The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
said he
“was acutely aware that … Snatch was not designed [for 21st century
urban
warfare]”
and “so one was stuck with a difficult set of
circumstances”.
“Yet … what
have you got available at short order? Well … better have a
Snatch
than a Land
Rover.”
171.
General
Sir Mike Jackson, Chief of the General Staff (CGS) from
February 2003 to
August
2006, told the Inquiry:
“Snatch
Land Rovers were deployed to Iraq because they were available or
could
be made
available as we drew down from Northern Ireland, and without them
it
would have
been completely soft‑skinned Land Rovers. That’s where the state of
the
equipment
inventory was at that point.
“The Snatch
Land Rover was only designed to give protection from low
velocity
rounds and
shrapnel and it wasn’t set out to do anything else, but it was
better than
a
completely unprotected vehicle.”82
172.
A JIC
Assessment on 3 September judged that the security environment
would
“remain
poor” and “probably worsen over the next year”.83
The JIC
stated that the
“most
frequent attacks” had been against Coalition Forces and
“increasingly” were from
small IEDs.
Those using them had “shown growing competence, determination
and
sophistication”.
The JIC assessed that IED attacks would become more
effective.
173.
The JIC judged
that Shia consent was “fragile and eroding”. The
guidance
of “senior
Iraqi Shia clerics” had been “to give the Coalition a year”, but
the recent
attacks
were “likely to have shortened this timeline substantially”. If
acquiescence
turned to
hostility, that “would have the most serious consequences for the
security
situation,
particularly in southern Iraq”. If the Coalition was “perceived to
be impotent”,
the
Shia would “take law and order into their own hands”.
Reporting indicated that
supporters
of the Muqtada al‑Sadr were “acquiring weapons” and “planning
attacks
on Coalition
targets”.
174.
In addition,
the JIC judged that Iran and Hizballah were:
“… probably
inciting violent anti‑Coalition protests and other disruptive
activity.
Their
incitement probably falls short of directly ordering attacks on
Coalition Forces.
But after
the death of Ayatollah al‑Hakim [the leader of the Supreme Council
for
Islamic
Revolution in Iraq], Iran will be reconsidering its
approach.”
82
Public
hearing, 28 July 2010, pages 74‑75.
83
JIC
Assessment, 3 September 2003, ‘Iraq: Threats to
Security’.
32