6.5 |
Planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, January to
March 2003
467.
On working
alongside the UK military, the advice stated that:
•
The
military was considering how to revise plans to allocate resources
to a
potentially
significant humanitarian role, but that, given the military’s
resource
constraints,
it could be “highly advantageous” if Coalition military units
could
supplement
the UK effort with medical teams and NBC units, where it
was
weakest.
•
DFID needed
to retain flexibility to deal with the possibility that, initially,
the UN
and other
humanitarian organisations might not be able to operate in Iraq.
In
those
circumstances, “we would need to rely on military forces supported
by
embedded
DFID civil/military humanitarian advisers and/or a DFID
operational
team”.
•
Significant
planning and preparation had been carried out, but some
sectors
were poorly
covered, including “fuel supply (supporting electricity generation
and
distribution
systems), water and sanitation and the power sectors”. The
security
environment
and the ability of humanitarian agencies to engage was a
“principal
concern”.
Past experience showed that “direct DFID/UK military
humanitarian
action can
save lives [and] alleviate suffering, and assists the process
towards
recovery
and stabilisation”.
468.
On DFID-led
interventions, officials advised that the military might provide
security
and
logistics to support DFID “assessments” and:
“…
depending on priority needs potentially including the maintenance
and
management
of key infrastructure including water and sanitation,
transport
infrastructure
and electricity generation and transmission infrastructure in an
AOR.
Under these
circumstances DFID would assist with technical programme
support
directly or
via specialist contractors retained internationally. However, it
has to be
noted that
our human resource capacity is limited (CHAD-OT [Operations
Team]
can provide
around 25 specialists, including recruiting additional experts) and
the
scale of
need could be immense and we may face … the threat of CBW.
Therefore
we should
concentrate on those tasks where our experience and expertise
would
add most
value. Working alongside Coalition military where necessary and
with US
DART
capacity where it would enhance humanitarian
response.”
469.
The advice
concluded with a section on resource constraints. Until DFID
received
an
indication from the Treasury or No.10 that further funds would be
forthcoming, it was
planning on
the basis that “a substantial share of DFID’s Contingency Reserve”
would
supplement
CHAD’s emergency funds and MENAD’s Iraq programme budget. If a
total
of £60m
were available from those sources in 2003/04, DFID would plan
initially to
commit £35m
for immediate relief. Exactly how to allocate that amount would
depend
on the
nature of the conflict and other factors, but an indicative
allocation might be:
•
£20m to
support the work of UN agencies, the Red Cross and NGOs
across
Iraq;
391