Examination of Witnesses (Questions 120
- 139)
TUESDAY 24 JULY 2007
RT HON
BOB AINSWORTH
MP, MR DESMOND
BOWEN CMG AND
BRIGADIER CHRIS
HUGHES CBE
Q120 Chairman: We would not expect
details.
Mr Ainsworth: That is what we
are going to have to see and that is what we are going to have
to talk about when we see what over-watch is. If it goes as smoothly
as the other three provinces then there can be real hope and we
can discuss that situation at the time, but until we see what
it is—in an actual over-watch situation we cannot get much
below 5000 because we have to be able to sustain the force and
self-protect the force itself, so over-watch in itself does not
take us down a lot lower than that.
Q121 Mr Jones: A simple question;
what is over-watch?
Mr Ainsworth: What is over-watch?
Over-watch is being there, able in the absolute extreme to offer
support, but to stand back and allow the Iraqi Forces themselves
to try to deal with the situations that arise.
Chairman: You have been talking about
Provincial Iraqi Control, Minister. Willie Rennie.
Q122 Willie Rennie: You have already
mentioned that you would hope to achieve Provincial Iraqi Control
in the near future, and I can understand why you do not want to
be any more precise about that, but why has it been so difficult
and would you respond to our concern that the reason why it has
not already been achieved is for domestic American purposes rather
than the ability of the Iraqi military to be able to cope in the
South?
Mr Ainsworth: We are a sovereign
nation and there is a process that needs to be gone through in
order to get to Provincial Iraqi Control. We have not got sole
control of that process, that is true, the Iraqi Government themselves
have been part of that, our allies have been part of that, so
those discussions have to take place and we have to be part of
that. It is not true to say that it is the Americans who are preventing
that; the biggest single part of that discussion is the discussion
with the Iraqi Security Forces themselves: what is their capacity,
what is their capability, are they ready for it? We may be approaching
that point where they are.
Q123 Willie Rennie: If we had already
achieved the military capability, surely that is the overriding
factor rather than the domestic politics of perhaps another country.
Mr Ainsworth: They need to understand
as well the consequences of us going to over-watch and what we
will and what we will not do. It is no good them accepting provincial
control and assuming that we are going to come in and support
them on a regular basis because that will not be the situation.
Mr Bowen: Can I just say that
there are criteria and some of the criteria that need to be dealt
with cannot be dealt with in a completely objective and scientific
way. There are four criteria: one is about the security situation,
another is about the state of the Iraqi Security Forces and their
ability to cope, another is about the state of governance—in
other words the political control and the processes—and
the fourth is the ability of the multinational forces to support
Provincial Iraqi Control. There are therefore some very clear
categories, against which we can report in order to make the case
for Provincial Iraqi Control and then there is a process which
has been established which involves submitting to Baghdad, and
in Baghdad both the Coalition and the Iraqi Government coming
together to agree that province X or province Y is ready for transfer.
That same process has been applied not just in the South but elsewhere
and fairly recently in the North.
Q124 Willie Rennie: You do not believe
that domestic US politics were a significant factor in the decision
not to transfer already.
Mr Bowen: There is a process.
All I can say is there is a process which is Iraq-based, in Baghdad,
involving the multinational forces and the Iraqi Government and
that is what has determined the PIC of provinces across Iraq.
Q125 Chairman: Can you tell us what
the current status of the Governor of Basra is, please?
Mr Ainsworth: Well, he is ...
Q126 Chairman: It sounds as though
the answer is no.
Mr Ainsworth: It is in the public
domain and everybody knows that there have been attempts to remove
the governor from within the structures within Basra. The Prime
Minister himself has said that he should cease to operate and
no longer has effective office there; nonetheless he does continue
to operate. That is a matter for the Iraqis at the end of the
day, we cannot intervene in that, we can only say to the Iraqi
Government it is not an aid to stability that they are unable
to sort that situation out, they need to get that situation sorted
out one way or another and they need to bring clarity to that.
It would be a huge help if they did.
Q127 Willie Rennie: Going to the
other provinces that have already handed over to PIC, how are
they performing in terms of security and politics and what has
our role been in those provinces since they were handed over?
Mr Ainsworth: We have not had
to intervene.
Brigadier Hughes: We have on a
couple of occasions.
Mr Ainsworth: Two of the provinces
have been better than the other in terms of the degree of problems
that there have been. Maysaan has been the more difficult of the
three, but by and large the Iraqis have dealt with those problems
themselves. The Brigadier can give you some information on the
interventions that we have had to make.
Brigadier Hughes: We will go round
clockwise. In Al-Muthanna, which was the first to go, west of
Basra, it has been largely peaceful but it is largely desert as
well, which is one of the reasons for the peace. It was interesting
actually that straight after it gained PIC the Australians, who
had been there—along with the Japanese but the Australians
were looking after the security as part of MND (South East)—tried
paying an early visit to the governor in Al Muthanna just to check
that everything was okay; they were given a pretty quick cold
shoulder: we are now looking after this, we no longer require
you in Muthanna and, indeed, we have never had to re-intervene
there. Dhi Qar has been a little more problematic, particularly
recently in An Nasiriyah, the main city in Dhi Qar, where there
have been similar sorts of militant JAM versus Iraqi Police Service
issues that have been going on in Basra. There was a stand-off
there a few weeks ago which the Iraqi Security Forces dealt with,
with Coalition support, but when I say "Coalition support"
it was air support and ISTAR—that is surveillance and target
acquisition assets—rather than boots on the ground. In Maysaan,
again, there have been some challenges up there but it is worth
saying that actually what is going on in Maysaan is difficult
to tell, even when you are there, so some of this is grey to us.
There have certainly been issues with militias and the police
service in Maysaan; the Iraqis have dealt with that largely themselves
and the only intervention there has been into Maysaan Province,
again quite recently, over the last two or three weeks, which
has been a national operation because even after a province has
PIC'd the national government keeps responsibility for terrorism.
There was a Coalition operation, a US operation, into Maysaan
which Prime Minister Maliki approved and Prime Minister Maliki
gave down to there, but we have not re-intervened at provincial
level back into Maysaan. The short answer is that there have been
one or two blips, as we expected, this is not peace, love and
harmony through three provinces, nobody would pretend that, but
it has been largely good. Basra, of course, is a different order
of issue because of the population, oil, etc.
Q128 Willie Rennie: Relations between
the central government and these provinces on terrorism or anything
that is reserved to the central government, how are they developing?
Brigadier Hughes: Normally on
a mobile phone. It is that, it is the personal relationships that
you see out there; if something is going to go off it does need
the Prime Minister or his known representative to make a call,
it cannot be done in the administrative way that we would recognise
here.
Q129 Willie Rennie: Relationships
are good?
Brigadier Hughes: They are mixed,
and it depends on who is after what at any one time, so you will
find that Governor Wa'ili, for example, will quite often say "I
need to go and check with Baghdad" and then at other times
he will ignore Baghdad, so they shift around depending on who
is after what, frankly, but they exist, the relationships exist.
Q130 Mr Jenkin: Just as a supplementary
and as a linked question, that sort of Maysaan operation that
we have been doing, is that the sort of thing we might continue
doing from the position of over-watch after transition?
Brigadier Hughes: It is possible.
What we do not envisage in over-watch is one package fits all,
so if the Iraqi Security Forces were going to ask us for support
once they have got provincial control, we do not envisage them
necessarily meaning that we have got to put a battle group into
the middle of the city. What they might be short of is intelligence
and surveillance assets, so it might be just flying something
high up, or it might be another niche capability or a piece of
logistics that they need putting in place. We foresee in over-watch
maybe nothing or maybe very limited and a scaled approach to it.
Q131 Mr Jenkin: To carry on giving
Min(AF) a little rest, could you give us a thumbnail sketch from
a military viewpoint, where are the Iraqi Armed Forces now in
terms of capability and development, particularly the 10th Division,
what more do they need?
Brigadier Hughes: The 10th Division,
as I have said, has had some genuine success and we have been
pleased and we have had people with them whilst they have had
that success, with battalions up in Baghdad and with some operations
down in Basra Province and elsewhere in South East Iraq. They
do have routine control alongside the police, but largely it is
the Army in the three provinces that we have mentioned that have
already gone to PIC. They have had effect in some of the operations
in Basra; where we have seen difficulty is where the loyalty issue
then comes into play and, as I have said, we have been trying
to address that. In terms of equipment levels, they are well-equipped
at the moment with their frontline kit so they have got 100% of
the up-armoured Humvees that they were due to get and their other
vehicles and equipment. The British Government has put £54
million through OSIRIS[1]
into the Iraqi Security Forces as well as the equipment that has
flowed down from Baghdad, originally from the Coalition and now
from the Iraqi Ministry of Defence. Where they still lack and
we know they still lack is at the rear end; they have not got
a big logistics footprint yet, but that was planned, they do lack
some of the intelligence assets, but are they a reasonable force,
given where they have come from in the timeframe that they have
come from, yes they are. Do they have problems? Yes, they do.
In terms of the defence border, the Department for Border Enforcement
(the DBE) we continue to mentor them. We have seen them make quite
impressive strides at some of the key crossing points with the
Iran-Iraq border where we have tightened up some of the real issues
there, and it was where a lot of the smuggling was going on—it
is where some of the smuggling is still going on because you are
not going to stop that. They continue to be taken forward and,
as I say, we continue with the SSR process on that. The Iraqi
Police Service is the biggest challenge; there is no doubt about
that and it remains so in Basra. We identified quite a while ago
and we have continued to work on this with the Iraqis, on getting
the Iraqi Police Service in Basra as best as it can possibly be.
Effectively there is a small, murderous, criminal element within
the Iraqi Police Force which we have to root out, and indeed we
have upped our strike and detention operations against them in
recent months in order to do that because they are truly irreconcilable.
There are those within the Police Force whom General Jalil, for
example, has said recently are totally incompetent and will always
be so. If that is the case then we need to drive forward with
trying to get them out of the Police Force in some way. Jalil
is charged with that and only the Iraqi Government is going to
be able to do that, with some sort of resettlement package if
you like that is going to keep them quiet once they have gone.
The rest are trainable and we continue to train where we can—during
Operation SINBAD last year, for example, going into every police
station to make sure that certain standards were met and with
direct mentoring and support to specialist units such as the CID.
We understand, therefore, what a problem the Iraqi Police Service
in Basra is, but we are doing what we can to put that right as
far as we are able.
Q132 Mr Jenkin: Very briefly, because
you have given very comprehensive answers, but two very brief
questions, how long is it going to take before we can take our
hands off so to speak?
Brigadier Hughes: We do not know.
We know that we can continue to do what we can, but to some extent
that SSR timeline will not be the driver because you will be driven
by other timelines as well about Provincial Iraqi Control, so
it is when the Iraqis decide and the Coalition decides that we
are ready for transition that you will come to a view then as
to what to take forward post-transition into PIC. We have programmes
where we can tick off units, but to give you a dead stop time
I could not do.
Q133 Mr Jenkin: Concerns that were
expressed to us about the Iraqi Government being very slow at
their equipment programmes; would you agree with that and can
that be addressed?
Brigadier Hughes: It can be addressed.
We have people inside the Iraqi MoD—in fact we are putting
another procurement specialist in in the next couple of weeks.
They have been slow; one of the issues is the anti-corruption
law that the Coalition put in place to try and address some of
the very serious corruption. That makes people quite frightened
to sign contracts, but we do have people in place to try and drive
that forward.
Chairman: That struck us as being improved
in terms of the Iraqi Government actually procuring equipment
over last year. Dai Havard.
Q134 Mr Havard: Within that, however,
we had a meeting with the Defence Minister while we were there
and he was very clear that General Mohan's appointment in Basra
was an important step in unifying command and control for all
security assets—that was the euphemism for going in and
trying to sort the thing out and give a consistent, coherent pattern
there. The resources he has at his disposal to do that, however,
we also discussed that, and it is this 5th Brigade within the
10th Division and this 14th Division that apparently is going
to appear and is going to apparently drop out of the sky as far
as I am concerned. I have little confidence, frankly, that that
is going to come on the timeframe that they were telling us and
is going to be equipped—given our experience of 12 months
to get to the stage we are with the 10th Division. Can you say
something about that because this really relates to how long we
are going to stay and what we are going to do, and this business
about their capacity there to do it. General Mohan may well be
able to knock heads together and accommodate militias and have
some architecture of control; however, what resources have you
got to actually police it?
Mr Ainsworth: The equipment is
there for the existing people, the existing 10th Division.
Q135 Mr Havard: The 10th Division,
yes.
Mr Ainsworth: The idea is that
they grow the 5th Brigade of 10th Division; they are already part
way there, but they are not fully equipped, so they are still
in the process of being formed, and then at some stage after that
you can effectively split the division and create 14th Division
and effect this turnaround that the Brigadier talked about, so
that we can get the Basra-based people out of Basra and into the
other provinces.
Q136 Mr Havard: It is like the South
Wales Police beating up South Wales miners—I have seen it,
yes, I know that.
Mr Ainsworth: It is a big job
and whether they have got the numbers yet is part of the conversation
that we are having.
Q137 Mr Havard: They have not got
the equipment, they have not got the capacity, they are not there.
They are a fiction.
Mr Ainsworth: At the same time
that they are saying that they have not got the numbers and they
are attempting to grow their capacity, they are equally beginning
to express their confidence in being able to take over in Basra
town and being able to take over in the province. We have to balance
that conversation, we have to understand that conversation and
they have to understand the size of the job they are taking on.
Q138 Mr Havard: The Defence Minister
seemed to think they would be there and they would be available
by September. I am afraid I do not share his confidence.
Mr Ainsworth: Who will be there
by September?
Q139 Mr Havard: The 14th Division.
Mr Ainsworth: I do not think that
is the timescale that people are working to but I am not very
sure.
Brigadier Hughes: Not everybody
is giving the same date. You are right to be sceptical, things
do not normally run to time. We have had some people say September
at the left hand scale of it; we have heard some say early in
the new year, January. Somewhere in there is probably about right,
but the important thing here—and we have genuinely seen
signs of this—is the Government recognising the importance
of Basra. It is always uppermost in their minds, for perfectly
understandable reasons, that Baghdad comes first and so a lot
of the equipment flow has gone straight into Baghdad. If there
is a genuine belief that Mohan can deliver, and in the importance
of Basra, we will see it come on line quicker.
1 The UK funding support to the Iraqi Security Forces
is provided through OPERATION Osiris and to date, around £13m
of this has been used to fund support to Iraqi Army 10 Division. Back
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