9.2 | 23 May 2003 to June 2004

Lieutenant General Sir John Kiszely went further, and said that six months was “manifestly

not long enough”.100 One risk of a six month tour was that Iraqi interlocutors might judge

that the postholder was “passing trade”, and would not establish as a close a relationship

with them as they would with an individual who would be in post for a year or more. He

made similar points in 2005 in his end of tour report, which can be found in Section 9.3.

Lt Gen Lamb told the Inquiry that he agreed to extend the length of his tour because

“it was exactly the right place to be”.101

The Inquiry asked Air Chief Marshal Sir Glenn Torpy to what extent the conduct of

the campaign was determined by individual GOCs rather than by the CJO.102

ACM Torpy replied:

“In terms of the overall campaign objectives set by CDS and then down through

myself to the GOC … that provided a degree of continuity but there is no doubt we

had a debate over how long tour length should be … There were army reasons for

keeping it at six months. That’s what we stuck with. In hindsight and what we have

now shifted to is much longer between nine months, a year, maybe even longer for

certain key people.”

ACM Torpy said that he thought that commanders would have benefited from longer

tours in Iraq because “it gives you an opportunity to build relationships, understand the

environment” and that this was “an acknowledged lesson out of the campaign”.

General Sir Mike Jackson told the Inquiry that “six months seems to be self-evidently too

short” given the importance of relationship-building.103 He indicated that tour lengths for

senior officers in Baghdad had begun to extend to nine or 12 months during his time as

Chief of the General Staff (CGS).

General Sir Richard Dannatt, who succeeded Gen Jackson as CGS, told the Inquiry that

he was “pretty convinced” that six months “in the front line” was as much as a soldier

should be asked to do.104 For some senior commanders and staff officers, and those

engaging with local leaders and in training local forces, the circumstances were different.

Consequently, “we have significantly changed the number of posts that go for nine

months, 12 months and some even longer”.

General the Lord Walker told the Inquiry that he considered “a minimum tour length for

operation, intelligence-type commanders should be a year long” but that six months was “

a good time for people on the ground”.105

Air Chief Marshal the Lord Stirrup told the Inquiry that:

“… there is a very clear view that a brigade needs to train, fight and recover together.

So that presents you with a difficulty, since you would actually like your command

team … to stay there longer.

“The way we sought to balance this circle is to have more and more continuity posts

that are in theatre for a year, and they run over from one brigade to another …

particularly in the areas of intelligence and cultural understanding.”106

100 Public hearing, 14 December 2009, pages 37-39.

101 Public hearing, 9 December 2009, page 34.

102 Public hearing, 18 January 2011, pages 100-101.

103 Public hearing, 28 July 2010, pages 91-92.

104 Public hearing, 28 July 2010, pages 39-40.

105 Public hearing, 1 February 2010, page 59.

106 Public hearing, 1 February 2010, page 73.

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