6.3 |
Military equipment (pre-conflict)
Combat ID
was preferable to delaying the advance. In both the UK
blue-on-blue
CR2
[Challenger 2] incident and the incident involving a US A-10 firing
on
2 CVR(T)s,
all UK vehicles were fitted with the appropriate Combat
ID.”299
571.
The
MOD’s First
Reflections report in July
2003 stated:
“By the
start of operations, MOD had deployed 1,861 vehicle-mounted and
5,000
dismounted
Combat ID sets. This was sufficient to meet the full
requirement,
although
the scale of equipment modifications required in theatre meant that
some
formations
were still being fitted as the first units crossed the line of
departure.”300
572.
The 17 October
2003 DOC report stated that training packages, which
were
created to
aid recognition of Coalition vehicles, arrived “too late and in too
small a
quantity to
be made widely available” and that the packages were “inadequate
for
573.
The DOC found
that there were not enough Thermal ID and Combat ID
panels,
which
formed part of the UK’s Combat ID capability for all vehicles, and
that they were
not robust
and proved to be inadequate aids for Coalition
aircrew.
574.
The House of
Commons Defence Committee concluded that:
“We expect
MOD to implement the lessons from Operation TELIC on Combat
ID.
MOD should
push forward with the work with its allies to agree on a single
system …
We note
MOD’s view that the opportunities for fratricide in an increasingly
complex
battle
space are likely to increase, but look to MOD to identify the
required action
and make
the necessary investment to ensure that such incidents are reduced
to
575.
The
failures in asset tracking identified in the 1991 Gulf Conflict had
not been
rectified
in 2003.
576.
Until January
2003, the UK military plan was to enter Iraq through Turkey. The
US,
which was
to manage the entry route, stipulated that UK forces should have an
asset
tracking
system that was compatible with that in use by US
forces.303
As a
result, the
MOD
approved a UOR for the purchase of a US asset tracking system,
known as Total
Asset
Visibility (TAV). The new system was not in place until the end of
February 2003;
too late to
be used in the early stages of the deployment.
299
Minute PJHQ
Civ Sec to PS/Minister(DP), 9 May 2003, ‘Iraq: Op TELIC
UORs’.
300
Report
Ministry of Defence, Operations
in Iraq: First Reflections, July
2003.
301
Report DOC,
17 October 2003, ‘Operation TELIC Lessons Study’.
302
Third
Report from the Defence Committee, Session 2003-04,
Lessons of
Iraq, HC 57-I,
para 233.
303
National
Audit Office, Operation
TELIC – United Kingdom Military Operations in Iraq,
11 December 2003,
HC 60.
93