The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
•
a further
1,000 were “required in the UK as soon as possible for
other
reasons”; and
•
a further
1,000 were “staff officers and other support personnel deployed
for
the war
fighting phase … [whose] jobs are now redundant”.
693.
Mr Watkins
commented to Mr Hoon that, although he, Mr Hoon, had been
told
about the
proposed drawdown “in very broad outline” in an earlier
briefing:
“… what is
now proposed involves an acceleration by about a week and
a
reordering.
(It is also something of a bounce.) While it is right and proper to
bring
people back
when they are not needed, we do need to be careful not to leave
the
impression
that we are rushing for the exit leaving chaos behind; queering our
pitch
with
Coalition contributors for Phase IV …” 391
694.
Mr Watkins
suggested to Mr Hoon that he might want to defer taking a
final view
on this
until he had spoken to the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Prescott)
about plans
for
Operation FRESCO392
and had
received further details from PJHQ explaining the
rationale
for the accelerated drawdown.
695.
In late
April, Lt Gen McKiernan asked the UK to take responsibility
for
five provinces.
696.
Lt Gen
Reith stated that the UK’s response would depend on the
extent
of other
nations’ contributions.
697.
Lt Gen Reith
visited the UK AO in Iraq from 24 to 28 April. During the
visit,
Gen Franks
requested that the UK occupy five southern provinces: Basra,
Muthanna,
Maysan, Dhi
Qar and Wasit.393
Lt Gen
Reith responded that:
“UK
resources would only populate Basra and Maysan and if we could only
populate
two further
provinces with other nations’ contributions then we would only
take
responsibility
for four … [Lt Gen Reith] would expect that ORHA boundaries
be
adjusted to
ensure all five provinces would be in one ORHA region if we took
a
fifth on.”
698.
ACM Squire
informed the Ad Hoc Meeting on Iraq on 28 April that security in
the
South
continued to improve. A meeting of future troop contributors would
take place in
391
Manuscript
comment Watkins to Hoon on Minute Wallace to PS/Secretary of State
[MOD],
24 April 2003,
‘Op TELIC: Realignment of UK Forces’.
392
The use of
military forces to provide cover in the event of a strike by the
Fire Brigades’ Union.
393
Minute
MA/CJO to PSO/CDS, 28 April 2003, ‘CJO visit report to TELIC AO
24-28 April’.
394
Minutes, 28
April 2003, Ad Hoc Meeting on Iraq.
122