6.4 |
Planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, mid-2001
to January 2003
way in the
State Department involving expatriate Iraqis, but “no real
connection to the
military
planning”. He had explained to US officials, “somewhat
repetitively”, the need
for an
early start to post-conflict planning. Kosovo had shown that civil
planning took
longer and
was more difficult than military planning. He reported that
references to the
UN’s role
had caused “an adverse reaction in many circles”, and he had found
it more
productive
to make the case for the UN as a source of legitimisation and
co-ordination
rather than
as an executive instrument.
996.
Mr Webb also
reported a “big pitch by the Republican right for making
democracy
an
objective” on the grounds that blood should not be spilt to replace
Saddam Hussein
with
another strongman. “Weary Europeans said this was hopelessly
unrealistic: modest
ambitions
for greater representation were more sensible.”
997.
In his next
update on US military planning for No.10 on 5 December, Mr
Watkins
warned that
it was increasingly difficult for the UK to plan without knowing
where the UK
land
package would be based. In order to keep options open for
significant UK military
participation
from mid-February onwards, the Armed Forces needed to “press
ahead
with
further preparations”.484
998.
The US had “no
formal position on the date by which they must be ready
to
act”.
It had a wide range of options, but assuming a political
decision to take military
action
on 15 February (known as “P Day”), the MOD expected the air
campaign and
amphibious
operations to start in early March.
999.
Mr Watkins
made no reference to post-conflict implications.
1000.
In the US,
CENTCOM’s Phase IV planners held a post-conflict planning
session
with a
40-person inter-agency team on 11 December.485
The event
anticipated “rough
going
ahead”. On the assumption that, initially, there would be no
government in place,
participants
were “anticipating chaos”.
1001.
After a
post-event briefing, Lieutenant General George Casey, Director of
the
Joint
Staff, recognised the need to augment the Phase IV effort. A new
Joint Task Force
(JTF-4) was
created in CENTCOM with an extra 58 staff.
1002.
On 13
December, the SPG described the post-conflict phase of
operations
as
“strategically decisive” and called for it to be “adequately
addressed” in any
winning
concept.
1003.
If the UK
was not prepared to make a meaningful contribution to
Iraq’s
physical
and political rehabilitation, it should not be drawn into
war-fighting.
484
Letter
Watkins to Manning, 5 December 2002, ‘Iraq: Military
Planning’.
485
Bowen SW
Jr. Hard
Lessons: The Iraq Reconstruction Experience. U.S.
Government Printing
Office, 2009.
281