The past could provide much instruction for the US and British militarychiefs, writes Col E. D. Doyle.
There has never been a time when . . . a study of history provided so little instruction for our present day. - Tony Blair, during a recent visit to Washington
Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson was Chief of the British Imperial General Staff (CIGS) (1918-1922). Lloyd George had picked him for his clarity of mind and expression, but in many respects Wilson was ill-adjusted to the 20th century.
He had, however, a clear grasp of the military requirements for occupying Iraq. He knew and corresponded with the general in command there. He knew its size and the terrain difficulties. The navy wanted Iraq for its oil. Conventional wisdom required infantry troops for occupying territory. Wilson said he hadn't enough troops. The British army was scattered over many parts of the world.
When the San Remo Conference (1920) assigned the Iraq/Palestine mandate to Britain, an Iraqi rebellion took months to suppress. As Keith Jeffries remarks in The Military Correspondence of Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson, this "illustrated all too graphically the slender margin of manpower available". The Director of Military Operations (DMO) considered "we ran things too fine, and a great disaster was only narrowly avoided".
Nothing to learn from history? Yet we hear of troop shortages in the present occupation.
Eventually, despite Wilson's scepticism, Iraq/Palestine became an RAF command. It operated by effective, controversial methods called "air policing" or "air control".
When Wilson was CIGS, his sardonic comments on the changes he could not prevent, on the "frocks" (politicians) he refused to understand, and on the Ireland he believed could destroy the empire were often savagely funny. Fortunately, he did not get his way about us, so we can enjoy him.
If Mr Rumsfeld has an infantry shortage in Iraq he may feel like the DMO quoted above. Rumsfeld has a clear mind and strong ideas about military changes - he wants smaller, more mobile and more flexible US forces. The invasion of Iraq was carried out with great economy of forces, if not of force.
Small Special Forces groups, precision missiles, "shock and awe" bombing and air supremacy can accomplish much during an invasion. But occupation duties require many "boots on the ground". Presumably he understands, as did Wilson, that occupation duties eat up troops.
The elimination of Saddam's sons should show if the resistance in Iraq is deeply rooted. Committed guerrillas tend to be resilient, even in disasters, but they need popular support. The sons were betrayed for money - the old enemy of resistance movements - $30 million in this case.
Money reduced resistance in Afghanistan, and there are reports of widespread distributions in Iraq. Only the amounts are new: the British paid subventions regularly on the North West Frontier.
The coalition casualties should also be kept in proportion: they are pinpricks to a force of 168,000 men. (There has been much discussion on modern western unwillingness to take casualties because of the prevalence of smaller families nowadays. To relatives, friends and comrades, casualties are not statistics, but personalities lost from family networks and circles of friends. When "X, only son of Mr and Mrs Y" is shown as "killed in action", one can understand the parental devastation. But it is claimed that the loss of a member from a family of four or six is not felt so much. Try that on a few mothers.)
In the second World War the Allies prepared AMGOTs, Allied Military Governments in Occupied Territories. The personnel spoke the relevant languages and got some training. The Allied armies needed order and good administration as they settled into occupation and/or went forward.
It is unclear what prearrangements were made for post-war Iraq. An AMGOT might be inappropriate, but how shall Iraq be "policed/controlled/occupied" now, and for how long? Again, history can help if only by recording and warning.
Paul Bremer's provisional authority has been making (and changing) policy decisions while developing an Iraqi Interim Council, and Michael Jansen, writing for this newspaper, has given a good picture of the latter's internal workings.
Elections are planned for next year, police are being re-equipped and the disbanded army still gets paid because idle, impoverished soldiers not under military discipline are dangerous. Up to $1,500 compensation is being paid for civilians shot by US troops.
Is a sustainable guerrilla war developing in Iraq? Too early to say: casualties are low but persistent. In 1920 the population was 2,849,800, so "air policing" (especially air surveillance) was relatively simple. It is now 22,300,000, but the number and capabilities of American aircraft are far greater.
It is claimed that most anti-American attacks are in Sunni areas; other areas are quietly recovering. The capture or death of Saddam could be decisive in disheartening resistants.
If reluctance to insert more infantry continues, what of "air policing" on the 1920s-1930s pattern?
The old easy targets of camel trains in open desert, and mud-walled huts and forts, won't be available. The Iraqi population is more urban, though its vehicles are trackable by air. By the mid-1930s air control had failed in Palestine: aircraft proved unsuitable against Arab and Jewish urban guerrillas. Modern helicopters can devastate urban areas. Would public opinion in the coalition states accept this?