take.
Mr Ingram: And they had not been
given them?
Linda Gilroy: They had not arrived.
Q31 Chairman: They had not been bought.
Mr Ingram: They had not been bought?
That is the information you have got. This goes back to the point,
in general terms, I was making about the confidence of the Iraqi
forces themselves to be able to deliver on the ground. I suppose,
like any military force, they always want the best and they always
want a sufficiency. Therefore, we have an objective to try and
deliver on all of that because then that makes sure that we then
have the confidence in their capabilities. It would seem to me
instinctively, as a civilian and not a military person, that what
you do not do is build in problems where they then cannot effectively
deliver on the ground, whether it is ground mobility or whether
it is air cover or whatever else. Part of Operation Overwatch
is about ensuring that if they do experience any difficulty they
then have a combination of forces as back-up to them. That is
an important aspect of all this. On the specific, I do not know
whether there is more detail to give you on this.
Lt General Houghton: In very general
terms, the assessment on the condition and the state of the Iraqi
Army and the police is done on a monthly basis. As a result of
the assessment they fall into one of four criteria, from four
to one, with one being the very best and four being the very worst,
and it is across personnel, training, logistics, equipment, firepower
and all those sorts of things. TRA, as it is called (Transitional
Readiness Assessment), Number Two is the one they need to achieve
in order to be ready for transfer. There is a level of capability
beyond that which is One, which allows them an increased level
of capabilities, but over and above that which is specifically
required to deal with an internal security situation. Many of
the commanders, and General Latif of the 10th Division is no different,
want a lot of what I might crudely say are the "goodies"
associated with Transition Level One, even though they are not
actually required to meet the basic transitional requirement.
Such things as the Polish armoured vehicles are in that Level
One basket. However, I can confirm, I was there last week, and
I know the first few vehicles have arrived and the crew, driver
and maintenance training on them is ongoing, and I have no reason
to believe why a reasonably steady deployment of those vehicles
should not ensue from now on in. There are, I accept, and you
will have come across this in your various briefings, various
levels of capability particularly to do with enhanced levels of
firepower, with logistic sustainability and with protective mobility
vehicles which are not the requirements of the transition criteria
at Level Two; they come on stream later.
Q32 Linda Gilroy: Can I ask a brief,
follow-on question to that? What assessment have you made of the
capacity of the administration in the Iraqi Department of Defence
to be responsible for procurement issues? Certain things that
we (learned is maybe too strong a way of putting it) picked up—and
we greatly welcomed the appointment of the Minister for Defence
while we were there; I think that is very important to the leadership—it
caused me, certainly, to wonder about the capacity of the administration
to deal with these matters.
Mr Ingram: Can I say you make
the same criticism of our MoD as well about procurement matters,
so it seems to be the iron law of MoD procurement that we can
never satisfy select committees. One of the issues, of course,
has been the question of governance in the administration departments.
Clearly, one of the key developments in that is getting a minister
in place. We now have that. I have not met the minister so I cannot
speak from any personal experience but it would be down, again,
to how powerful he is and how he then relates to the Prime Minister.
It would seem to be that these are probably early days in all
of this. How does he then—not unlike what happens here—get
his share of the budget and then how he disburses that budget?
Part of the process of good governance is making sure that they
get best advice, if they so seek it, in the way in which they
approach all of this. However, at the end of the day, they are
the Government of their country; I do not think it is for us—and
I am walking very carefully here—to comment one way or the
other. On the competences, we will do what we can to ensure that
their competences are raised, but they are a sovereign government
and I am not going to criticise their capacity in that sense.
Roger may want to give you some detailed information on the way
we approach this in Baghdad.
Chairman: Do you want a quick follow-up
on that Linda?
Q33 Linda Gilroy: I am very happy
to listen to what Dr Hutton has got to say. I was just going to
ask a more general question about other obstacles, which, perhaps,
we have not raised and that the Minister may be aware of, to achieving
the transition.
Dr Hutton: We recognise that procurement
within the Iraqi MoD has been a problem in the past, and we have
been working very hard to try and put that and other structures,
processes and procedures within the Iraqi MoD right. We have people
in the Iraqi MoD sitting alongside both ministers and officials
introducing those new procedures and structures. So I am not going
to claim that we have solved all of that, but we are at least
on the starting blocks and the Iraqi MoD is starting to look like
a functioning body now, which we think will start to deliver the
goods, including in the region of procurement.
Q34 Linda Gilroy: Are there other
obstacles—we have discussed a number about confidence, about
the right timing, etc—to moving sooner rather than later
on the transition to Iraqi control in the four southern provinces?
We have discussed, obviously, the security situation in Basra.
Mr Ingram: Are there other obstacles?
I suppose the security environment on the ground would be one
of the major obstacles. That is one of the key conditions; we
have to ensure that the conditions on the ground are right for
all of this. This is an iterative process; it is progressive.
We have one big step, I suppose, in terms of what has been announced
over the last 24 hours or so, but it is only one part of the ongoing
process. Will it all work smoothly into the future? We hope so,
and we will throw all our effort into achieving that. Do we have
to plan for it not happening that way? Yes, we do, and we have
to identify as best we can what those obstacles are. Overall,
it is about the competency of the security forces, it is about
the competency of the governance of the country itself and about
the relationship between the provincial governments and central
government. This is only a young country in that sense, in terms
of its democratic overwatch and relationships.
Q35 Mr Havard: Can I ask about one
of those areas? We are now going to see the setting up of Provincial
Reconstruction Teams. This is an idea that we have seen partly
working in Afghanistan under one sort of model, but really the
question in relation to Iraq is whether or not this is the right
construct to introduce into Iraq. Part of the reason I ask that
is that whilst it is quite clearly necessary that all the organisations
come together as efficiently as they possibly can (and if it is
a vehicle for bringing them together that is a good thing), on
the other hand, those are all of the organisations that are separate
from the Iraqi Government. The Iraqis have their own national
development plan and there are provincial development plans. Is
a PRT going to be an enabler of that process or is it going to
actually be competing with Iraqis in setting up their own processes
of distribution to do the things that you rightly agreed, which
are not necessarily all military tasks? They are the people appearing
at the barricade to do their bit.
Mr Ingram: The PRTs have proven
successful in Afghanistan, and I think increasingly we will see
greater success for them there. The concept is fundamentally sound
(I will talk about the relationship with the Iraqi Government
in a moment), and that is to try and bring as much non-military
expertise into play, and it is about reconstruction, it is about
economics, it is about social, it is about political—all
of those key aspects—and, also, importantly, to try to make
it multinational and multi-agency. So the concept, as I say, has
proven itself. You cannot, of itself, say that because it has
worked in one part of Afghanistan it is going to work throughout
Afghanistan, and, therefore, the same argument and logic applies:
it will not necessarily work with certainty with Iraq. However,
it is a very sound concept and it does ensure, from a UK Government
point of view, other departmental buy-in. It forces us, as a government,
to make sure that we have got our act together; that we are co-ordinated
in all that we are seeking to do. Then you have got to work in
a relationship with what else is happening on the ground. In terms
of what the Iraqi Government is seeking to do, it is not to be
in competition but to be complementary. So we may be getting to
parts that they are not touching and they certainly, hopefully,
are getting to the bigger parts that we cannot touch, because
at the end of the day it is the responsibility of the Iraq Government
to make the country whole again; all we can do is assist as best
we can. A key ingredient of all of that is having a stable environment
so you can deliver those programmes. Let us remember the history
of the early days of Iraq when the UN had a very bad experience
of some sad loss of life and, therefore, disengaged. The key to
this, as I say, is to get other agencies involved, NGOs, all those
international donors, to be supportive—
Q36 Mr Havard: That is part of why
I asked the question.
Mr Ingram: That is why I am answering
in the way I am.
Q37 Mr Havard: Is there a mechanism
that does that, because quite clearly what we have seen in previous
visits there is this basic sort of stuff about water and infrastructure
and all the rest of it? The message that came to us very strongly
was that the Basra province is quite clearly the economic engine
of the country of Iraq and more attention needed to be put to
it from elsewhere, namely Baghdad or the USA or wherever, and
its relative importance in being able to generate the money for
all the other things as being something, if you like, that had
not been given sufficient consideration, and there needs to be
sufficient spend there. That is what we see. We see a frustration
there, and frustration amongst some of our military, I think,
which is that, frankly, they are being asked to do tasks that
are not theirs to do with money that they have not got. So where
are all the other agencies coming together to actually provide
to do these other things? Is the PRT mechanism the efficient way
to do that, or does it actually, in some way or another, stop
the Iraqi processes? You now have a new interior minister and
you have a new minister for the MoD. So that is the fear: is it
another talking shop or is it actually an enabler?
Mr Ingram: You said: "Is
it the way forward?" It is not the way forward, it
is a way forward, and it is a component part. It is actually
delivering and it has the potential to deliver on some of those
areas where we can actually make a difference. Is it the total
solution to the problem? No, it is not. We are not offering it
up in that way. This is part of the process of engaging with the
wider community, because the way in which the military can be
accepted in carrying on the security role is if people can see
there is some benefit accruing on the other side of all of this,
in terms of economic infrastructure development, political development
or social development. That is what we are specifically trying
to tackle. Is it perfectly formed? Not yet. Will it ever deliver
on every objective 110%? Probably not because of the very nature
of the environment in which it is trying to operate. Will it fail
because of a lack of effort? No, it will not. Will it fail because
of a lack of funding? That depends on what the funding demands
are. There are significant tranches of money being put in both
by the US and the way in which we will operate our central allocation,
mainly through DfID money, but it will be small by comparison
to what is required and what the Iraqi Government itself has to
do. Clearly, in terms of the underlying aspect of your question
about the vitality of Basra and the region as an economic engine
room, that is the case, and the more that can be stabilised the
more it generates wealth and the more that wealth can then be
reinvested back into Iraq overall and into Basra and surrounding
provinces.
Q38 Mr Havard: The success of the
PRT is also in direct relationship to the success of our drawback
plan, the rebating strategy and our ability to actually have overwatch
as opposed to current engagement.
Mr Ingram: They work together.
It goes back to this point of creating the stable environment.
You cannot put civilian agencies out into a very hostile environment.
It does not matter how much money you have got or how solid your
plans are if your people are being threatened and, probably, even
being killed. You will not be able to deliver on those mechanisms.
So they are a part of the whole, and the more we can create that
stable environment the more the agencies can then go out and deliver.
Q39 Linda Gilroy: Minister, if I
understood correctly, that PRT is only part of the reconstruction.
Where can we look at what the whole strategy for reconstruction
in those provinces is to make an assessment of what the relative
value of the PRT is in contributing towards that?
Dr Hutton: DfID has its own strategy
for reconstruction in Iraq which I do not have with me today,
but it is publicly available and readily available to the Committee.
Getting back to the point made by the Minister, the PRT is not
a panacea here; it is about oiling wheels, brokering solutions
and establishing relationships, but above all acting as a conduit
for international engagement in Basra and, also, international
engagement in Baghdad being directed towards Basra.
Linda Gilroy: Exactly, and I think that
is what Dai was saying. We experienced some frustration that that
was not being directed in a focused way. I am still not certain
of the extent to which the PRT is the means of focusing that,
or if there is another means of focusing the overall reconstruction.
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