British Generals in Blair's Wars

British Generals in Blair's Wars is based on a series of high profile seminars held in Oxford in which senior British officers, predominantly from the army, reflect on their experience of campaigning. The chapters embrace all the UK's major operations since the end of the Cold War, but they focus particularly on Iraq and Afghanistan. As personal testimonies, they capture the immediacy of the authors' thoughts at the time, and show how the ideas of a generation of senior British officers developed in a period of rapid change, against a background of intense political controversy and some popular unease. The armed forces were struggling to revise their Cold War concepts and doctrines, and to find the best ways to meet the demands placed upon them by their political leaders in what was seen to be a 'New World Order'. It was a time when relations between the Government of the day and the armed services came under close scrutiny, and when the affection of the British public for its forces seemed to grow with the difficulty of their operational tasks. This is a truly unique and invaluable book. For the first time, we are offered first-hand testimony about Britain's involvement in recent campaigns by senior participants. In addition to touching on themes like civilian-military relations, the operational direction of war and relationships with allies, these eyewitness accounts give a real sense of how the character of a war changes even as it is being fought. It will be essential reading for those in military academies and staff colleges, not only in Britain but throughout NATO, and especially in the USA. It also has profound policy implications, as both the UK and NATO more generally reassess their strategies and the value of intervention operations. It will also become a primary source for historians and students of the wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan in particular.

Jonathan Bailey's last appointment in the British Army before he retired in 2005 was Director General Development and Doctrine. He served in Northern Ireland, commanded Assembly Place ROMEO in Rhodesia in 1979-80; was Operations Officer 4th Field Regiment RA during the Falklands War; and in 1999 was KFOR's Chief Liaison Officer to the Yugoslav General Staff and to the Kosovo Liberation Army. He has written several books and articles on defence and strategic themes. Since 2005 he has worked in the defence industry, and led the seminar series on Campaigning and Generalship, at the University of Oxford. Richard Iron left the British Army in 2012 and is a visiting fellow at the University of Oxford. He has served in the Sultan of Oman's Armed Forces and several tours in Northern Ireland. He commanded 1st Battalion the King's Own Royal Border Regiment in the Balkans. He was subsequently responsible for British and NATO land doctrine. He was a prosecution expert witness in the Sierra Leone War Crimes trials and from 2007 to 2008 was chief mentor to the Iraqi commander in Basra, including Operation Charge of the Knights. Sir Hew Strachan is Chichele Professor of the History of War, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford and was Director of the Oxford Programme on the Changing Character of War from its inception in 2004 until 2012. He is the author of several highly acclaimed books on military history, including European Armies and the Conduct of War (1983), The Politics of the British Army (1997), and The First World War: Volume 1: To Arms (2001). He is a member of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and the World War I Centenary Advisory Board. He has also written extensively on strategy, and is a member of the Chief of Defence Staff's Strategic Advisory Panel.

Contents: Preface; Introduction; Part I Setting the Scene: The political context: why we went to war and the mismatch of ends, ways and means, Jonathan Bailey; The Northern Ireland campaign: the challenges of command, Alistair Irwin; Command of Kosovo Force 1999, Mike Jackson; Sierra Leone 2000: pregnant with lessons, David Richards. Part II Hard Lessons: Rebuilding Iraq 2003: humanitarian assistance and reconstruction, Tim Cross; Southern Iraq 2003-2004: multinational command, Andrew Stewart; Great expectations: broadening the military role to include nation building, Barney White-Spunner; Iraq 2004: the view from Baghdad, Andrew Graham; Modern campaigning from a practitioner's perspective, John McColl; The British Army and thinking about the operational level, John Kiszely; 21st-century operational leadership: Sierra Leone, Baghdad and Northern Ireland, Nick Parker. Part III Iraq 2006-2009: Success of a Sort: On generals and generalship, Graeme Lamb; 'Best effort': Operation Sinbad and the Iraq campaign, Justin Maciejewski; Basra 2007: the requirements of a modern major general, Jonathan Shaw; Campaigning and generalship: Iraq 2008, Bill Rollo; Basra 2008: Operation Charge of the Knights, Richard Iron; The psychological impact of operations in Iraq: what has it been, and what can we expect in the future?, Simon Wessely. Part IV Improving in Afghanistan: Multinational command in Afghanistan - 2006: NATO at the cross-roads, Chris Brown; Southern Afghanistan 2006-2008: the challenges to a comprehensive approach to counter-insurgency, Nick Pounds; NATO operations in Afghanistan 2008-2009: a theatre-level view, Jon Riley; Helmand 2007-2008: behavioural conflict - from general to strategic corporal, Andrew Mackay; Campaigning: an air force perspective, Iain McNicoll. Part V What Have We Learnt?: The political-military relationship on operations, Desmond Bowen; Too busy to learn: personal observations on British campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, Alexander Alderson