From: CHUMB@CHUBOO.ORG   
      
   'Yet there is a British sub-text to all this, which must also be   
   acknowledged. Fantastically, the British Army is struggling to sustain the   
   manpower for Tony Blair's Iraq crusade when this same Blair is cutting its   
   numbers, to save money to fund more important New Labour priorities - gay   
   rights counsellors in Southall, job creation schemes for John Prescott, and   
   suchlike.'   
      
      
      
      
   We are in this together: if America fails, we fail   
   By Max Hastings   
   (Filed: 07/11/2004)   
   Many British people regard the battle beginning at Fallujah and last week's   
   casualties among the Black Watch with dismay, even revulsion. They perceive   
   an ugly predicament in Iraq growing worse by the day, and Tony Blair   
   allowing hapless British troops to be dragged ever deeper into it. Here,   
   they say, are the first fruits of the re-election of George W Bush, an   
   ignorant and dangerous man. Heaven help those shackled to his chariot   
   wheels, when he really gets into his stride.   
      
      
   There are good reasons for questioning Bush's fitness to lead the world, and   
   for savaging his administration's handling of Iraq. Yet it seems gravely   
   mistaken to go beyond this and start to hope - as so many French and German   
   people hope - that Washington's hubris will be humbled in the Sunni   
   triangle. Even Bush's Western critics should beware of wanting him to fail   
   in Eyerack.   
   Win or lose, we are in this together. If America fails, we all fail. If Iraq   
   dissolves into anarchy, as well it may, the world will be the loser. The   
   fact that the United States has not used its power wisely since 2003 does   
   not diminish our profound need for this power, to save us from the   
   consequences of failed and failing states. In Iraq, we are where we are.   
   Political defeat or premature withdrawal threaten not only a vacuum and even   
   greater bloodshed, but lasting damage to world order.   
   Which brings us back to Fallujah and the Black Watch. There is a rational   
   case, even if one rejects it, for demanding that British troops come home.   
   There is no case at all for suggesting that they should stay but sit on   
   their hands in the south and keep away from the bungling Americans.   
   Even many British soldiers dislike American tactics. A senior adviser in   
   Basra said to me a couple of months ago: "It is very uncomfortable to fight   
   as partners with allies who have a completely different attitude to the   
   value of civilian lives from our own." The Americans' doctrine of   
   overwhelming firepower is repugnant, indeed counter-productive, in the   
   present circumstances of Iraq.   
   Yet it is the only way they know to do the business, and it might yet   
   succeed. We are overwhelmingly junior partners in an alliance in which the   
   Americans have 20 men on the ground for each British soldier, and have paid   
   a correspondingly higher share of the blood price. The British zone is   
   relatively stable militarily. The Americans needed some help to hold ground   
   vacated by their own marines, to reinforce the push on Fallujah. It seemed a   
   wholly proper operational decision that we should send a battlegroup.   
   If Iraq is to have any chance of becoming viable, January's elections are   
   critical. It is impossible to make every part of the country secure for   
   polling in the next two months, but the insurgents must be pushed back and   
   weakened. Breaking their hold on Fallujah is a crucial step.   
   The Black Watch and other British units are likely to suffer significantly   
   more casualties: both sides on the ground know how much is at stake.   
   Soldiers can only protect themselves against suicide bombers by shutting   
   themselves up inside fortified positions. If they do this, they cede control   
   of swathes of territory to the insurgents, and make progress impossible   
   towards political education, voter registration and all the other essential   
   preliminaries to elections. If the Coalition's presence in Iraq is to mean   
   anything, troops must travel, take risks - and losses.   
   This is a war. All wars cost lives. British critics who suppose there is any   
   blood-free way through the mess delude themselves, unless they frankly   
   advocate withdrawal. Every soldier's death is a human tragedy, but overall   
   losses in Iraq remain small, in a struggle being waged against fanatics.   
   Yet there is a British sub-text to all this, which must also be   
   acknowledged. Fantastically, the British Army is struggling to sustain the   
   manpower for Tony Blair's Iraq crusade when this same Blair is cutting its   
   numbers, to save money to fund more important New Labour priorities - gay   
   rights counsellors in Southall, job creation schemes for John Prescott, and   
   suchlike.   
   Is it any wonder that soldiers feel dismayed by the duplicity of a   
   government that pays constant lip-service to Britain's Armed Forces, yet   
   relentlessly attacks their capabilities? It is, of course, bitterly ironic   
   that the Black Watch drove into the Sunni triangle alarmed not by the enemy   
   but by the prospect of amalgamation when they drive out again.   
   There is a real need for an infantry reorganisation, because   
   single-battalion regiments are hard to sustain without imposing intolerable   
   strains on the family lives of soldiers constantly reposted and relocated,   
   as indeed the Black Watch has been. But thanks to the Government's Defence   
   Spending Review, argument about reorganisation has become entangled in   
   overall force cuts, which are inexcusable. Not surprisingly, morale has been   
   hit.   
   Geoff Hoon, presiding genius amid all this, was born to be town clerk of   
   Bootle rather than Her Majesty's Secretary of State for Defence. Downing   
   Street, conscious of this, has reinforced his department with disinformation   
   experts from Alastair Campbell's stable. The Chiefs of Staff now labour   
   under shameful and draconian injunctions against opening their mouths, which   
   only the bold ones ignore. Mr Hoon explains Iraq and service re-organisation   
   with all the rhetorical gifts of an undertaker briefing pall-bearers at a   
   foundling's funeral, which in a manner of speaking he is.   
   It is a sorry story. Just when the British people and their Armed Forces   
   need convincing answers, these are absent. If ministers told the truth, they   
   would say: "There is plenty more pain to come in Iraq, for the Black Watch   
   and everybody else. It is possible, perhaps probable, that the Coalition   
   will have to leave the country before it can be secured. But we must keep   
   trying, unless we surrender to anarchy."   
   British soldiers doing the job would more readily be reconciled to its   
   perils and frustrations if they did not face having their strength hacked by   
   a grateful government when they come home. One lesson of Iraq that even Mr   
   Hoon might learn is that numbers of bayonets on the battlefield count as   
   much as, indeed more than, that dreadful buzzword of the modern Ministry of   
   Defence, "platforms". They were not platforms who died on Thursday up the   
   road to Baghdad.   
      
   Next story:  Wrong to smack but right to kill?   
    News: Black Watch look for insurgents   
      
      
   News: 'Hoon risked lives'   
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
   © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004. Terms & Conditions of reading.   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)