6.2 |
Military planning for the invasion, January to March
2003
418.
Mr Stephen
Pollard, Head of MOD Overseas Secretariat (Sec(O)), showed the
IPU
paper to Mr
Hoon the same day.150
He
explained that a more detailed cross-government
paper,
setting out potential UK involvement in Iraq in the short, medium
and long term,
would be
prepared after the Rock Drill.
419.
The first
paper matching that description was the ‘UK Vision for Phase IV’
sent
to No.10 on
26 February, described in Section 6.5. Section 6.5 also describes
how
sectorisation
remained unresolved after the Rock Drill and how the UK was
unclear
about how
large its AOR was likely to be during the stabilisation
phase.
420.
A JIC
Assessment on 10 February warned of the possibility of
terrorist
attacks
against Coalition Forces in Iraq, during and after
conflict.
421.
On 10
February, at the request of the MOD and the FCO, the JIC produced
its
second
Assessment on the potential terrorist threat in the event of
conflict in Iraq.151
422.
The earlier
Assessment, produced on 10 October 2002, is described in
Section 3.5.
423.
The
Assessment’s Key Judgements included:
•
“Al Qaida
associated terrorists in Iraq and in the Kurdish Autonomous
Zone
in Northern
Iraq could conduct attacks against Coalition Forces and
interests
during, or
in the aftermath of, war with Iraq.”
•
“In the
event of imminent regime collapse, Iraqi chemical and biological
material
could be
transferred to terrorists including Al Qaida …”
424.
The Assessment
is considered in more detail in Section 3.7.
425.
The JIC
judged on 19 February that Iraqi conventional forces in southern
Iraq
could
rapidly be defeated and that southern Iraq was “the most likely
area for the
first use
of CBW against both Coalition Forces and the local
population”.
426.
On 19
February, at the request of OD Sec, the JIC issued an
Assessment,
‘Southern
Iraq: What is in Store?’, of the situation in southern Iraq and
what might
happen
before, during and after any Coalition military
action.152
427.
In the
discussion of the draft Assessment, the points made by the members
of
the JIC
included:
•
It was an
“important paper for informing planning following a Coalition
attack”.
•
Saddam
Hussein “might target oilfields but whether he would try
fundamentally
to destroy
the wells was not known”. It would be “useful to have
more
150
Minute
Pollard to PS/Secretary of State [MOD], 20 February 2003, ‘Iraq:
Day After’.
151
JIC
Assessment, 10 February 2003, ‘International Terrorism: War with
Iraq’.
152
JIC
Assessment, 19 February 2003, ‘Southern Iraq: What’s in
Store?’.
449