The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
454.
The record of
the meeting stated that Lord Bach believed work should be
set
in hand
urgently “to develop a better handle on the facts of equipment
performance
(including
the extent to which UORs reached users). Identifying and being able
to
account for
potential vulnerabilities would be “vital” to address Parliamentary
Questions
(PQs) and
reports of shortages in desert clothing, boots, ECBA and Combat
ID
equipment:
“Ministers
will need chapter and verse on these issues, and on any others yet
to
come to
their attention; and they will need it whatever the conclusions of
the lessons
learned
process.”
455.
Specific
questions on desert clothing, boots and UOR delivery were set out
in
an Annex,
including why the desert clothing “saga” came to light “so late in
the day”,
given the
attention it received in the run up to operations, and asking for
clarification on
whether all
UORs delivered to theatre were fitted. Lord Bach also sought
confirmation
that all
UORs had been received by the end user for whom they were intended.
If not, he
requested a
list of those that had not been received, with an explanation in
each case.
“As I have
tried to articulate previously, Minister(DP) is not seeking here to
second
guess
decisions made by commanders in theatre, which he accepts will
have
been made
for very good operational reasons. He simply wants to
understand,
and be able
to defend as required, the facts and the arguments pertaining
to
these judgements.”
457.
Lord Bach also
wanted to proactively “get the message across” publicly that,
in
general,
equipment performance had “been impressive”. He accepted that the
MOD
should be
prepared to acknowledge that “not everything went exactly according
to plan
and that
lessons are, of course, being learnt” but that this should not
deter the MOD
from
highlighting positive news.
458.
Mr Paul
Flaherty, Head of Civilian Secretariat, PJHQ, replied on 9 May
that
Op TELIC
had been “a great success both in terms of performance of equipment
and
the
successful delivery of an enormous amount of equipment in a very
short space of
“… it is
also becoming clear that there were problems in theatre, of which
we were
not aware,
in relation to the fitting of UORs and the delivery of kit. At this
stage
contributory
factors appear to include the sheer speed and scale of the
deployment,
the large
number of UOR equipment, the significant advance of G
day,224
and
the
absence of
an in theatre asset-tracking system with the consequent mismatch
of
people and
equipment.”
223
Minute PJHQ
Civ Sec to PS/Minister(DP), 9 May 2003, ‘Iraq: Op TELIC
UORs’.
224
The date on
which the ground operation commenced.
72