The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
22.
Mr Day
considered that the UK had a number of motives for entering into a
dialogue
with
JAM:
•
to
contribute to the coalition’s overall outreach effort to groups
involved in
violence,
in line with what was happening with Sunni groups further
north;
•
to
encourage mainstream JAM (who it was believed were “looking for a
way out
of
violence”) to move towards a commitment to democracy, particularly
with the
provincial
elections expected in 2008;
•
to drive a
wedge between the mainstream JAM core (who were nationalists
and
believed to
be “reconcilable”) and the largely Iranian-sponsored JAM
Special
Groups (who
were following an Iranian agenda);
•
to
encourage a reduction in the level of violence, to make time for
the Iraqi
Army to
develop its capability to enable it to confront the unreconciled
militias
successfully;
and
•
to reduce
the threat to UK and other coalition forces.
23.
The process of
seeking Ministerial agreement for continued dialogue
with
an
individual (JAM1) was interrupted by the formation of the new
government
(see Section 9.5),
and had to be re-started in early July.
24.
On 2 July, an
official working closely with the military reported:
“HMA [the
British Ambassador to Iraq] and SBMR-I … judge that US and
GoI
[Government
of Iraq] will reject the deal.
“To
summarise a lengthy and detailed discussion: SBMR-I repeated that
he could
see some of
the opportunities offered by [JAM1]. As such he would like to be
able
to write
supportive comments on a submission. But as the submission
currently
stood – he
would have to comment that he did not believe that either the GoI
nor US
would
support the proposal. He was concerned that this would lead to
Ministers not
agreeing
the submission, and would like to avoid this if
possible.”15
25.
Although he
could see the benefits of reducing indirect fire (IDF) and
allowing
transition
to PIC to happen, US views reportedly remained a major concern
for
Lt Gen Lamb
because:
“… such a
deal in the South would represent an about-turn of the policy that
had
only months
ago convinced them to establish [another operational body]. In
short the
suggestion
of a no-strike agreement in the South was at loggerheads with the
active
targeting
policy conducted against Iranian proxies by MNF-I [Multi-National
Force –
Iraq] and
MNC-I [Multi-National Corps – Iraq] elsewhere in
Iraq.”
15
Minute
official working closely with the military, 2 July 2007, ‘New [NAME
OF OPERATION]
Submission: […]’.
186