Sir Malcolm Rifkind: Time to learn the lessons from Iraq

In a new article for the TRG Blog, the Rt Hon Sir Malcolm Rifkind QC MP, the former Foreign and Defence Secretary and TRG Patron, reflects on the Iraq War. In this timely piece, written as Britain’s combat operations in Iraq draw to a close, Sir Malcolm calls the Iraq War “the most serious mistake of American and British foreign policy in the last fifty years”.

The Iraq War was the most serious mistake of American and British foreign policy in the last fifty years. However, the formal end of British combat operations in Iraq represents the appropriate moment to begin a period of reflection. It is true that the UK’s armed forces will continue to be involved in Iraq with regard to the training of local forces and nation building. However, they will no longer be engaged in the kind of combat role that makes a re-evaluation of Britain’s involvement in the entire Iraq venture inappropriate.

There can be no doubt that the five and half years in which British forces have been engaged in combat operations, ranging from intensive operations against Saddam’s Ba’athist regime to low scale counterinsurgency efforts against Shia militias, have take an enormous toll. Yet it is important to note that that toll extends well beyond the troops who gave their lives serving their country in Mesopotamia.

The United Kingdom’s involvement in Iraq has had a detrimental impact upon the entire defence establishment, both in terms of resources and morale, and has weakened public confidence in the political leadership’s ability to employ the use of force in a judicious manner. Many lessons must be learned if we are to avoid a repetition of such consequences in future. At the present time, two stand out as being of paramount importance.

The first regards the use of our armed forces. The last decade has been one in which the military has been employed on a regular basis, with British personnel deployed to Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and Iraq. No one would question the professionalism of those who have taken part in these campaigns.

However, such missions have too often been underpinned by too vague a rationale. The invasion of Iraq epitomised this trend. Weapons of mass destruction, the desire to inject United Nations’ sanctions with a degree of credibility, the liberation of the Iraqi people and the promotion of democracy were all cited as reasons for the use of force. Yet this abundance of different arguments given to try and justify military action should have been considered a reason against acting, not a sign that operations should proceed. Military ventures initiated by a democratic nation, that has not, itself, been attacked, can only count on the support of the public at large when they are underpinned by a clear and consistent principle unambiguously supported by international law. On this count, Iraq failed the test, and fell short of public support as a result.

The second lesson to be learned from our involvement in Iraq concerns our political decision making process. The benefit of hindsight would lead most to conclude that the decision taken by Parliament in 2003 to declare that the case against Iraq was “proven” was a profound error. Yet more troubling than the de facto authorisation given by Members of Parliament, was the manner in which it was provided. Should a future Parliament choose to support an assertive use of force by a future Prime Minister, they would be well within their rights to do so. Yet they should only do so having cast a much more sceptical eye over the justification for such action, including the underlying rationale, likelihood of success, potential “exit strategy”, and military feasibility of the mission itself.

In 2003, Parliament abdicated this role. It accepted faulty and vague intelligence too readily. It did not ask hard questions about the capacity of an occupying force to apply the principles of western democracy. It failed to ascertain the circumstances in which UK forces would be withdrawn from the theatre of operations. Finally, it failed to ask hard questions about whether the resources of the UK’s armed forces were equal to the mission they were being asked to undertake.

So what lessons must we learn?

In military terms, a key lesson of the Iraq war must be that we employ a much greater degree of caution before resorting to the use of arms. The confused and ambiguous reasoning that sustains the UK’s ongoing mission in Afghanistan, and the strain being placed on the UK’s reserve forces, requires that we adopt such a practice as a matter of urgency. Pursuing desirable goals is an insufficient threshold for the use of our armed forces. Only where our national direct interests are at stake should we, normally, be prepared to expose British soldiers to death or injury. We must also avoid making military commitments that may be out of proportion to the UK’s capabilities.

Britain’s military involvement in Iraq has caused it considerable harm, and weakened its credibility in the eyes of the world. Learning the lessons of that war would be the only way of ensuring that some good comes out of the experience.