6.4 |
Planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, mid-2001
to January 2003
462.
On
post-conflict commitments the paper stated:
“The likely
post-conflict scenarios and demands have yet to be clearly
articulated.
Scenarios
include immediate and catastrophic regime collapse, the mounting of
an
internal
coup as the campaign commences, or at the opposite end of the
spectrum
an
exhausted Iraq suing for peace. Each of these will require a
different response.
The infant
US inter-agency process has just started to identify the means by
which
transition
to a post-Saddam regime might take place. This commences with
a
CENTCOM-led
military government.”
463.
In the section
headed “Conflict vs Post-conflict”, the SPG asked whether, if
UK
forces were
to participate in the military campaign, “our effort should be
against the need
to meet US
short-term planning for combat, or the equally demanding and
pressing need
for
preparations for the post-conflict phase”. It
continued:
“Conflict
phase. Commitment to this phase may carry with it inherent risks
with
regard to
post-conflict engagement with little choice on role, timing,
location, or
future
extraction. An alternative approach that offers a UK lead, or UK
participation in
the
post-conflict phase may be equally attractive to the US as our
commitment to a
land role
in the conflict phase.
“Post-Conflict.
Given the wide range of possible post-conflict scenarios these
forces
would have
to be combat capable forces at high readiness, and in all
probability
with key
elements forward deployed during the conflict phase. The length and
scale
of our
post-conflict commitment will determine our ability to fulfil a
range of other
operations,
and most notably our Balkan commitment. An enduring medium
scale250
commitment
in Iraq would preclude continued medium scale engagement
in
the
Balkans.
“Strategic
Balance. We are currently committed to two medium scale land
operations
(FRESCO251
and the
Balkans), and a land commitment to Iraq at anything
above
small
scale252
will commit
us to three
medium scale land
operations. Although with
a full
Package 3253
commitment
to the conflict phase we retain the SLE [Spearhead
Land
Element], our ability to deploy and sustain even a small scale
force package
has yet to
be determined, and anything above this Scale of Effort will be
impossible
… Recovery
and recuperation will also be key to our judgements as to which
phase
to commit
to. Hard and fast judgements are not possible, however, commitment
of
Package 3
will have an effect for at least two years.”
250
Defined in
the 1998 Strategic Defence Review as “deployments of brigade size
or equivalent” for war-
fighting or
other operations, such as the UK contribution in the mid-1990s to
the NATO-led Implementation
Force
(IFOR) in Bosnia.
251
The use of
military forces to provide cover in the event of a strike by the
Fire Brigades’ Union.
252
Defined in
the 1998 Strategic Defence Review as “a deployment of battalion
size or equivalent”.
253
The most
ambitious of the four options and the only one involving the
deployment of UK land forces
(to northern
Iraq).
189