The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
The team,
which included seconded police officers as well as officials from
the Home
Office and
MOD, was set up to co‑ordinate the work of a virtual team of
advisers from
ACPO, the
Home Office, the MOD police and Bramshill College of Policing. It
reported
to the
Iraq Senior Officials Group.
507.
A briefing by
the Iraq Police Training Project Team on 18 September stated
that
the first
course at az‑Zubayr was due to begin on 15 October, with
specialised training
courses
being carried out by Danish police officers.449
At the same
time, the facility was
being
expanded so that it could accommodate larger courses and begin
three‑week
‘Transition
Integration Programme’ training. The expansion was due to be
completed
in December.
In July
2003, military commanders from each of the areas in Iraq were
instructed
to stand up
ICDC battalions. In response to that, in early September an MOD
force
level
review concluded that a further two UK battalions should be sent to
Iraq, one of
which would
begin training of the ICDC in MND(SE) alongside force protection
and
intelligence‑gathering/surveillance
duties.450
The review
did not make clear what proportion
of the
battalion (around 600 strong in total) would be involved in
training the ICDC.
The UK ICDC
training team arrived in theatre in late September with the aim of
training
1,200
troops by mid‑October, and 5,000 in total, for deployment in
MND(SE).451
In the
Security Action Plan written in September 2003, the IPU recorded
that UK forces
were
training 160 members of the ICDC, and that would increase to 1,700
by early
November.452
ICDC
battalions would be “fully operational” by the end of the year in
all four
provinces
of MND(SE), carrying out basic guarding and infantry
tasks.
The IPU
identified four actions required:
•
provision of
additional UK Short Term Training Teams;
•
allocation of
a delegated budget to MND(SE) to support the training;
•
provision of
CJTF and CPA central support; and
•
agreement that
ICDC development costs should be underwritten nationally
in
order
to avoid “procedural delays in CPA”.
508.
In October,
Sir Hilary Synnott reported that CJTF‑7 had issued an
unexpected
instruction
entitled ‘Acceleration of the Iraqi Police Services’ which gave the
military
a greater
role in accelerated police training programmes. That is described
earlier in
449
Minute FCO,
18 September 2003, ‘Iraq: Police Training: Update: 18
September’; Email White
to UND
[junior
official], 21 September 2003, ‘Re: Police Training
Plan’.
450
Letter
Williams to Rycroft, 4 September 2003, ‘Iraq: UK Forces and
Resources Review’.
451
Paper MOD,
9 December 2009, ‘Iraq Security Sector Reform’.
452
Paper IPU,
8 September 2003, ‘Iraq: Security Action Plan’.
453
Telegram
110 FCO London [on behalf of CPA Basra] to UKRep Iraq, 31 October
2003, ‘Police Training
in South
Iraq’.
166