The Report of the Iraq Inquiry

In September 2003, a Whitehall policy seminar was held to look at best practice on

SSR.269 To coincide with that, officials within the FCO, the MOD and DFID had planned to

publish a report on SSR best practice. The MOD minute to Ministers stated that “SSR is

an area that necessitates high levels of co‑operation and co‑ordination between all three

Departments” and that the Departments had, in the Global Conflict Prevention Pool SSR

Strategy, a “common objective of helping governments of developing and transitional

countries fulfil their legitimate security functions through reforms that will make the delivery

of security more democratically accountable, as well as more effective and efficient”.

However, there was “currently no joint policy brief to guide practitioners” beyond a 1999

DFID statement on the link between poverty and security, which had become out of date.

There was no mention of Iraq in the SSR report or the Ministerial foreword.270

307. On 19 September, DCC Brand produced an “Info Memo” for Ambassador Bremer

containing a plan for Iraqi police training and development.271 DCC Brand wrote that the

goal was to establish a 65,000‑70,000 member Iraqi police force over 18 months to two

years with an estimated annual cost of US$970m. That would require 600 international

trainers and 1,500 international police advisers and mentors with executive authority.

308. DCC Brand broke the plan down into four strands:

• Police recruitment and selection (US$5m) – to identify and initially screen at

least 33,000 qualified candidates with a team of 25 police and 150 MOI staff.

• Police training (US$150m) – to be run in Iraq and Jordan. Existing police officers

would receive a three‑week Transitional Integration Programme and new recruits

would receive an eight‑week basic police skills recruit course.

• Police institutional reform and development (US$800m) – to create a

“uniformed 1,500 member International Coalition Police Force (ICPF) which

will have executive authority and authorised to be armed, and will implement

new organisational structures, standard operating procedures, training and

equipment guidelines for police throughout Iraq under command of a CPA

appointed commissioner”.

• Developing police operational capacities (US$20m) – to focus on developing

specialised skills to deal with organised kidnapping, extortion and trafficking.

269 Minute MOD [junior official] to PS/Min(AF), 11 September 2003, ‘Security Sector Reform Policy Brief’.

270 Report [DFID/MOD/FCO], November 2003, ‘Security Sector Reform Policy Brief’.

271 Minute Brand to Administrator [Bremer], 19 September 2003, ‘Iraqi Police Training and Development –

Short Summary Version’.

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