5 Implications for future operations
136. During our inquiry we discussed with witnesses
the lessons that could be learned for future operations, not just
in the context of the UK's contribution but also for the future
of NATO and the UN. In evidence we heard that both NATO and the
UK were committed to holding 'lessons learned' exercises for the
Libyan operation. Other countries such as France are also carrying
out similar exercises.[158]
NATO Lessons Learned Exercise
137. Prior to the end of operations, at his monthly
press conference on 5 September 2011, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO
Secretary-General, said that NATO could start learning the first
lessons from the operation:
Most of those lessons are positive. [...] First,
the crisis shows NATO's flexibility. Nobody saw it coming. But
NATO decided to act within 6 days. We set up the operation. And
we adjusted it when we needed to.
Second, it shows NATO's openness. We were joined
by partners old and new. From the Middle East and Northern Europe.
We agreed what needed to be done. We agreed how to do it. And
we did it. Because our partners know us, they trust us, and they
are ready to work with us.
Third, it shows NATO's strength. This was the
first Alliance operation where European Allies and Canada took
the lead. And the Alliance got the job done. European Allies and
Canada led the effort. But this mission could not have been done
without capabilities which only the United States can offer. For
example: drones, intelligence and refuelling aircraft. Let me
put it bluntly: those capabilities are vital for all of us. More
Allies should be willing to obtain them.
That is a real challenge. And we will have to
find the solutions at the next NATO Summit in Chicago.[159]
138. We pursued the lessons that NATO could learn
from the operation at our evidence session with UK Permanent Representative
to the North Atlantic Council and the UK Military Representative
to NATO. Air Marshal Harper, UK Military Representative to NATO,
outlined how the NATO's formal lessons learned process would be
carried out:
The lessons-learned process itself will be conducted
by the joint alliance lessons-learned centre in Portugal, which
is an Allied Command Transformation organisation. I am confident
that it will indeed tackle every single part of the system in
drawing together its conclusions. I know that the SACEUR, Admiral
Stavridis, and the SACT, General Abrial, are keen that there should
be an efficient and swift process, so that we do not lose momentum
in learning these lessons and applying their results.[160]
139. We have already mentioned the speed with which
NATO reacted to developments in Libya and to the interaction with
non-NATO states (see paragraphs 74 and 81). Another positive lesson
identified by Mariot Leslie, UK Permanent Representative to the
North Atlantic Council, was "the value of minimising civilian
casualties and the positive effect that that had on the politics
of the operation, both inside and outside the Council". She
added that although the conflict was ongoing [at the time of the
evidence session] there might also be lessons for NATO from the
way in which the conflict ended.[161]
140. Mariot Leslie and Air Marshal Harper agreed
that the capability gaps highlighted by the operation and the
over-reliance on the US for particular capabilities were areas
for concern that NATO had to address. Air Marshal Harper said:
On the perhaps negative side, Libya has highlighted
capability gaps. The gap in our ability to project a mission at
this sort of range in these circumstances can only be filled at
the moment by those capabilities held by the United States. As
we described earlier, there are steps in place to try to address
those gaps, and they are being given the right sort of priority.[162]
141. Other witnesses' views of the success of the
mission suggested that the operation raised additional challenges
for NATO which needed to be addressed. In their interim report
on Libya, the Royal United Service Institute noted that the operation
in Libya "reflected a number of new and sometimes novel,
political and military elements",[163]
and:
The relationship between the United States and
its other NATO partners is unlikely to remain unaffected by this
crisis. Ambiguity over the command arrangements, the extensive
back-up support that US assets had to provide, and the overt political
splits in the alliance, even while it was acting as the military
arm of the United Nations in enforcing Resolution 1973, saw NATO
acting in a way it had never done before. [...]
If future NATO operations are likely to be as
ambiguous and vulnerable as this one; success in this case principally
dependent on the determination of France and Britain to act militarily,
then bilateral and trilateral defence relations between the key
European players may loom much larger in the future than their
commitment to NATO, as such.[164]
142. Professor M J Williams, Visiting Professor of
Government at Wesleyan University, was critical of the NATO alliance:
[...] The Americans ostensibly 'handed off' the
Libya mission to Europe, but they remained deeply involved. [...]
NATO is at the very least a two-tiered alliance. Any pretense
that the Alliance is based on mutual solidarity is rubbish. Libya
reinforced a division evident since the late 1990s. The UK must
consider the impact of a multi-tiered NATO on future policy. [...][165]
143. Some aspects of NATO's involvement in operations
in Libya were particularly positive, especially the involvement
at an early stage of non-NATO nations. However, we also note concerns
expressed to us that the US "handed off" the operation
to European allies and that NATO is a divided Alliance. We consider
that the US decision not to lead the engagement in Libya was positively
beneficial, in that it forced European members of NATO to face
their own responsibilities, and shone a light on the gaps in European
capabilities—gaps which we consider it essential to be plugged.
Experiences from operations in Libya have revealed challenges
for the political and military future of NATO, including the requirement
to develop new ways of working especially if the US does not participate
in operations and there is further involvement of non-NATO countries.
These challenges must be considered as a matter of urgency.
UK Lessons Learned Exercise
144. In a statement to the House of Commons on 5
September 2011, the Prime Minister announced that Sir Peter Ricketts,
the National Security Adviser, would lead a lessons learned exercise
in respect of operations in Libya:
Of course, after any such conflict and an intense
period of military, Government and humanitarian activity, it is
right to learn the lessons. Sir Peter Ricketts, my national security
adviser, will be leading a lessons-learned exercise on how the
Whitehall machine operated and what lessons we can learn. That
should include the operation of the oil cell, which I think did
a very good job of trying to help deny oil to the regime and to
make sure that the rebels, who were not getting oil products,
got them.[166]
145. In their evidence to us, the UK's Permanent
Representatives to the UN and North Atlantic Council and the UK
Military Representative to NATO told us that they expected to
be consulted as part of the review.[167]
The National Security Adviser's review was published on 1 December
2011 and covered the period of military action in Libya (19 March
to 31 October 2011) and some of the key events in the lead up
to military action.[168]
The review focused on "how the central co-ordination mechanisms
worked through the crisis" and covered seven key functions:
- Strategic direction/decision
making
- Operational co-ordination and implementation
- Humanitarian response
- Stabilisation planning
- Co-ordination with Allies
- Informing Parliament
- Strategic communications[169]
146. The review concluded that "overall the
central co-ordination mechanisms worked well" and highlighted
14 specific areas.[170]
However the review also stated that the "campaign highlighted
a number of lessons for handling future conflicts, including:
- initial delays and other problems
with the consular evacuation from Libya, which are reflected in
the Review of Consular Evacuation Procedures[171]
which the FCO published on 4 July. The first priority in any crisis
is likely to be effecting the safe extraction of those UK nationals
who want to leave, as early as possible. The FCO is taking forward
the recommendations identified in its Review;
- integrating better economic analysis and policy
more prominently at the early stages of conflict planning;
- establishing a clear cross-Government process
on UNSCRs, led by a senior FCO official, to maximise the effectiveness
of sanctions and evaluate options while retaining the flexibility
necessary in fast-moving international negotiations;
- the UK should ensure that it obtains key command
positions in those parts of a reformed NATO Command Structure
that are most likely to be relevant to the conduct of future operations;
- being ready to review long-standing policies,
such as recognition of States not Governments, even where deeply
engrained;
- bringing the Strategic Communication Steering
Group (SCSG) into the Cabinet Office to support the newly-formed
NSC communications team;
- the importance of establishing a clear operating
rhythm as quickly as possible to balance the frequency of meetings
against the need for sufficient time to implement Ministerial
decisions; and
- briefing situation reports to Ministers more
efficiently through e.g. a single dedicated oral briefer supported
by a single integrated written update".[172]
147. We commend the Government for commissioning
a lessons learned exercise undertaken by the National Security
Adviser. We request a list of all those consulted as part of this
exercise. We note that the review stated that "overall the
central co-ordination mechanisms worked well". However we
also note that the review highlighted a number of lessons for
handling future conflicts. In response to our Report, the Government
should set out the steps to be taken and timescales involved to
resolve these concerns. We look forward to hearing how the Government
proposes to "ensure that it obtains key command positions
in those parts of a reformed NATO Command Structure that are most
likely to be relevant to the conduct of future operations",
including clarification of which key command positions.
148. We note that the National Security Adviser's
review stated that individual departments would conduct their
own lessons learned exercises. The MoD should clarify the remit,
format and schedule of the reviews it has carried out or will
be undertaking and we expect to see the reports. We request a
briefing from the MoD's Defence Operational Capability on the
lessons learned from the Libya operation.
149. We pressed the Minister on whether the lessons
learned exercise would include a calculation of the costs of the
operation and an assessment of the cost effectiveness and value
for money of the assets deployed during the operation, including
comparisons with those of NATO allies. He responded:
It is a perfectly legitimate question and, as
part of the lessons-learned exercise, we will most certainly be
scrutinising questions of cost. On the particular point that you
are making, where you suggest it would be a valid comparison to
look at the costs of sorties made by the RAF against those made
by other nations, such a comparison would only be valid if you
were comparing like with like.[173]
150. We commend the Minister for the Armed Forces'
commitment to include the costs of the operation in the lessons
learned process. This should include an assessment of cost effectiveness
and value for money of the assets deployed. We note his comment
that cost comparisons with allies on different types of operations
are only valid if comparing like with like (including the difficulty
of the operation), but recommend that where possible these comparisons
should be undertaken.
Conclusion: a successful operation?
151. When we asked Nick Harvey MP, Minister for the
Armed Forces, for his assessment of the operation, he said:
I think by any objective measure, the operation
as a whole and UK involvement in it should be judged a success.
[...]
We have played a leading role on the military,
diplomatic and humanitarian fronts. Militarily, we flew a fifth
of all the air strikes, launched more than 50 helicopter missions
from HMS Ocean and helped to enforce the maritime embargo and
ensured that the sea lanes were free from threats to allow humanitarian
aid to be delivered, which was particularly relevant in Benghazi
and Misrata. I think that by all measurements it has been a success
for the UK and a success for NATO. It has demonstrated our expeditionary
air, maritime and amphibious capabilities and we have shown our
Armed Forces in the way we wanted to project them—as flexible,
adaptable and able to sustain operations and routine defence commitments
worldwide, using allies and allied basing facilities where appropriate.[174]
152. When asked what had not gone so well, he responded:
We do not think from this that anything went
conspicuously badly... It has certainly been the case throughout
that we have been quite stretched as an alliance in terms of the
intelligence picture with which we were working. There have been
challenges in terms of air-to-air refuelling, for example, but
in all instances, we have managed, working with allies, to deploy
different bits of different nations' capability to make it work.
I think that there is no conspicuous failure that we are chastising
ourselves about, but it would be surprising if a lessons learned
exercise did not distil for the future some practices that could
improve another time.[175]
153. Commodore Steven Jermy, a recently retired naval
officer, was more critical in his assessment of the mission:
Events, and Her Majesty's Government's actions
in Libya suggest that the UK has still not recovered its ability
to think and act strategically in pursuit of the national interest.
Although, at the time of writing, the campaign appears to have
taken a more positive turn, this may be temporary, and very possibly
more to do with good luck than with good strategy. Luck—good
and bad—very often plays an important role in operations
and war, and we should naturally be prepared to ride good luck.
But equally, we should also work to understand how to improve
our strategy-making and, thus, our overall strategic performance.[176]
154. Professor M J Williams, Visiting Professor of
Government at Wesleyan University, was also concerned that the
operation had shown that the UK and other European allies remained
dependent on the United States at a time when that country was
changing its foreign policy and defence focus, that UK resources
had been stretched by the operation and that the UK had been lucky
that the operation had ended when it did.[177]
155. We note the concerns of witnesses regarding
the operation, but believe that the mission in Libya should be
regarded as a success. NATO and other nations acting under the
authority of the United Nations have ensured the safety of Libyan
civilians who would otherwise have been at risk of being killed
by pro-Gaddafi forces.
156. UK Armed Forces have contributed significantly
to the successful conclusion of the operation. UK Service personnel
have yet again performed their duties in a professional and dedicated
manner. The capabilities deployed by NATO and the UK performed
well, minimising civilian deaths and collateral damage. However
the mission has also highlighted challenges and issues that need
to be addressed and taken forward by the United Nations, NATO
and the UK Government. The mission in Libya was successful in
discharging the UN mandate. The real test is whether the success
of this mission was a one-off or whether the lessons it has highlighted
mean that future such missions can be successfully undertaken,
whilst maintaining the UK's capability to protect its interests
elsewhere.
158 Qq 191-194 & Q 197 Back
159
NATO Secretary General Monthly press briefing, 5 September 2011.
Available at: www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/opinions_77640.htm
Back
160
Q 194 Back
161
Q 191 Back
162
Q 194 Back
163
Royal United Services Institute Interim Campaign Report, Accidental
Heroes, Britain, France and the Libya Operation, September
2011, p1 Back
164
Ibid, p 13 Back
165
Ev w5 Back
166
HC Deb 5 September 2011, col 29; further information on the exercise
was given at HC Deb, 12 September 2011, cols 983-4W Back
167
Qq 121 & 191 Back
168
Libya Crisis: National Security Adviser's Review of Central
Co-ordination and Lessons Learned, 1 December 2011. Available
at: www.number10.gov.uk/news/report-on-libya/ Back
169
Libya Crisis: National Security Adviser's Review of Central
Co-ordination and Lessons Learned, 1 December 2011, p 5. Available
at: www.number10.gov.uk/news/report-on-libya/ Back
170
Ibid, p 3-4 Back
171
Available at: www.fco.gov.uk/resources/en/pdf/consular-evacuation-review
Back
172
Libya Crisis: National Security Adviser's Review of Central
Co-ordination and Lessons Learned, 1 December 2011, p 4. Available
at: www.number10.gov.uk/news/report-on-libya/ Back
173
Q 290 Back
174
Q 196 Back
175
Q 197 Back
176
Ev w1 Back
177
Ev w4-5 Back
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