Iraq inquiry: Black Rod blames 'amateurs' for the deaths of troops and civilians in Iraq

Published on Wednesday 9 December 2009 22:05

BRITAIN put "amateurs" into senior positions in Iraq during the occupation of the country, causing the deaths of local people and troops, a senior army officer claimed yesterday.

&149 Smoke rises over Baghdad

Occupying forces were also unprepared for the problems they faced running Iraq after invading in 2003, the official inquiry into the war heard yesterday.

Lieutenant-General Sir Freddie Viggers, senior British military representative in Iraq from May to September 2003, who now holds the post of Black Rod in charge of security in the House of Lords, said

"lack of a sense of direction from the outset" had put officials on the "back foot".

The lessons learned could apply to Afghanistan, he told the inquiry. "We have not really progressed at the strategic level," he said. "I am not talking about the soldiers and commanders and civilians … who did a great job. But it's the intellectual horsepower that drives these things (which] needs better co-ordination."

Of the need for training on how to make decisions to reconstruct an occupied country, he said: "We are putting amateurs into really important positions and people are getting killed as a result of some of these decisions. It's a huge responsibility and I just don't sense we are living up to it."

The speed of the military operation that led to the occupation took planners by surprise, said Gen Viggers, and reconstruction efforts were hampered by a growing insurgency and security, economic and governance problems.

He said: "It was rather like going to the theatre and seeing one sort of play and realising you were watching a tragedy as the curtains came back. We suffered from a lack of understanding of the state of that country post-invasion."

Not enough research had been done, and reality was a "long way" from the expectation it would be a humanitarian crisis, with a population willing to help.

Gen Viggers told the inquiry it took 16 days for troops to enter Baghdad from the start line, compared with the estimated 100 days. "That was a stunning military operation, but in so doing, it took everyone by surprise," he said.

After being met initially with a "hugely celebratory population", the tide quickly turned against the occupying forces.

Strategic plans did not prepare for the "kaleidoscope" of problems in the country as it emerged from the Saddam Hussein regime, and it was a struggle to restore infrastructure and security.

Troops tried to win over the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people amidst a "growing insurgency" and uncertainty about how and when power would be transferred to the population.

British military responsibility was focused on the southern city of Basra following the occupation. Senior civil servant Sir Hilary Synnott said that by the time he arrived as regional commander of the Coalition Provisional Authority in July 2003, he had been warned the situation was "bleak". "Once I got there, this was very much confirmed," he said.

There were no phones and no computer, so he ended up sending daily reports to the Foreign Office via Yahoo on a machine provided by the Americans. He told the inquiry: "That was an indication of the sort of problems we faced."

The inquiry had earlier heard that military staff were unprepared to run Iraq after the invasion, but Sir Hilary said it was to be expected that UK forces, as an occupying force, would have a "high degree" of civilian authority.

But he had to balance Prime Minister Tony Blair's wish for the south to be a "good example" and to publicise any success the authority had there with Britain's dependency on the United States for financial resources.

Sir Hilary said he felt he had the backing of Mr Blair for his efforts but criticised the Whitehall machinery for failing to deliver.

After requesting 37 additional expert staff and 20 armoured vehicles in August 2003, the record of the ad hoc ministerial committee stated he should be given everything he thought was necessary – guidance he understood to have come from No 10. By January 2004, 18 staff had arrived.

The inquiry continues.