“Acceptance of defeat”. Well, yes. It’s part of not being a superpower any more that you are subject to being defeated. But as well as that there’s another issue that limited the UK government’s efforts. And that’s a lack of percieved legitimacy for the war in Iraq.

“In my opinion, Great Britain as a Great Power is not only in decline, they are gaining speed in that decline becoming subservient to the United States in the spirit of a military puppet state.”

Absolutely. But we were in that position, and knew it, from the moment we signed up for the war. The intelligence presented in the UK to justify the war was visibly cooked at the moment it was presented. There was lots of posturing about it, and official enquiries, but the thrust was clear to those with eyes to see. The floor figure for the number of people who protested againt the war in London on Feb 15th 2003 was 750,000; estimates vary up to two million. Tony Blair lost his position as Prime Minister mainly because of the war.

The UK strategy for some time has been to get out; the subtle part, which was meant to be taking advantage of US propoganda about success to “demonstrate” that we weren’t needed any more rather fell apart, but it was a decent plan.

The people never wanted the war in Iraq; Afghanistan has been tarred with the same brush. Now Pakistan is going down the tubes too. OBL’s plan, to provoke the west into destroying what legitimacy it had, is working all too well.

John

War in Irag began 17 January 1991.
and resulted in “victory”
which lasted, what?…a whole 12 years long? And then in 2003 we “must” do it again? and now we have another “victory”, because the level of violence has subsided, and will lie doggo for, how long? “victory in Iraq” is so much more than an oxymoron.

So, the British left the field a bit sooner than we. my my.

Do you understand that the War on Terror is not simply about Iraq and Afghanistan? That it much more complex than that? I’m just an ignorant civilian with no formal warfighting education, and I undestood what it would take and how long it would take years ago. Start thinking in macro, not micro.

Iraq was like a dog chasing a car; what do you do with it when you catch it?

There is an interesting post over at Galhran’s about failed states.

In many respects the post invasion debacle of disrupting the sstatus quo and existing institutions tossed Iraq into a failed state status where we then faced the premise of having to destroy institutions to save them~

http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2006/04/18/chinas-silence-boosts-tyrants

“When it comes to human rights, China’s foreign policy is deliberately agnostic. As Hu puts it, China operates “without any political strings.” Inspired by how it would like to be treated by others, Beijing adheres to a policy of “noninterference in internal affairs,” trading, investing and providing aid without regard to whether its partner is a democratic visionary or a tyrant.”

When we look back at Iraq, was it about democracy, WMD, etc…

I will point out that “cultural hegemony” is an expensive proposition beyond strictly military victory.

Possibly Britian reached a conclusion that the people who said that the war would pay for itself were wrong.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080331/navasky_cerf

Do I suggest accepting defeat? No. But I remember Powell stated succinctly: “If we break it we own it.” I guess that is sort of like catching the car!

Yes we were defeated. I was part of the army that was defeated. Was it the fault of the average squaddie – hell no ! Was it the fault of our politicians, absolutely.

Galrahn says: “In my opinion, Great Britain as a Great Power is not only in decline, they are gaining speed in that decline becoming subservient to the United States in the spirit of a military puppet state.” Again absolutely correct, we are have become your lapdog, those politicians with the balls to disagree with our U.S. masters were lambasted in parliament and told to get with the program.

Even if you accept that we should never have been there in the firt place, but we are so lets get on with it, the biggest diferences between U.S. and British attitudes was indeed the arrogance of some senior army officers who believe they wrote the book on Counter-insurgency in Malaya, Oman, Northern Ireland etc, and “we can learn nothing from the heavy handed Yanks”. Also the resourcing and funding – look how much extra cash has been voted through congress in the years of war, whereas the our armed forces have been forced to fight two wars (or one war on two fronts), while keeping up peace-time tasking on a drastically REDUCED budget.

So as G notes, we are down to the lowest number of frigates and destroyers ever, we are going to build 2 carriers, for which we will never be able to afford enough F35′s to fly from them, but we think we are clever because we have an independant nuclear deterrent and a seat on the security council. The British people are sea blind for sure, even though 95% of commerce still arrives in the islands by sea, but if the British people only want a coast guard, then fair enough, but the U.S. has to drop the special relationship and expecting us to be their ‘staunch’ allie, we will be just another part of federal europe who does not want to pay to safeguard its freedom.

I am truly sad to hear that Jed. I’ve always looked at Great Britain, Canada and Australia as close brothers, speaking the same language and having the same heritage. Having to think of England as a bit player is very disturbing. I am very unhappy to have to think of the great British Lion now take on the manners of a house cat.

I only pray that it doesn’t happen here in the States!

I would like to add a few things on victory and defeat.

Since military objectives always is (and should be) subordinated to political objectives, one must ask, how did the loss of Basra adversely affect Britain?

And on the other side, I am still not sure what “victory” will look like for the Americans that bravely stick it out in Iraq, but still, when V-day does come America has already lost so much politically by this war that military victory seems irrelevant. By losing politically I am not talking about Europeans allies complaining about US policy, I am talking about real capability being weakened (economically and militarily) and the loss of image, or fear if you like, by America’s enemies.

The US has already lost in Iraq even if they one day can claim victory. The Brits on the other hand seems to have lost little, even though they can be said to have been defeated in Basra.

Though I am still in full agreement with Galhran that UK is in decline as a great power. That process has gone on for at least 60 years and is not stopping now. Worth remembering that exactly this development was a central strategic goal of the United States at least until the 1950′s.

I think the article is quite hypocritical. I have huge respect for the US as a country and for its great military tradition.

However:
US defeat in Vietnam was followed by humiliation in Iran and Somalia (through no fault of brave US forces). This versus a vastly under-resourced British in the South of Iraq relying on reinforcement from the Iraqi army to subdue the militias. It’s hardly the fall of Singapore again is it? There have been no Saigon-style British helicopters pulling staff from Embassy roof-tops. To compare it to the US Revolutionary War is ridiculous. This was a small-scale action that wasn’t adequately resourced.

Considering the UK is led by a left-wing government, it has actually shown a level of commitment in staying on in Iraq not displayed by any other US ally. I think its fair to say that had the US been led by its equivalent party (the Democrats) since 2004, there would be no Western forces left in Iraq at all at present. The problems in Southern Iraq were the fault of the UK government not committing enough resources. The numbers committed to pacify an area including a city of 2 million people was pathetic and makes any judgement of the effectiveness of the UK military hard to make.

To address some points:

“Britain was unable to hold the most important city in their theater of operation, and ultimately required the Iraqi forces …to do the job they were unable to do.”

Erm..a bit like the well-equipped US forces in Anbar relying on Sunni militias swapping sides to rectify the situation in a province ‘lost’ by the US’s own admission? However good a military force is, numbers and resources limit effectiveness. The Brits never had enough troops to ‘surge’ like the US did in 2007.

“Political support from Great Britain clearly eroded over time, which means the entire country carries the responsibility of the military defeat.” Political support didn’t ebb away over time in the UK. The Iraq war was unpopular from the start but was never a key election issue in the UK: hence Tony Blair being re-elected in 2005. The UK has lost over 332 personnel in wars far away in support of the US in recent years. I would not call that lacking stomach for a fight.

“the last time the British Army was defeated this bad by a small state insurgency was when the US defeated Britain in North America supported by France led by then General George Washington.” The last time the US was defeated by a small insurgency (not even given third party support) was in Somalia in 1993. Its best not to throw stones in glass houses. I also take issue with the term ‘defeated this bad’. Even the most ardent critics of the UK Iraq mission would take issue with defining it as some kind of nation-shattering event. Somalia in ’93 was a hugely more traumatic event.

To contrast the US to the UK as “a country with strong political leadership with a conviction towards victory” is ludicrous and not supported historically. The US is renowned as country whose political elite quickly lose the stomach for a fight when things get messy in foreign lands: look at Vietnam, Somalia, the tragedy in Beirut, the resistance to UK suggestions for ground forces in Kosovo. Bush went against US public and political opinion in supporting the ‘surge’ in 2007. Historically, this reinforcement of a costly US mission abroad is something of an aberration for the United States.

I would argue that they were politically defeated. Militarily, if given enough manpower and resources, they could have done it alone; but the Brits were only in Iraq because Bush, et al. essentially blackmailed Blair into coming along (probably with promises of military contracts). When the Army got caught holding the bag, Blair was on his way out.

I don’t blame them for leaving. I wouldn’t blame them for leaving Afghanistan either.

The sooner we all remember that you cannot not defeat an enemy solely through military means, the better off we’ll all be. I think the British Army figured that out quite a long time ago. The politicans haven’t figured that out though.

Iraq was Blair’s albatross. Afghanistan is rapidly becoming Brown’s. Let’s hope it also doesn’t become Obama’s.

We’d be better of funding education in Pakistan and Afghanistan, so that poor familes don’t send their kids to Taliban schools. Ending the asinine war on drugs would eliminate a fair amount of funding for terrorists around the world.

But I digress…

I’m afraid I agree with the comments that suggest that this article is motivated by hypocrisy. It reads as though the US sees Britain gradually reduced to non-independent status and tries to hurry the process along with the comment “Well, they can’t fight, anyway”. The trite and insulting allusions to 1776 don’t exactly help either, apart from being adolescent.

It’s worth remembering that this kind of lofty attitude has consequences. Continental Europe took so much patronizing abuse from the US over Iraq – a war in which they perceived, rightly or wrongly, no self-interest – that today their distancing of themselves from the US has ended up covering issues far wider than Iraq, as Obama found out on his recent trip to the G20 meeting.

I think the US has to decide what it wants from its allies. If you just want “political cover” from the UK when you invade Iraq, then accept that political cover gracefully and don’t turn it into a sneering “debate” over “defeat”. And if you want full-bore military support, then accept that you will have to make a much better case to the UK electorate to get it. The UK public know all about colonial wars, and they can see through cant that is opaque to the more patriotic kind of American.

The UK in Iraq behaved – quite rationally – like a gambler who suspects the game is bent and politely declines to commit his capital fully. The UK gave just enough “political cover” by supporting the US at the UN and by sending a small military force, to avoid being accused to betraying the US, but it also made sure that the “small force” really was small enough that it could be disengaged at any time, as it has been.

The UK saw Iraq for what it was; not a fight for “freedom”, but a straightforward colonial war in which the entire point is to commit forces only in order to be able to withdraw them later. In colonial wars, forces are committed not to “win”, but to keep control of the timetable under which events unfold which are going to unfold anyway. Just as in Northern Ireland there are trends unfolding in Iraq which most outsiders don’t even understand, but it’s worth committing minimal military forces just to slow them down and make sure genocide does not take place, but no more than that.

In a sense, this is the begged question in the comment “…support the strategic or economic interests of that nation”. Exactly what were Britain’s interests in Iraq? To present the US with a massive victory from which the UK would eventually be air-brushed out, as they always are in the US media? Or to do what their UN mandate asked them to do, which was to hold the ring while the Iraqis got their act together?

I suggest it was the latter, and that it would be a very irresponsible UK Government indeed that acted as though it had to tax its citizens to provide massive military support for operations from which the US would as usual take all the benefits, military and economic.

Da Nile ain’t just a rive in Egypt. Pick at Galrahn’s post all you want to, but the larger truth remains. The Brits were a great ally, but things have changed. And ignoring that won’t change it. Let’s hope Oz remains.

The British are still great allies to the US though Iraq wasn’t our finest hour. Changes need to happen in the leadership of the military and the country and sometimes it needs a failure for these changes to take place…

I’m afraid I agree with the comments that suggest that this article is motivated by hypocrisy.

Jon that is the only statement I take exception to. The article is motivated to encourage discussion, like your 500+ word response.

I’m not looking for agreement, I’m looking for opinions. I’m always willing to be told when and how I’m wrong through constructive friction.

“Increasingly, the national security agendas of policymakers will be dominated by five questions: whether to intervene, when, with whom, with what tools, and to what end?”

http://www.dni.gov/nic/special_globaltrends2010.html#implications

While I’m skeptical of any predictions of the future I would say that this thread illustrates along with the Pirate issue that the agenda will indeed be dominated by five questions.

Britain has been defeated many times, in many wars on many continents. In the scheme of things this would have to be marked at the low end of that scale. As we say over here, you can’t win them all.

Interesting article, though I assume the author hasn’t heard of the Anglo-Afghan wars especially the first which are a much better comparison,( though the humiliation from the first was at least an order of magnitude worse) a small Imperial war that wasn’t necessary and not supported sufficiently. I would like to know where the Kipling quote comes from though as I’ve never heard him say anything like that any chance of a source?

In terms of other “defeats” this does not come any where near defeat in a war with France and Spain, and some revolting colonials for 13 colonies that UK intended to keep. It does not even come close to the defeats in Palastine in 1948 to US supported Jewish terrorists or in the late 60′s to Arab terrorism and the loss of the naval base of Aden. Others have mentioned the defeat in 1919-21 in Ireland which obviously the objective had been to keep Ireland within the UK forever.

Iraq was an operation which was only ever going to be temporary, we had originally been promised the commitment would be for 1-2 years and we stayed for 6, if a decision had been made that it was the primary strategic campaign then the UK would not have volunteered to take on additional responisbilities in Afghanistan in 2006, (year 3 in Iraq) and increase it’s forces there from around 1,000 to approaching 10,000 or more than double the commitment to Iraq.

The intresting thing will be the Strategic Defence Review after the next election, scheduled for sometime between now and June 2010. The recent budget has announced that bailing out the Banks and the ecconomic crisis has doubled the National debt from 40% of GDP to 80% of GDP in 3 years and Defence is going to have to share some of the pain in paying that down so already the new carriers are under threat, even the Trident replacement is being seriously discussed by the Tories.

The question has to be asked if the campaign in Afghanistan is in the intrests of “the West” and is a fully supported NATO operation why should the UK commitment be bigger than France, Germany and Italy combinded when all 3 have bigger populations and bigger economies?

Kipling’s advice would be pertinent in our current Afghan situation to say the least. Interesting post.