14.1 |
Military equipment (post-conflict)
Board”. He
had a role in influencing the Chief of the General Staff, but his
primary role
was to
ensure “whatever troops are required … are made available, that the
units are
properly
trained, manned and equipped to the greatest degree possible, and
that’s his
primary
responsibility”.12
28.
The USUR
process only applied to new capability requirements.
Where
in‑service
support was needed to sustain existing equipment, an Urgent
Sustainability
Requirement
(USR) was raised.
29.
The Standing
Instruction issued on 26 November 2004 stated that the
Urgent
Sustainability
Requirement (USR) process was operated in parallel to the UOR
process
but by the
DLO.13
This was
“to deliver urgently required stocks and spares to
meet
operational
sustainability requirements”. The “key points” about the process
included:
•
USRs
followed “a similar staffing process as UORs”.
•
DLO
procured, tracked and accounted for USR expenditure.
•
There was
no formal review because DEC, IPT and industry support
was
already in
place for the required equipment.
30.
The
1998 Strategic
Defence Review (SDR) set out
the UK’s defence requirements
in the
period up to 2015.14
31.
The importance
of the SDR assumptions for equipment available to the
forces
deployed
for the invasion of Iraq is addressed in Section 6.3.
32.
The SDR
explained that, “in the post Cold War world”, there was a greater
need for
the Armed
Forces to build an expeditionary capability because “we must be
prepared to
go to the
crisis, rather than have the crisis come to us”.
33.
A supporting
essay to the SDR listed the future military capabilities it
considered
“increasingly
important”, including:
•
command,
control, communications and computers, and
Intelligence,
Surveillance,
Target Acquisition and Reconnaissance (ISTAR); and
•
“the trend
towards force projections operations, for which we may need
to
deploy very
rapidly in order to be successful, places an increasing
premium
on transport
or lift capabilities”.15
12
Public
hearing, 28 July 2010, pages 10‑11.
13
Minute Soar
to UOR Stakeholder, 26 November 2004, ‘Urgent
Operational/Sustainability Requirements
– Standing
Instruction (Version 1)’.
14
Ministry of
Defence, The
Strategic Defence Review, July
1998.
15
Ministry of
Defence, The
Strategic Defence Review: Supporting Essays,
July 1998.
9