6.4 |
Planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, mid-2001
to January 2003
508.
Mr Gray, the
FCO attendee at the first meeting, commented to FCO
colleagues:
“In
practice this first meeting was largely an exercise in telling the
FCO how to suck
eggs. I’m
sure future meetings will improve.”279
509.
The first
FCO paper for the AHGI identified possible consequences of
conflict
for the
Middle East and beyond. They included:
•
a refugee
crisis;
•
heightened
anti-Western feeling;
•
an easier
environment for terrorists to operate in; and
•
higher oil
prices.
510.
The paper
stated: “By preparing for the worst, we should be better placed
to
avoid
it.”
511.
In Washington
on 17 September, Mr Miller told Mr Ricketts that he had started a
lot
of work on
post-conflict issues and expected to have the basics in place in
two or three
weeks.280
Mr Ricketts
suggested that UK and US experts should get together at
that
point and
“stressed the importance of this work. We had to think through the
unintended
consequences
of any action we might launch.”
512.
On 20
September, the FCO sent Sir David Manning a DSI paper on the
regional
and
international impact of conflict in Iraq.281
‘Iraq –
Consequences of Conflict for the
Region and
Beyond’ was the first of five FCO papers on post-conflict issues
prepared
over the
following weeks and tabled at the AHGI on 11 October. The four
others were:
•
‘Scenarios
for the Future of Iraq after Saddam’;282
•
‘Models for
Administering a Post-Saddam Iraq’;
•
‘Vision for
Iraq and the Iraqi People’;
•
‘What sort
of relationship could the EU have with a rehabilitated Iraq?’,
shown
to the
AHGI in final form on 4 November.283
279
Manuscript
comment Gray on Minute Drummond to Manning, 23 September 2002, ‘Ad
Hoc Group
on Iraq’.
280
Telegram
1192 Washington to FCO London, 17 September 2002, ‘Iraq: Ricketts’
Visit to Washington,
17 September.
281
Letter
Sedwill to Manning, 20 September 2002, ‘Iraq – Consequences of
Conflict for the Region and
Beyond’
attaching Paper Directorate for Strategy and Innovation, undated,
‘Iraq – Consequences of
Conflict
for the Region and Beyond’.
282 A
first version of this paper was also sent to Sir David Manning on
20 September. The Inquiry has seen
no
response. A revised version was sent on 26 September.
283
Paper
Middle East Department, 4 November 2002, ‘What sort of relationship
could the EU have with a
rehabilitated
Iraq?’
197