The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
the Future
of Iraq Working Groups, originally to have been composed of
technocrats,
appeared to
have been “hijacked” by opposition politicians.
987.
On 19
December, Mr Masoud Barzani, leader of the Kurdistan Democratic
Party
(KDP), and
Mr Jalal Talabani, leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
(PUK), called on
Mr Powell
and Sir David Manning at No.10.478
Mr Blair
joined the meeting unannounced.
988.
The briefing
prepared for Mr Blair explained that the two party leaders did not
know
that he
might drop in and that it was not essential that he did
so.479
If he did,
he could
ask about
the opposition conference and the situation in “Kurdistan”, and
should state
that the UK
was committed to Iraq’s territorial integrity.
989.
The record of
the meeting stated that Mr Blair agreed with the two leaders that
all
groups in
Iraq should be involved in helping to reunite post-Saddam Hussein
Iraq.480
990.
Mr Blair wrote
to Mr Barzani and Mr Talabani twice during March 2003
(see
Section 6.5).
991.
By December
2002, US military preparations were gathering pace.
992.
The MOD
informed No.10, the Cabinet Office, the FCO and the Treasury,
but
not DFID,
that the US military was “gearing up” to be as ready as possible
by
15 February.
993.
Sir David
Manning wrote to Mr Watkins on 27 November, requesting a note
for
Mr Blair
on the progress of US planning (see Section 6.1).481
994.
Mr Watkins
advised Sir David Manning that it was “misleading to talk of firm
plans”,
not just
because of unresolved practical issues such as Turkish
co-operation, but also
because the
US political strategy remained “unclear”.482
There had
been “a significant
shift in US
military planning” as CENTCOM sought to “reduce the lead times
between
a political
decision and military action”. Secretary Rumsfeld had signed a
number of
deployment
orders to take effect in early January, and the US was
“increasingly moving
beyond pure
planning into at least some actual forward
deployments”.
995.
Mr Webb
visited Washington from 2 to 4 December for a US/European
conference
on
post-conflict Iraq and two days of bilateral talks with US
officials at the NSC, State
Department
and DoD.483
In his
report, copied to Mr Ehrman and Mr Chaplin in the FCO,
Mr Webb
observed that there was a good deal of activity on civil
reconstruction under
478
Letter
Rycroft to Sinclair, 19 December 2002, ‘Iraqi Kurds: Meeting with
Prime Minister, 19 December’.
479
Minute
Rycroft to Prime Minister, 19 December 2002, ‘Iraqi Opposition
Leaders’.
480
Letter
Rycroft to Sinclair, 19 December 2002, ‘Iraqi Kurds: Meeting with
Prime Minister, 19 December’.
481
Letter
Manning to Watkins, 27 November 2002, ‘Iraq: Military
Planning’.
482
Letter
Watkins to Manning, 29 November 2002, ‘Iraq: Military
Planning’.
483
Minute Webb
to ACDS(Ops), 9 December 2002, ‘Iraq Aftermath’.
280