IAN BRUCE: With the Black Watch
IN many respects, it has been a corporal's war rather than a general's. Britain's action in southern Iraq has ended more with a whimper than a bang after a display of initiative delivered Basra, the country's second city, at the cost of only three British lives.
Faced with insurgents and militia rather than regular troops, it is the UK's junior NCOs who have taken most of the life-and-death decisions in combat. The valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the reputed birthplace of civilisation, was supposed to have been converted into the graveyard of Iraq's military elite, Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard divisions.
Instead, Baghdad's armies simply melted away in the south. Only scattered detachments of the 30,000-strong corps positioned to counter the British thrust from Kuwait offered resistance. Most simply abandoned their tanks and artillery, took off their uniforms, and went home.
The lightning campaign envisaged by the coalition a month ago unravelled within days of crossing the Iraqi frontier.
Instead of fast-moving armoured battles and mass enemy surrenders, allied troops found themselves facing a ghost army.
Geared up for hi-tech warfare, they were forced into counter-insurgency operations more akin to Northern Ireland than a 21st-century encounter.
While the regular Iraqi army had voted with its feet in the face of certain defeat, militiamen in civilian garb launched their own behind-the-lines campaign of ambush and sniper attacks.
Rather than set-piece battles, Britain's war became a series of skirmishes, raids, and small-unit actions. Most of the decisive confrontations involved relatively low numbers on both sides and seldom more than a 100-man company.
The hostile warren of al Zubayr, eight miles south of Basra and home to up to 300,000 people, was Iraq's Belfast. Narrow, nameless Arab souks and alleys substituted for the back-to-back red brick ghettos of Northern Ireland, but the tactics were the same. It was pursuit of a ruthless, faceless enemy on his own urban turf.
Even the enemy's weapons of choice proved to be the same. Like the IRA, Saddam's Fedayeen favoured the Kalashnikov assault rifle and the rocket-propelled grenade, the instruments of ambush and attrition.
With the exception of the strategic skill shown by Lieutenant Colonel Michael Riddell-Webster, the Black Watch battle group commander, who had an uncanny feel for time, ground, and opportunity, most of the key moments belonged to section leaders - the corporals and sergeants who are the true backbone of any army.
Colonel Riddell-Webster was the man who seized the moment to break the crust of enemy resistance outside Basra. He also had the foresight to plan ahead for the possibility that an organised defence would collapse and leave the city open for capture.
To that end, he concentrated the formidable striking power of his combined-arms battle group to exploit forwards should the chance arrive. It was a calculated gamble that paid off.
But the majority of the earlier fighting to break the back of hard-core militia at al Zubayr turned on the decisions of 20-something corporals leading nine or 10 men. To them fell the awesome responsibility for ensuring that civilian lives did not figure in the final casualty toll.
These young men led even younger men, the 18 and 19-year-olds who made up most of the Warrior fighting vehicle dismount teams. Their performance has been a credit to themselves and to the British Army's training and discipline.
The vast majority were in action for the first time, and they responded magnificently to the challenge, charging from the back doors of their steel vehicles into harm's way time and time again.
Most of the time it was dark and opponents could be picked out only by the muzzle flashes of their weapons and the terrifying flare of rocket-propelled grenades. Battle noise alone is a stunning sensory assault in its own right.
They settled down, returned fire as they had been taught, and watched their comrades' backs.
No commander could have asked more of veterans, far less novice warriors.
Discuss.......
IN many respects, it has been a corporal's war rather than a general's. Britain's action in southern Iraq has ended more with a whimper than a bang after a display of initiative delivered Basra, the country's second city, at the cost of only three British lives.
Faced with insurgents and militia rather than regular troops, it is the UK's junior NCOs who have taken most of the life-and-death decisions in combat. The valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the reputed birthplace of civilisation, was supposed to have been converted into the graveyard of Iraq's military elite, Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard divisions.
Instead, Baghdad's armies simply melted away in the south. Only scattered detachments of the 30,000-strong corps positioned to counter the British thrust from Kuwait offered resistance. Most simply abandoned their tanks and artillery, took off their uniforms, and went home.
The lightning campaign envisaged by the coalition a month ago unravelled within days of crossing the Iraqi frontier.
Instead of fast-moving armoured battles and mass enemy surrenders, allied troops found themselves facing a ghost army.
Geared up for hi-tech warfare, they were forced into counter-insurgency operations more akin to Northern Ireland than a 21st-century encounter.
While the regular Iraqi army had voted with its feet in the face of certain defeat, militiamen in civilian garb launched their own behind-the-lines campaign of ambush and sniper attacks.
Rather than set-piece battles, Britain's war became a series of skirmishes, raids, and small-unit actions. Most of the decisive confrontations involved relatively low numbers on both sides and seldom more than a 100-man company.
The hostile warren of al Zubayr, eight miles south of Basra and home to up to 300,000 people, was Iraq's Belfast. Narrow, nameless Arab souks and alleys substituted for the back-to-back red brick ghettos of Northern Ireland, but the tactics were the same. It was pursuit of a ruthless, faceless enemy on his own urban turf.
Even the enemy's weapons of choice proved to be the same. Like the IRA, Saddam's Fedayeen favoured the Kalashnikov assault rifle and the rocket-propelled grenade, the instruments of ambush and attrition.
With the exception of the strategic skill shown by Lieutenant Colonel Michael Riddell-Webster, the Black Watch battle group commander, who had an uncanny feel for time, ground, and opportunity, most of the key moments belonged to section leaders - the corporals and sergeants who are the true backbone of any army.
Colonel Riddell-Webster was the man who seized the moment to break the crust of enemy resistance outside Basra. He also had the foresight to plan ahead for the possibility that an organised defence would collapse and leave the city open for capture.
To that end, he concentrated the formidable striking power of his combined-arms battle group to exploit forwards should the chance arrive. It was a calculated gamble that paid off.
But the majority of the earlier fighting to break the back of hard-core militia at al Zubayr turned on the decisions of 20-something corporals leading nine or 10 men. To them fell the awesome responsibility for ensuring that civilian lives did not figure in the final casualty toll.
These young men led even younger men, the 18 and 19-year-olds who made up most of the Warrior fighting vehicle dismount teams. Their performance has been a credit to themselves and to the British Army's training and discipline.
The vast majority were in action for the first time, and they responded magnificently to the challenge, charging from the back doors of their steel vehicles into harm's way time and time again.
Most of the time it was dark and opponents could be picked out only by the muzzle flashes of their weapons and the terrifying flare of rocket-propelled grenades. Battle noise alone is a stunning sensory assault in its own right.
They settled down, returned fire as they had been taught, and watched their comrades' backs.
No commander could have asked more of veterans, far less novice warriors.
Discuss.......
Being in charge is not the same as actually doing everything. By your definition, the Chairman of a major public company such as Tesco has no real say in how a store manager runs things....I'd suggest that he does, but feels able to 
