British in back-up role in Basra

By Caroline Wyatt
BBC Defence Correspondent

British forces have made clear that the current operation in Basra is not just an Iraqi-led operation, but an Iraqi operation full-stop.

Fighting in Basra districts has been stoked by various criminal gangs

Though the British are providing some support, it is essentially as back-up - offering military capability, such as air power, that the Iraqi forces do not yet have.

Coalition jets, many of them British, have roared through the skies above Basra constantly over the past days, while British forces have also offered help with surveillance.

However, it is clear that the real British contribution was made ahead of time: training and mentoring the Iraqi army well ahead of the operation, most recently offering specific instruction on anti-insurgency techniques.

I watched last week as a unit of the Iraqi army was put through its paces at Shaiba airbase, just outside Basra air station.

Members of 1 Scots taught the Iraqi infantry how to clear buildings, and fight house-to-house in a mock "city" set up to resemble Basra itself.

The Iraqi army commander in Basra, General Mohan, flew in to inspect his troops last Tuesday and must have been satisfied with what he saw, as by Sunday he went to the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri Maliki, with plans for the operation to take on the militias in Basra city.

"This is an Iraqi effort," confirmed Major Tom Holloway, spokesman for British forces in the south.

"It is a statement of their confidence and capability.

"The Iraqi army is cordoning off city blocks so that the Iraqi police can go in to clear the areas of militia, slowly re-establishing security across Basra. It is a serious operation."

Success crucial

British forces are not expected to step in.

All the indications from the Iraqi security forces are that they will not ask for British infantry or artillery back-up.

Yet the success of the Iraqi operation "Charge of the Knights" is crucial: not just for the people of Basra and their security, but for Britain's end-game in Iraq.

British forces withdrew from Basra Palace and the city itself last autumn, handing over security to Iraqi forces in Provincial Iraqi Control in the south in December in the belief that the British presence in the city had become part of the problem, rather than the solution.

British forces are not expected to intervene in Basra

However, there have been clear differences of opinion between the US and Britain over that strategy.

Some US commanders have made clear their belief that an enhanced British military presence or surge in the city, similar to that of the US in other areas of Iraq, would make more sense in restoring order than leaving it to Iraqi forces.

The British view, though, remains that Iraqi forces had to be allowed to take control and be in the lead on any operation to restore law and order to Basra, because only the Iraqis themselves can provide the long-term solution to Basra's problems.

Those problems are not simple and may not be resolved in one swift military move.

The current Iraqi military and police operation is a bid to end the on-going power-struggle in Basra between rival militias.

After it was taken by British forces in 2003, the city enjoyed relative peace, despite severe economic problems such as joblessness, a lack of infrastructure and accompanying protests over the lack of progress on all those fronts since the Allied invasion.

But since 2005, the city has been riven with feuding between rival Shia militias, in a fight for control and power between the Mehdi army of Moqtada Sadr (the Mehdi Army, or JAM) and local Shia rivals such as the Badr Organisation, and a militia under the control of the Fadhila political party.

Unless the Iraqi security operation succeeds in bringing peace to Basra.... the British will not be able to pull out of Basra air station Caroline Wyatt BBC Defence Correspondent

Basra is critical because it is the hub for some 80% of Iraq's valuable oil revenues, and the Fadhila groups are believed to be in control of the port and port-workers' unions.

That control helps drain crucial revenue away from both central and regional government.

However, while bribery, corruption, kidnapping and petty theft are all blamed on the various militias, some Basrans say that the local government is also less than spotless in its example.

Provincial elections are due later this year, a fact perhaps not unrelated to the central government's desire to assert control in Basra now.

The wider danger, though, is that the current military operation will lead to the Sadrists' ceasefire unravelling - not just in Basra, but in Shia areas across Iraq, creating a security headache for US and Iraqi forces elsewhere, and threatening the security gains made over the past year or so that many saw as a sign that Iraq was on the long, slow road to recovery.

British pull-out?

Unless the Iraqi security operation succeeds in bringing peace to Basra, and creating a stable atmosphere in which legitimate elections can be held and the economy allowed to flourish, the British will not be able to pull out of Basra air station, and certainly not nearly as quickly as had been hoped only last October.

Already, the plan to draw British troop numbers there down to 2,500 by this spring from their current level of 4,100 appears to have been quietly dropped, while optimists who expressed hope that the UK's forces might be able to leave altogether by the end of the year have fallen silent.

Britain's future plans for its forces in Iraq also depend on another key election - that in the US, and the decisions made by America's next leader on US troop levels in Iraq.

Having gone into Iraq in 2003 shoulder to shoulder with Washington, London cannot be seen to be abandoning its ally prematurely - nor leaving the people of Basra in the lurch.