Mick Smith - Times Online - WBLG

Sorry Jock. The UK Has Failed in Basra!

It is sadly not true to say, as the Chief of Defence Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, does in an interview with The Times today, that British troops have not failed in Basra. It was not just the government that was suggesting our troops could do something worthwhile in Iraq’s most southern city, it was British military commanders themselves. Too often, we heard that UK troops were better than their US colleagues at winning hearts and minds and that we could do something in the south that our American allies had no hope of doing further north.

Harry's "job" is to do what he's told!

Senior army officers are apparently reviewing plans to send Prince Harry out on patrol in Iraq’s dangerous Maysan province in a Scimitar armoured reconnaissance vehicle following the deaths of two soldiers there last week. The two soldiers from the Queen’s Royal Lancers died when their Scimitar was destroyed by a bomb. The Lancers are due to be replaced next month by Harry’s regiment, the Blues and Royals.

Blair: How British Officials Conspired to Do Me Down

Tony Blair attempted, in an interview with the BBC's Today programme, to dismiss the claim that he had already agreed to go to war when the infamous "Downing Street Memo" meeting took place in July 2002 as “conspiracy theory”. Even by his pathetic standards this is a novel excuse. But just in case anyone is gulled into believing him, here is an extract from what was to my mind the most important of the eight memos. It was a Cabinet Office briefing paper, dated 21 July 2002 prepared for a key meeting of Blair's war cabinet, which was to take place at 10 Downing St two days later. It was the minutes of that meeting which included the infamous statement by Sir Richard Dearlove, the then head of MI6, that the intelligence was being “fixed around the policy” in Washington.

Is he Just a Fool?

Tony Blair has just announced to Parliament that British troops are to begin withdrawing from Iraq. This was supposed to be a move designed to show that Tony didn’t do everything George Bush wanted, a sign of independence that would help Labour in the polls. But since we are now - temporarily at least - the 51st state of America, the British withdrawal will be much slower than ministers and officials have previously suggested. This is because Bush insists we have to hang around to monitor the vastly over-stated threat from Iran, hence Tony's announcement in parliament that one of the key roles of the British troops would be "securing the Iran-Iraq border".

British General Questions What US Forces in Iraq Are Doing?

General Sir Rupert Smith is reluctant to condemn the dispatch of 20,000 more US troops to Iraq without being certain of what they are going to do, but the very fact that it seems unclear to him ought to suggest that all is not right. Smith is widely seen as the best chief of general staff the British Army never had. He made his name in Bosnia, as a brilliant commander of UN forces in very difficult times, and his book The Utility of Force, published in America this week, is considered a must read for up-and-coming British officers.

British Troops Help a Republican Cause

In the early hours of the morning, President George W Bush confirmed that British troops will remain in Iraq as along as he is president. Yes I know it is at odds with the reports you have seen. I know that Bush said 20,000 more US troops would be going to Iraq, not British. I know some papers are actually running stories claiming that they can “reveal” that several thousand British troops will actually be out of Iraq by May. But the bottom line here is that for the sake of long-term Republican electoral chances the bulk of British troops will stay, and some of them inevitably die, in Iraq until the president finally leaves office.

Sticking Another Finger in the Dyke

My first thoughts on hearing reports of Des Browne’s latest comments on Iraq, were that it was so good of him accept reality and confirm our report a couple of weeks back that British troops are likely to be out of Iraq by the end of next year. Defence ministers seem to spend so much of their time denying obvious realities, that any attempt that gets close ought to be applauded. But a closer look at what he actually said made me realise that it was just another attempt to stick a finger in the dyke holding back the flood of calls for British troops to be pulled out of Iraq.

Are They Really Dying for Their Country?

The spin doctors have done pretty well by Tony Blair over the last few days. The deaths of four servicemen and women on the Shatt al-Arab was neatly edged off the top of the BBC newscasts by the news that the prime minister was going to push for talks with Syria and Iran - actually reported before their dreadful deaths but regurgitated by the BBC’s reliable idiots as if it was somehow new and more important than the loss of four lives in a totally unnecessary fashion. Thereafter their deaths fell swiftly down the bulletins, apparently less important than a series of meaningless government announcements that it was going to do this or that. We shouldn’t of course be surprised. It is all we should expect from the dreadful post-Hutton BBC. They are frankly not alone. The scandal that is the continuing loss of British lives in Iraq is the story that no-one seems able to confront.

Are we staying in Basra to help the Iraqis or the Republicans?

Senior military commanders are concerned British troops will stay in Iraq longer than necessary to protect the political position of President Bush. Senior defence sources rightly believe there has to be a continued British presence in southern Iraq even once security is completely handed over to Iraqi control. But they have expressed concern that the continued presence of British troops in Iraq will depend on the political fortunes of the Republican party in America rather than assessments based purely on the situation in Iraq.

"Mentoring" the "Transition" in Iraq

As predicted last week on this blog, the withdrawal from Iraq is about to begin. Tony Blair and George Bush will announce that they are to start withdrawing troops from Iraq at a summit in Washington as early as this week. The process appears to have been carefully choreographed in an attempt to bolster the popularity of Bush and Blair, both of whom are desperate to boost their poll ratings which have plummeted to record levels with Iraq seen as a major factor in both cases.

Long Awaited Withdrawal About to Begin

Returning from a brief holiday in Cuba, I’ve been struck by the lack of attention given to a very interesting briefing from Baghdad on Friday by the senior British officer Lt-Gen Sir Rob Fry, who is the coalition deputy commander in Iraq. He was asked about the recent renewed speculation in the US press that an announcement on plans for withdrawal is imminent. Most informed observers believe that an announcement will follow hard on the heels of the appointment of the al-Maliki government. But on both sides of the Atlantic the politicians have refused to give any hints of whether troop numbers will be cut, how soon that process might begin and how long it will take. Fry though was pretty clear on all counts.

Sorry Donald You've Got To Go

$282bn! No come on, don’t say it so quickly. Give it the respect it deserves. Two hundred and eighty two billion dollars! That is the precise cost so far of the war in Iraq to America. Yes, the latest Congressional figures show that by the end of this fiscal year America will have spent $282bn – a sum that dwarves the measly $6.13bn we in the UK have spent - messing up a country that was no threat to America or the UK in any way, turning it into what are effectively three separate states with no government and no means of keeping the country secure and at the same time creating a terrorist theme park where all those Islamist terrorists who want to take their ludicrous and pathetic ire out on America can congregate.   

Winning the War on Terror?

I have spent the past week in Turkey at a Nato counter-terrorism conference where a number of speakers dealt with the complete failure of the west to win the “hearts and minds” of the Muslim world. It is a battle that ought to be easy to win, since as Bassam Tibi, a leading scholar of Islam and International Relations told the conference, Jihad doesn’t actually mean war and the vast majority of Muslims do not support violence. But while we were there, Turkish television showed US troops flattening the house of an Iraqi while laughing and shouting out: “See you in hell mother*******!” As the chairman of my panel, a Turkish professor, said, this footage was not guaranteed to help win hearts and minds. A few days later US troops joined an Iraqi assault on a mosque, in which at least 16 people were killed. 

Iraq: Is there no hope of getting it right?

The third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq is time to take stock of what it has achieved. Not much would be a realistic response. Tens of thousands killed for a start-off and let no-one suggest that the number killed might have been higher had Saddam been left in power. It is a claim that is hinted at on a regular basis by the US administration but it is complete nonsense. Many thousands of demonstrators are calling for US and coalition troops to be pulled out. The polls show both President Bush and Tony Blair at all time lows in the popularity stakes while Iraq is, according to its former Prime Minister Iyad Alawi, in the middle of a civil war that will rip the country apart. Yet there is still hope.