The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
209.
On 21
September, Major General Andrew Salmon, who had
succeeded
Maj Gen White-Spunner
as GOC MND(SE) in August, reported that Gen Odierno
had assumed
command of MNF-I “with a clear focus on putting ISF into the
lead”.75
Gen Odierno
had informed Prime Minister Maliki that the US would be
“positioning
elements in
Basra next year”.
210.
Maj Gen Salmon
also reported that MND(SE) had been:
“…
considering what being without a SOFA on 1 Jan means, either
because we
won’t get
one, or because one hasn’t quite been finalised and we’re in limbo.
There
are
probably various legal interpretations as to where we will stand in
the latter case,
so it might
be useful to have some policy views in due course on the limbo
scenario.”
211.
Mr Brown
met President Bush at the White House on 26
September.76
In a
report
of the
meeting, Mr Brown’s Assistant Private Secretary recorded that
a formula had
been
developed for the SOFA to cover when US service personnel would be
subject to
Iraqi
jurisdiction. It meant that “in practice it was extremely unlikely
that these conditions
would ever
be met”. Mr Brown emphasised that a SOFA needed to be agreed
by the
end of
December. He told President Bush that in July Prime Minister Maliki
had said he
wanted the
UK out of Iraq. Mr Brown had responded that the UK would
stay.
212.
An MOD note in
the No.10 files entitled “Southern Iraq Force Levels”, dating
from
late
September 2008, set out “as requested” the options “to reduce the
overall size of
the force
to c.1,900 as part of the November 2008 rotation”.77
213.
The note
explained that under current plans there would be 4,148 UK
ground
troops in
southern Iraq until November. In October, it was expected that the
number of
support
roles (engineers) could be reduced by 200, bringing the total to
around 3,950.
“Our
analysis shows that we could not achieve the required level of
reduction
through pro
rata cuts across the force.”
As a
consequence:
“The only
alternative is to give up some of the tasks we currently
undertake.
In practice,
that means transferring responsibilities to the US. We have
identified
two options
for achieving a reduction to around 1900 posts. Both would make
us
very much
the junior partner in MND(SE) and in these circumstances we
assume
that the US
would take over command of the division … The options are (a)
transfer
to the US
responsibility for providing enabling capabilities and running the
COB
75
Minute
Salmon to CJO, 21 September 2008, ‘GOC MND(SE) weekly letter – 21
September 2008’.
76
Letter
Catsaras to Gould, 26 September 2008, ‘Prime Minister’s meeting
with President Bush,
26 September’.
77
Paper MOD,
[undated], ‘Southern Iraq Force Levels’.
416