EFFORTS BY British military chiefs to prepare for an Iraq invasion in late 2002 were blocked by then-defence secretary Geoff Hoon, who worried that a disclosure of such preparations, would create a major crisis for the government.
Some early planning had been done in summer 2002, but Peter Boyce, who then served as chief of general staff, said Mr Hoon stopped detailed preparations in November 2002.
Mr Hoon warned him that if news of this emerged it could seriously complicate then-British prime minister Tony Blair’s efforts to get a United Nations agreement sanctioning military action.
“It was very frustrating. I was not allowed to do that. In other words, having refined our theoretical strategic planning, I could not take the next step, which was to implement it and to start doing the necessary purchasing and bringing things forward, getting people in the right sort of place,” said Lord Boyce.
This, he said, was “in order not to make any signals that we were doing overt military planning while the UN negotiations were going on, leading up to the resolution that happened in November”.
The British military were “in a vacuum” in September 2002 when Mr Blair met then-US president George Bush in Camp David and urged the latter to seek a second UN resolution to win international support.
Senior officers had presented options to Mr Blair but had not received any instructions, which made it difficult for them to make early preparations to put people in the right places, along with organising military purchasing.
The seventh armoured brigade – better known as the Desert Rats – did not finish its preparations for the invasion until March 19th, 2003 – the day before the Americans and British invaded.
Meanwhile, Lord Boyce was sharply critical of the then-US secretary of defence, Donald Rumsfeld, who insisted on believing the British would join the invasion, regardless of its talk of the need for a UN resolution.
He said “no matter how many times” Mr Rumsfeld and senior US military officers were told about the importance of the UN for the UK, there “was a complete reluctance to believe it”.
Lord Boyce said he had been concerned about the limited number of troops the Americans – who were convinced that they would be welcomed as liberators – had deployed for the invasion, and its aftermath, describing the force as “anorexic”.