They were in a Mastiff

In The Observer today we find published extracts from the diary of a soldier engaged in Operation Panther's Claw. As well as recording his experiences, the account provides a valuable insight into the thinking of one soldier as he grappled with the news of colleagues terribly injured and killed by the growing menace of IEDs.

He himself is shot in the chest and has to be evacuated, but he also finds himself twice in a Viking struck by IEDs. On these occasions, all troops inside survived.

Clearly conscious of the IED threat (he could hardly be otherwise) he asks why the Army does not have more sniffer dogs, suggesting that finding IEDs would be "a lot easier with a furry friend running about and a lot more lives would be saved." He observes that, since arriving, he has not seen one dog.

The pertinence of this observation is reinforced when he learns that another soldier has been killed in an explosion while searching for IEDs. The soldier also observes that, "We are so spread out and overstretched on the ground and it means the Taliban are taking the piss. They can lay these IEDs at fucking will. We are not there at the moment to put out ops or sniper over-watch and the Taliban know it."

Several points emerge from these observations. Firstly, as one might expect – this is not a criticism – the man is interpreting what he sees from his own very narrow perspective.

Thus, while he is clearly aware of the utility of sniffer dogs, he has not necessarily thought the issue through – that in a "kinetic" environment (which this certainly was) dogs and their handlers are extremely vulnerable and tend to be targeted by the Taleban.

As to "ops or sniper over-watch" to counter the IED emplacers, that is an infantry response but, in the context of this overall operation, we have already observed that this was an ideal role for UAVs and, in this piece noted:

In that Panther's Claw is a "deliberate operation" – i.e., one that was planned and executed in an area of choice - the fact that the Taleban had laced the area with IEDs could perhaps have been pre-empted. Not least, troops could have been provided with far more knowledge of their locations and extent than they seem to have been.

Our soldier also writes of being told that a checkpoint spotted "two males lying prone and digging on the track where we keep getting hit." In this instance, he reports with disgust, "...we only fired warning shots at them. Another wasted opportunity." Indeed.

In other instances, we have seen reports of the lethal effect on bomb emplacers of the combination of UAV surveillance and airpower and one wonders why such assets could not have been employed here.

But in another diary entry, we read this appalling observation:

We have spent all that money on a new bomb-proofish vehicle but you've still got four blokes with metal detectors out at the front of it and one commanding them. Sometimes I just don't get it. We need to invest in better bomb detection equipment and get more dogs out here. Surely there is something that we can use to trigger bombs off early?

And, of course, there is. Earlier, we reported on these self-same "primitive" British mine/IED clearance methods, compared with their US counterparts, noting that the USMC were equipped with a 10-vehicle clearance team that included a vehicle equipped with a mine roller, pushed ahead to detonate pressure-pad actuated mines and IEDS, a Husky mine detection vehicle and a number of MRAPs, all manned by specialist combat engineers.

Later, we then noted how the British deficiency had been made up by borrowing "an American anti-explosive unit, Task Force Thor, with specialised vehicles, sweeping the road ahead for the ever-present threat of bombs."

The soldier's comment, where he calls for investment in such kit, displays his own ignorance. The MoD has invested in some of this kit, announced last October as "Project Talisman". A better question, therefore, might have been why the investment was made so late – a question which the media could be asking, but have never bothered with.

The results of this lack of investment have all too often been tragic, but on one occasion the soldier is able to report better news. He is told that two casualties had been flown in, their vehicle hit by a 40kg IED. One "had a bad arm" and that other "his vertebrae done". "They were in a Mastiff," writes our soldier, "that's why they survived. They were both very lucky. The Mastiffs are worth their weight in gold."

Compare and contrast this with the experience of Pte Richard "Hunty" Hunt, as recorded by Sean Rayment in The Sunday Times. As the driver of a Warrior, he was protected by several tons of metal but, as it trundled along a river bed, en route to the main British base at Musa Qala, his vehicle, the 11th in a convoy of 30, hit an IED.

Such was the force of the blast that Pte Hunt's head was smashed against the side of the Warrior. Even though he was wearing a helmet, the impact caused immediate brain damage. Close to death, he was taken to the field hospital at Camp Bastion, where surgeons fought to keep him alive long enough so that he could be flown home to spend his final hours with his family.

Our soldier, of course, was luckier. With his chest wound, he was flown home on a medical flight. There are, he writes, "blokes with no legs on board." He sits next to one lad who is completely deaf. Another tells him he has been hit with IEDs four times while inside a Viking and he's just had enough, too frayed to get inside another vehicle.

It would be facile to suggest that he should have been in a Mastiff, and that mine clearance/detection teams should have preceded him. But the diary of our soldier does suggest very much that our troops are not getting the deal they deserve.

COMMENT THREAD

Media responsibility

It is easy to recall the squawks of media indignation when Gen Dannatt artfully explained that the reason for his travelling on a US Blackhawk helicopter during his tour of Helmand in July was that there was no British machine available.

Helicopters, of course, comprise only one aspect of the shortage of British equipment in theatre. There is equally a pressing need for specialist mine/IED detection and clearance vehicles, the first of which are not due to arrive until next year as part of project Talisman.

Given the carnage caused by IEDs, one might have thought that the media might show some interest in this vital deficiency, not least because this equipment – even more than helicopters – is needed to protect supply convoys and mounted troops as they go about their patrols.

However, despite US forces, the Canadians and now the French having acquired such equipment, the British media has been almost completely silent on this remarkable and dangerous lack of capability in the British Army.

Interestingly, we now see Kim Sengupta, of The Independent writing about Operation Tor Shadey, the last offensive by British and Nato forces to clear insurgent-held areas before this week's national elections.

Entirely with critical comment, though, he notes that the British convoy, moving through the night to the operational area was "a laborious affair", trailing behind "an American anti-explosive unit, Task Force Thor, with specialised vehicles, sweeping the road ahead for the ever-present threat of bombs."

This is the same Kim Sengupta who enthusiastically wrote up the debate on helicopters, but he (and his fellow hacks) is apparently completely unconcerned about the shortage of equally vital equipment.

Of course, Sengupta could have made this an issue, focusing his piece on a "shortage of IED clearance vehicles" which had forced the British to rely in US resources. But then, while helicopters are part of the "narrative", IED clearance equipment is not.

It is probably not unfair to assert that the media furore over helicopters has at least focused ministers' minds on the shortage of helicopter capacity, and perhaps ensured that machines will be brought to theatre a little earlier than they might have been.

If that is the case, then arguably, a similar furore over the criminal lack of specialised IED clearance vehicles could have had a similar effect. To that extent, it would not then be unfair to assert that the trivial, superficial and careless conduct of the media over such equipment is part of the problem.

Journalists do like to dish it out, and are ever so good at criticising all manner of people – especially defence ministers – who might offend them (or provide good copy). But one wonders whether they might also think about taking some responsibility for their own conduct.

COMMENT THREAD

A tale of two armies

Primitive British mine/IED clearance methods, compared with their US counterparts, may have been responsible for the death of Private Robbie Laws, 18, of the 2nd Mercian Regiment – to date, one of the youngest soldiers to die in Afghanistan.

On 4 July, Private Laws was attached to a squadron of the Light Dragoons which were operating Scimitar light reconnaissance tanks taking part in operation Panther's Claw. Laws was part of a four-man "dismount" team carried in a Spartan armoured personnel carrier (pictured below right), his and his comrades' task being to carry out mine/IED sweeps on foot, using hand-held detectors, ahead of the armoured vehicles, whenever their commander suspected a possible trap.

Recounted in detail by The Daily Mail, after Laws and his comrades crossed the start line in their Spartan on 4 July, they were soon called into action but, as they dismounted, Taleban fighters opened up with small arms. A Scimitar armed with 30mm Rarden cannon moved up to engage them, setting a pattern for the operation. The advance thus continued in a stop-start fashion as Laws and his comrades painstakingly cleared the route with their detectors.

Come the late afternoon as the light and intense heat began to fade, Laws and his comrades had been resting by the side of the vehicle for an hour or so, then helping to unload another Spartan which had come in from a water resupply run. Small arms fire started coming in and the Light Dragoons started their vehicle engines. Laws and the three other dismounts piled into their Spartan, which began to move.

Some 200 yards on, the squadron commander ordered two men to dismount to carry out a sweep ahead. Laws with one other completed the task and remounted. As the Spartan started to move off, there was a "massive bang" and the cabin filled with smoke. The vehicle had been hit by a Taleban RPG. Laws was killed instantly, another soldier was very seriously injured and one other was slightly injured.

It is of course the case that the Spartan could have been targeted at any time during the operation by a Taleban PRG, with fatal consequences. But the main defence of this lightly armoured vehicle is its speed and manoeuvrability over a wide range of terrain. Its constant stop-start progress, and pauses to allow manual sweeping, thus made it a predictable and highly vulnerable target while it was stationary.

Compare and contrast, however, the experience of the US Marines further south, confronted by multiple IEDs impeding their progress. In terms of delays, their clearance team was no less impeded. But, unlike the British using lightly armoured personnel carriers with infantry using hand-held detectors, working on foot, the Marines were properly equipped.

Their 10-vehicle clearance team included a vehicle equipped with a mine roller, pushed ahead to detonate pressure-pad actuated mines and IEDS, a Husky mine detection vehicle (pictured below) and a number of MRAPs, all manned by specialist combat engineers.


After 72 "tough hours" on the road, the first IED destroyed an anti-mine roller being pushed by the convoy's lead vehicle. The explosion sent the roller's pieces flying into the air, and flipped the 17-ton onto its side, nearly toppling it into a canal that ran beside the dirt road. The crew, however, escaped unharmed.

After an overnight wait, a recovery team with specialist lifting equipment was despatched along the same route, only to hit an IED that had appeared to have been planted overnight specifically to strike them.

The explosion wrecked their vehicle but fortunately, it was another MRAP and the crew escaped unharmed. Then, and only then with the scene secure, did the Marines used hand-held mine-sweepers to check the road between the two blasts and then destroyed burnt damaged equipment to stop it falling into Taleban hands.

The convoy finally got back on the road by the evening but within an hour it was hit by a third IED that destroyed the Husky. The crewman survived. In between that point and the first of the blasts, the team had covered only a couple of miles of road and had discovered and dismantled seven further IEDs.

Said the convoy commander, Lieutenant Dan Jernigan, "Vehicles are being blown apart but the Marines inside are being kept safe. Not to sound cavalier, but it is better we take the blast than Humvees or someone else such as villagers." He was surprised that there had been no Taleban ambushes targeting his convoy when it had been stranded, but the vehicles were well armed and armoured – unlike the Spartan – and able to protect themselves.

The clearance process here was being applied to a supply route, but exactly the same process could have been applied to the route taken by the Light Dragoons. Typically then, the route is kept under observation after clearing – by UAVs or even infantry stationed along the route. As a final safeguard, an MRAP precedes the tactical convoy – a process known as "route proving" – to take the blast from any device that has been missed, or where emplacers have managed to evade observation and plant another bomb.

With a route almost guaranteed free from emplaced explosives, light tactical vehicles can then exploit their mobility and speed, without being tied to the stop-start routine that dogged the Light Dragoons, making their vehicles such vulnerable targets.

With such procedures in place, even the lightly armoured Vikings could be used with impunity, their routes through danger areas cleared, allowing them to exploit their off-road performance once they safely reach open country.

Ironically, the clearance and proving procedures – and the equipment to carry them out – were pioneered by the British – and used with great success in Bosnia in the early 90s, being copied by US forces and applied to both Iraq and now Afghanistan. Since Bosnia, however, the specialist equipment acquired by the British has been sold or otherwise disposed of. The need for such now again belatedly recognised, more equipment was ordered last October under the "Talisman" project, but deliveries are not scheduled to commence until next year – although the vital Husky is not being procured.

That is the measure of the shortfall in the British operation, but this is not a shortage of finance – clearly, as the equipment is now on order. More likely, it reflects the failure of the British Army to recognise and pre-empt the threat of mines and IEDs, with tragic consequences which stretch back into the Iraqi campaign, where troops in Basra and elsewhere faced similar threats and were similarly ill-equipped.

In this day and age, while there is still a valid and extensive role for the hand-held detector, there is no excuse for the excessive reliance on dismounted teams to do a job which could often be done more safely with armour and machines. That they are not available is yet another of those scandals, for which there should be a reckoning.

COMMENT THREAD

The home front

It is essential to stop Afghanistan becoming an "incubator for terrorism" and a launchpad for attacks on the UK and other countries says David Miliband.

The badlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan – that border area – have been used to launch terrible attacks, not just on the United States, but on Britain as well. Thus, he says, "We know that until we can ensure there is a modicum of stability and security provided by Afghan forces for their own people, we are not going to be able to be secure in our own country."

The thought is echoed by The Times which affirms that, "The campaign in Afghanistan is crucial," adding that, "It has been advanced by British servicemen of extraordinary courage and real heroism."

"The failures in the campaign have been on the home front: the British Government has been dilatory and uncertain in making the case for the war," it goes on to say. "Nor has it provided sufficient armoured vehicles for the troops already there or adequate and consistent numbers of troops on the ground to establish the security that is the foundation for building a new nation in Afghanistan."

The paper then states the obvious: "The campaign for Afghanistan must be won," adding the rider: "And it is time the Government started doing a better job of fighting for it at home."

Here, there are many problems, to add to the extraordinarily difficult matter of defining "victory". Presumably, when the land is covered with Ferris wheels, packed with happy Afghani wimmin, spinning to the beat of the latest Michael Jackson release, that will be considered to be one measure. Short of that, though, it is difficult to know what our rulers have in mind.

Of the other problems, surely the most intractable is that the "home front" does not actually care enough – or at all - about the Afghani campaign.

As long as "Our Boys" are not getting killed in excessive numbers – as defined by the media when it can be bothered to report events - most people are more concerned with running their own affairs and warding off the depredations of this pitiful government which, in its own way, seems more destructive than the Taleban.

And, while one might expect the political classes and their associated claques to be more interested in such matters than the great unwashed – in that condition as hidden inflation makes the price of soap an unreachable luxury – there is no evidence that this is the case.

If the British political blogosphere is any guide – and it probably does reflect the prevailing obsessions – not only does its relative silence speak volumes but the rare foray by Tory Boy Blog is struggling to compete, in terms of comment volume, with the later entry covering that stunning revelation that: "CCHQ downgrades oak tree logo." One is amazed that they are not live blogging on it.

The Times does have a point though. It is very hard to engage in an issue where the objectives are poorly defined, vague or so obviously unrealistic that they lack credibility, where there is no narrative or measure of progress – other than the mounting death toll – and where there is no significant discourse which will fuel an ongoing debate.

Thus we are supposed to rely on the current CDS, Jock Stirrup, who lied his way through the Iraqi campaign and its aftermath and, for all we know, is lying to us now.

This may be especially so in terms of his less than credible statement that, " ... the Taliban have rightly identified Helmand as their vital ground. If they lose there then they lose everywhere and they are throwing everything they have into it."

Operation Panchai Palang - and the parallel operations being conducted by US forces may – or may not be vital in the short-term, but it is far from the "game-changing event" that Stirrup would have us believe. The Taleban will simply regroup, recover what losses they have sustained and continue to prosecute their insurgency.

Here, one takes note of the fact that the attack which killed five troops was mounted out of the immediate operational area of Panchai Palang which indicates that the Taleban, even when under pressure around Lashkar Gah, still had the resources to attack elsewhere, with devastating effect.

We could, on the other hand, take the advice of Lt-Col Tim Collins (ret) who enjoins us to "support the judgement and experience of Brigadier Radford and his men. They are on the ground and we are not." Of course, we heard the same thing – or similar – of Iraq, where the "judgement and experience" and the military commanders of the time had our troops patrolling in Snatch Land Rovers, with effects which were predictable – it seems – to everyone but them.

Collins believes that, if we lose, it will be because we have defeated ourselves by a lack of nerve – that "home front" again - and if that happens the sacrifice will be in vain. "Keep the faith," he tells us.

However, in what should we keep our "faith"? Assailed by IEDs, our forces are struggling to deal with this weapon which the Taleban are using to such great effect. However, the emergence of this problem was flagged up in January 2007 by The Financial Times yet it was not until October last year that the MoD focused on buying the essential equipment to deal with this threat, in the "Talisman" project – with deliveries not to take place until next year, leaving the Americans to do the work.

This is a military that also fielded the Viking and the Vector, both of which vehicles could not meet the threat present in the theatre by the time they were deployed, and certainly are not up to the current challenge. It is a military that, in effect, has been behind the curve from the very start, and is struggling to catch up, reacting rather than pre-empting the Taleban's constant evolution of tactics.

If the military have feet of clay then, perhaps we could turn to Rory Stewart, soldier, diplomat and academic who has travelled extensively in Afghanistan and Iraq. He tells us that Afghanistan is "a war we cannot win" and, in a long and rambling thesis argues that the best Afghan policy would be to reduce the number of foreign troops from the current 90,000 to perhaps 20,000 – turning away from the idea of state-building.

Two distinct objectives would remain: development and counter-terrorism with the "good projects" allowed to continue in electricity, water, irrigation, health, education, agriculture, rural development – but not a single mention of roads. We should not control and cannot predict the future of Afghanistan, he says.

With such contradictory and unreliable advice, it is no wonder that we find it hard to engage in the issue – and retreat to the comfort zone of oft' repeated mantras. One can then only take comfort in the words of the MoD's own "spin doctor", Lt-Col Nick Richardson. He insists that operations in Helmand are achieving "a huge amount" and the soldiers had not died in vain. "It is fair to say that war is not risk free. We are taking the fight to the enemy," he says.

Even then one wonders, not least where the true enemy lies. More than the Taleban, the greatest threat to Afghanistan (and therefore our own security) could be the home front, here in the UK, bludgeoned into indifference by wholly unrealistic and ill-defined objectives.

COMMENT THREAD

A profound abuse

Details coming in of the deaths of three soldiers from 1Bn The Rifles point to the continued misuse of resources and equipment in the Army, leading once more to unnecessary deaths.

According to The Daily Telegraph, the three were killed while riding in an open-topped Wimik Land Rover, when they were hit by an IED just east of the town of Gereshk in Helmand province.

What is particularly relevant here is that the vehicle was being used as part of the escort for a supply convoy, making it highly vulnerable to attack, while negating any of the claimed advantages for this type of vehicle.

The essence of a Land Rover Wimik is that it is a lightweight, highly manoeuvrable gun-platform. The emphasis is on mobility, therefore, rather than armoured protection, the theory being that the vehicle is not tied to roads or any specific routes. The crew can choose unpredictable routes, and avoid potential ambush points, by which means the mobility afforded is judged to offer as much or greater protection than conferred by armour.

Even that theory is arguable. On the one hand, the Taleban have become adept at ambushing vehicles when they are travelling to and from operations, when they are tied to fixed routes and lose the advantages of off-road mobility. Then, crucially, it makes a false distinction between mobility and protection, as if they were mutually incompatible, which they are not.

Where a vehicle is involved in escort duty, however, even the theoretical advantages disappear. Supply convoys in that region are often laboriously slow, with typical average speeds of 5mph. Their routes are predictable and their slow progress gives the Taleban plenty of opportunities to get ahead and prepare ambushes.

While it is possible – and standard practice – to carry out explosives searches at "pinch points", these are carried out by the British Army with dismounted troops using hand-held mine detectors (pictured left) and dog teams. They are laborious and slow, with checks often having to be cut short or omitted to avoid delaying the convoys – where hold-ups in vulnerable positions carry their own risks of ambush.

Under such circumstances, Wimiks and the like should never be used as escorts. Even within the frame of reference dictated by the Army, they are patrol vehicles and light gun platforms. They were never designed for convoy duties and are not safe for that purpose.

Nor should any convoy be required to travel through hostile territory without route clearance and proving. Dismounted techniques, being too slow – and dangerous for the clearance teams, who are themselves prone to ambush - purpose-built vehicles are essential.

Such use was, of course, pioneered by the British and, as we have often observed on this blog, copied by US forces and the Canadians, where such route clearance is routinely carried out in Afghanistan. Now, belatedly - having sold off its own vehicles ans sat on its hands for six years - the MoD is at last buying replacement vehicles, the so-called "Talisman" package. Unfortunately, this is not due to start coming on-stream until next year.

Belatedly, also, the MoD has just issued a "contract notice" inviting expressions of interest from manufacturers prepared to supply "up to 400 Light Protected Patrol Vehicles (LPPV)".

The LPPV, we are told, will be a wheeled vehicle with an estimated gross vehicle weight of around 6 to 7 tons, capable of carrying up to 6 crew (2+4), integrated with a range of communication and electronic equipment providing protected mobility. This, we are also told, will replace in-service light legacy platforms based on the Land Rover based SNATCH vehicle. Additionally, the platform may be used as the basis for the replacement to Land Rover WMIK.

Interestingly – tragically – the tiny Irish Army has already resolved this issue, having at the end of last month ordered 27 mine-resistant patrol vehicles (LPPVs by any other name).

These are the BAE Sytems/OMC RG-32Ms (pictured right), the smaller version of the RG-31. This is a vehicle the MoD tested in 2002/3 and rejected in favour of the less-protected Iveco Panther, which is still not in service.

However, the Irish, slow though they might be, do have an advantage. They do not have to contend with the MoD. This is the MoD's second attempt at buying an LPPV, the first being the ill-fated Pinzgauer Vector (pictured below left). And it is worth noting that, in June 2006, when the Army ordered its first batch of 80 Vectors, at a cost of £35 million, the intention – or so it was claimed – had been "to counter the threat posed by suicide bombers."

We were then told that it had been adapted for use in "high-risk" environments and would thus "protect troops from automatic fire, landmines and fragmentation bombs."

At the time, it was reported that senior officers believed the greatest threat to British troops would come from suicide bombers and insurgents "armed with the same improvised explosive devices that have been used against lightly-armoured vehicles in Iraq." Nothing has changed.

Nevertheless, as early as June 2008, less than a year after the vehicles had been deployed, there were hints of a problem. This came in a published list of "expected out-of-service dates" for a range of vehicles. The Vector was given a date of 2015.

In an Army that routinely keeps vehicles for 30 years or more, a mere seven-year service life was unprecedented. Then, by the end of the year, the Army had conceded that the vehicle was not up to the job, having proved inadequate, and unable to cope with the threat from roadside bombs - the very purpose for which it had been bought.

In December 2008, however, we had General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue, without so much as a blush, airily telling the Commons defence select committee, "You produce a solution for the requirement of the time; the requirement changes as the threat changes, as the security architecture changes and you need to produce something else." It hadn't changed - they got it wrong.

Now, more than three years after the Pinzgauer contract was first mooted, we see a "contract notice" inviting expressions of interest for a vehicle which will probably end up being something like the RG-32M or another vehicle that has been available for many years.

So, while the Army gets it wrong again and again - pouring money down the drain in the process - men have to die, again and again. And the MPs, who are supposed to monitor such things, have asked what?

COMMENT THREAD

"Same old failings"

The starting point of this piece is the assertion that we will never get sensible military procurement until or unless MPs and the media start to take the subject seriously.

Only then, do we assume that they will make the effort to understand the issues and put the pieces together. And, if they do so, they will be able to target their criticisms accurately and fairly. But they must also come up with clear ideas of what should be done. There is no point whatsoever relying on the MoD – or the military. Time and time again, it has become demonstrably clear that they have very little idea of what they are doing.

The illustration of this broader thesis comes with today's media coverage of the annual National Audit Office (NAO) report on MoD project management, which has featured, amongst other things, the problems in bringing "Terrier" battlefield engineer vehicle into service – a project slated at £300 million, each vehicle costing £5 million.

The focus on this machine in the report has prompted three media articles dedicated specifically to the subject of the Terrier.

In no particular order, there is a piece by Chris Irvine, in The Daily Telegraph, another in the same paper (online both) by Thomas Harding and a piece in The Daily Mail by Matthew Hickley. Then, in each case there is comment by an MP, Edward Leigh, the Conservative chairman of the Public Accounts Committee.

To understand the scale of the problem, we first have to look at each article individually. Then we need to look at the bigger picture, Leigh's response to the newspapers and the role of the NAO.

Taking Hickley's Mail piece first, the headline (which would not have been written by the author) proclaims: "Army forced to buy JCBs and paint them in camouflage colours to clear warzones." The message, however, accurately reflects the copy, which tells us:

Plans for new armoured bulldozers to help British troops to clear obstacles in warzones have been hit by such long delays that the Army has had to buy JCB diggers instead and paint them in camouflage colours.

This assertion is then reinforced by the picture (above), which shows a line of ordinary, commercial JCBs.

Taking that one point (we will return to the others) – that the Army is, in effect, using ordinary JCB diggers, with a new paint job - this is a cheap shot, and wholly wrong. The vehicles being bought are the state-of-the-art JCB High Mobility Engineer Excavator (HMEE) - pictured below, right.

They were purpose-designed, initially for the US Army and are custom-built military machines. Furthermore, the version to be fielded is armoured, which adds to the differences – although we have reservations about this, as these machines are not mine protected. Nevertheless, they bear no more relation to the civilian machine than does an Army truck to a Tesco delivery vehicle.

Moving on to Chris Irvine's Telegraph piece, he also writes in similar terms that "The Army had to buy JCB diggers and paint them to camouflage them after plans for new armoured bulldozers to clear warzones were met by long delays."

The issue we need to address here is the inference that the Army bought the HMEE because of the delays in procuring the "new armoured bulldozers" – the Terriers (picture, below left) to which the NAO report refers.

Once again the assertion is wrong. Although ostensibly based on the NAO report, that is not what the NAO actually says. The passage is here:

2.17 Terrier will replace the Combat Engineer Tractor that was withdrawn from service in March 2008 because of concerns about the safe integration and operation of the Bowman communications system, reliability and obsolescence problems. The delays to Terrier will extend this capability gap; but users have been willing to accept that the vehicles will not be available to support operations until 2012 rather than risk a lower level of reliability. The Department does not believe that the delays will have an operational impact in the short term because of Urgent Operational Requirement action to purchase alternative engineering vehicles for current operations, including the JCB High Mobility Engineer Excavators.

The most relevant sentence here is the last, where the MoD argues that the delays in the Terrier procurement will not affect operations because, inter alia the HMEE has been bought. From this, it is a long way to go to assume that the HMEE was bought because of the delays in the Terrier programme. And, in fact, that was not the case,

Those that have followed this issue will know that the HMEE is to be purchased as part of the £96 million Talisman package, devised as a "specialist route clearance system", which "will provide a new high-tech way of dealing with the IED (Improvised Explosive Device) threat."

In this role, the HMEE brings to the table capabilities which the Terrier cannot supply. Specifically, the HMEE is a development of the JCB Fastrac, a machine which is optimised for (relatively) high-speed road use. It is thus capable of travelling long distances at convoy speed, keeping up with other vehicles without the need for specialist transportation. It can also operate freely on a wide variety of roads.

Strangely enough, when the concept was first announced in 2005, it was much lauded, not least by Sean Rayment in The Sunday Telegraph as the US Army's "latest secret weapon in the war against terror". How times change. But it is a pity that Telegraph writers do not read the Sunday version of their own newspaper.

The contrast with the Terrier, to anyone who thinks about it, is obvious. A tracked vehicle, if it is to travel any distance, has to be transported on a low loader. Furthermore, it is not by any means ideal for working on metalled roads – tracks tending to tear up the tarmac. It may have a limited role in Afghanistan, its design use being to carry out engineering works in the "indirect fire zone". But it is not an equivalent to the HMEE (and vice versa).

At best, the two machine types have overlapping capabilities, which is probably what the MoD was getting at when it argued that there would be no "operational impact" from the delay in the Terrier. Most of the jobs the Terrier would have been called upon to do, the HMEE can also do. But the HMEE can perform tasks for which the Terrier would be wholly inappropriate.

With that, we now come to the next point, majored on by Thomas Harding, his article headed: "Mine clearing vehicle that could save lives of British troops delayed for two years." Unfortunately, he has been misled both by the MoD and the NAO, which position the Terrier as a "mine clearance vehicle", which is actually only a secondary role.

Harding thus writes: "The armoured vehicle can clear minefields and make routes safe for following armour and is likely to have proved a significant asset in Afghanistan where dozens of soldiers have been killed by roadside bombs." He then goes on to say, "As a result of the hold-up the MoD has been forced to buy 10 off-the-shelf Buffalo route clearance vehicles as part of an urgent £96 million project."

The juxtaposition of these two issues is not altogether a happy one. In the mine clearance role, the Terrier is mainly what is known as a "breach" vehicle. Usually, to clear mines, it tows a bit of kit called Viper minefield breaching system (now replaced by the Python) which it uses literally to blast a way through a known minefield, paving the way for armour.

In insurgency warfare, the mine is used as an ambush weapon and, therefore, a different approach is used, needing equipment to investigate suspect locations, to determine whether there is an explosive package hidden there. Once one is detected, it is then identified and dealt with.

Thus, the distinction is between "breach" and "clearance". The Terrier is used for the first, the Buffalo for the second - as one of a suite of vehicles, providing part of the detection capability. There is no comparison. The Terrier can be used for the one (as an ancillary function) but cannot perform the role of the Buffalo. There can be no question, therefore, of being "forced" to buy Buffaloes because of delays in the Terrier programme. The two are completely different animals, used for different jobs.

However, as between the Terrier and the HMEE, there can be an overlap. Both vehicles can be fitted with mine clearance rollers (pictured right). But this kit is also currently fitted to Mastiffs and can be fitted to virtually any other armoured vehicle (in Oman, rollers were fitted to Saracens), so one hardly needs a £5 million, specialist engineering vehicle for the purpose, especially as the Terrier is not mine protected. Futhermore, this equipment - unlike the Husky detector gear - will only deal with pressure-plate activated devices, and not those triggered by command wire or other remote actuation mechanisms.

This brings us to the problem of the "bigger picture". The limitation of the NAO is that it looks at individual projects, mainly from a cost perspective. It does not look at projects in context (how they relate as part of a system, with other equipment), nor does it consider whether they are necessary or whether an alternative would be more appropriate. It simply looks at the situation "as is".

The trouble is that no one else is looking at the bigger picture either. Perhaps the Defence Select Committee should be doing this, but it does not. And neither does the media. As we see with this story, it dissects the information served up to it on a plate and goes no further. But, if you examine the "system" as a whole, a different and altogether more disturbing picture emerges.

Looking specifically at the HMEE, the question has to be asked, what is it for? An excavator, with or without armour, cannot be used to look for mines or other explosives. That is the job of the Husky (see left) in combination with the Buffalo. You would not expect an excavator to dig up a mine or explosive device once found. For a start, the HMEE armour (and design) is not up to that, which would make it far too dangerous. Explosive devices, invariably, are hand-cleared or blown up in situ. The only role one can think of, for which the HMEE is particularly suited is filling in the craters after a device has been blown up.

The question that devolves is why, in the £96 million Talisman project, the Army is buying HMEEs - 13 of them at a cost of £6.2 million – when it is not buying Huskies, an essential component of any route clearance operation? Another question is why the Army is spending £6.2 million on buying HMEEs at all, when it has already has a fleet of 25 armoured mine clearance vehicles, which it is now trying to sell off, unused, at the knockdown price of less than £4.5 million.

If the NAO is interested in value for money – which is its purpose in life – then it needs to look a bit closer at the Talisman project. Tucked into that, as Ann Winterton discovered, are some additional Mastiffs. Their role will be to function as armoured bomb disposal vehicles.

Only last year though, the MoD replaced its entire overseas fleet of bomb disposal vehicles, spending £7.5 million on 18 Swiss-built Bucher Duro vehicles, called the "Tellar" (pictured right). As we pointed out at the time, these unarmoured vehicles are totally unfit for purpose and now, surreptitiously – disguised by another project – these are being replaced.

Thus, we find ourselves in a position where, after the waste of nearly £20 million, we are going to end up with route clearance teams which still lack the essential Huskies to make them truly effective. But the NAO has no comment about that, and the media – entirely heedless of what is going on – is chasing after hares, making false points about JCBs, missing the real story.

That leaves Edward Leigh, who comments on the NAO findings. He complains of the "same old failings", which threaten to leave British troops poorly prepared for frontline action. He condemns what he calls "a lack of realism" and then declares: "This is about more than money. This kit will sooner or later be operated, perhaps in anger, by our men and women in the forces."

That latter sentiment is one with which we would agree. But, instead of offering any more detailed critical evaluation or himself looking at the bigger picture, Leigh is mouthing sound bites in response to an agenda dictated by the NAO. We are indeed – to use his words – dealing with the "same old failings", but there are far more failings than those identified by the NAO. As an MP, and chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, it is his job to root them out.

Instead, from our parliamentary representatives, we also get the "same old failings", which means that money will continue to be wasted and "our men and women in the forces" still won't get the right kit.

They – and we, the taxpayers – deserve something better.

COMMENT THREAD

Welcome, but four years late

Yesterday, in a terse but informative announcement, the US armoured vehicle manufacturer, Force Protection Inc, told the world (or that small bit of it that was interested) that it had received from the United States Army "under contract W56HZV-08-C-0028" an additional order worth $15.5 million. This was for the delivery of 16 of its Buffalo A2 route-clearance vehicles - for delivery no later than the end of June 2009.

But the really interesting news followed. "In addition," Force Protection said, it had received "a Foreign Military Sales order of 14 Buffalo vehicles to be delivered to the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence." This contract, although two less than the US order, was "not to exceed $18.6 million" - we are paying $3 million more for two less vehicles.

Nevertheless, it represents "the first orders for the Buffalo vehicle for the United Kingdom." Work, including vehicle deliveries and "sustainment" is to be completed by October 2009.

This is part of the "Talisman" project, announced at the end of last month by defence secretary John Hutton and, welcome though it is, the arrival of these life-saving vehicles by October next year will come almost four years to the day too late for one man, Sergeant Christian Ian Hickey, 1st Battalion the Coldstream Guards. He is already dead.

On Tuesday 18 October 2005, at around 23.20 local time, 30-year-old Sgt Hickey (pictured right) was in Iraq. He, with his detachment, was on patrol in a convoy of two "Snatch" Land Rovers, just short of a roundabout on the notorious "IED alley". This was not far from the centre of Basra - a straight road that runs south west out of the city from the Basra teaching hospital.

This was a handover patrol with soldiers from the new roulement on board. The vehicles were packed - six to each instead of the normal complement of four - and the atmosphere was tense.

Not only had there been a spate of bomb attacks on these vulnerable vehicles, there had recently been, in September, a major incident at the al Jameat police station and the mood in Basra had soured. Furthermore, Saddam Hussein's trial had been about to start.

Sgt Hickey had every reason to be concerned, and with only three days left in Basra before he left for home - this was his last patrol of the tour - he had asked for a helicopter to carry out "overwatch". None had been available.

That fateful night, just before midnight, he was doubly suspicious. This place was ideal for an ambush, as the convoy would have to slow to negotiate the roundabout. The spotlight on his vehicle was not working, making it difficult to see on the verges ahead, so he called to a halt the convoy he was leading.

Dismounting from his vehicle - in the words of the official report - he went forward on foot to reconnoitre a route for the patrol. With him, but slightly behind, was Sgt Andy Wilkinson, 3rd Regiment Royal Horse Artillery, and a young Lieutenant, straight out of Sandhurst.

Wilkinson described how Hickey had bent down to examine what he thought might be an IED, and at that moment there was a huge explosion where he had been standing.

Sgt Hickey was cut to pieces. He took full force of an explosively formed projectile which tore his legs off, slashed a gaping wound in his head, shattering his skull, and peppered his body with shrapnel. Infra-red activated, his body heat had probably triggered the bomb, destined for the leading "Snatch", packed with men, their lives undoubtedly saved by his heroic action.

"We did all we could for Sergeant Hickey," said Wilkinson diplomatically, "but he was dead." The lieutenant was hurled backwards by the blast and both his eardrums burst. He also had a serious eye injury and was knocked cold.

In the official report, it records that Sgt Hickey was given first aid at the scene. The rituals had been followed. His body was evacuated by ambulance and helicopter to the British Military Hospital in Shaiba. There, "despite the best efforts of all those involved in treating him," says the same report, he was declared dead on arrival.

The death of Sgt Hickey, the 97th in Iraq since the start of the campaign, invoked considerable media attention and an ongoing controversy (to which we will return). But, in none of the torrents of media reports did any commentator pick up what to us seemed so obvious that, on 23 October - five days after Sgt Hickey's violent and untimely death – we remarked on it on our blog.

Recalling that the incredibly courageous Sgt Hickey had been effectively forced to make that perilous – and ultimately fatal – journey on foot, to clear the way for his patrol, we noted:

… the "dumb Yanks" - as too many people delight in calling them - are providing a neat little (actually not so little) machine for dealing with this type of problem, and it ain't an armoured Land Rover, which provides only very limited protection.

Weighing in at 23 tons, this machine is called a Buffalo. Designed on principles developed by the South Africans, it has a 30 ft extendible arm to check out suspicious road-side packages and debris, with highly effective armour to protect its occupants if a bomb does go off.

At the time, we linked to a specialist military website, from which one can deduce that 50 such Buffaloes would have been in US service in Iraq and Afghanistan by October 2005. The site itself noted:

The heavily protected Buffalo is a central element in the US Army's counter-IED "hunter-killer" concept that protects convoys against the threat of mines and IEDs. [It] enables engineers to inspect suspected objects from safe distance, using the robotic arm and video cameras, operated from the relative safety of the protected cabin. Large windows of armored glass provide good visibility to the sides of the vehicle, to enable effective operation on route patrols and dealing with suspected IEDs.

Sgt Hickey was the twelfth soldier to die in a "Snatch" related incident in Iraq and others had died in other vehicle attacks. Had the Buffalo been available to British forces at the same time that the "Snatches" had been deployed in October 2003 – which they could have been – then many of those men would still be alive. Many more since would also have survived.

That the MoD is now buying 14 of these machines is testament to their value. We can thank in a small way the former defence secretary Des Browne for insisting that they were ordered, but it would have been so much better if Mr Geoff Hoon, defence secretary in 2003 (and now transport secretary), had been the man to sign that vital bit of paper.

COMMENT THREAD

A failure of opposition

An answer to a routine parliamentary question from Lord Lee of Trafford on 16 October of this year was hardly calculated to excite any great interest. The outcome, however, turned out to be more than unusually interesting and - despite (or because of) the picture illustrated above - has significant lessons for the Conservative Party.

Lord Lee, himself a former Conservative MP, defected to the Liberal Democrats in 2001 and was made a life peer in 2006. He was performing his task as Lib-Dem defence spokesman in the Lords, in which capacity he had asked how much the government expected to spend on urgent operational requirements (UORs) for equipment this year and how much would be spent on each of the 10 largest UORs (the mechanism for rapidly purchasing much needed equipment and bringing it into service).

The answer conveyed very little we did not already know, and gave little indication of how politically significant it would become. The clue – but difficult to fathom - was in item number two on the "top ten" list, described as "Talisman" on which £96 million was to be spent. The only project of that name publicly associated with the MoD, however, was a Royal Navy mine countermeasures project – of not very great interest and of no immediate political importance.

It was therefore not until yesterday that the specialist magazine DefenseNews put two and two together and identified "Talisman" as an entirely new project. That was interesting.

It appeared, said the magazine, to be the MoD intended to buy the Buffalo mine clearance vehicle, so successfully used by US and Canadian forces, in whose hands it had saved many lives. That is "Talisman" and the fact that the MoD is to introduce this life-saving kit is important.

An unknown number of these 40-ton giants, we were told, were to be "rushed into service with the British military in Afghanistan next year," one of "several urgent vehicle purchases intended to increase protection for troops in the increasingly bloody conflict with the Taliban."

By way of detail, we were also told that Britain's Defence Equipment and Support Organisation was in the final stages of negotiating a deal with South Carolina-based Force Protection. An MoD spokeswoman had confirmed talks were under way but had declined to give further details.

The DefenceNews story was then confirmed today by defence secretary John Hutton confirming that the "Talisman" package would include the Buffalo mine-protected vehicle and the Engineer Excavator.

This is extremely welcome news and, if it had come about from successful and intensive lobbying, it would represent something of a victory for its advocates.

Certainly, we have written about it, the first time almost exactly three years ago, when we extolled its virtues and suggested that this was precisely the equipment the British Army needed to buy – which it then showed no signs of doing.

By then, it was already in action in US hands in Iraq and had been introduced to Afghanistan in July 2003. It obviously did good service in Afghanistan as, by March 2008, an article, featuring this and other mine-clearance vehicles, was reporting:

There is no calculating the damage or loss of life mitigated by the removal of the hundreds of mines and IEDs that EROC teams have already discovered in Afghanistan, but they are proud of their work and their contribution to soldiers returning home safely.

As significantly, when in May 2007 the Canadian Army took over a sector which had previously been occupied by the US Army, where it had deployed Buffalo and other specialist vehicles, one of the first things the Canadian command did was order replacement vehicles - including Buffaloes. These arrived the following year and, as we were later to report, were used to very great effect.

Arguably, therefore, with such a glaring gap in the British order of battle, the acquisition of this equipment could have been a prime target for political attention. Its lack could have formed the focus – albeit one of many – on which the Conservative Party could have attacked the government. This, one would have thought, was and is the very meat and drink of the party political system.

Clearly, the Conservatives would have been justified in so doing. The Buffalo is an important weapon in the counterinsurgency campaigns in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Not only is it used by the Americans and the Canadians, it has also been purchased by the French and latterly the Italian Armies. That the British were entirely lacking in such life-saving equipment - while suffering significant casualties from mines and IEDs, against which this vehicle was (and is) intended to protect – did have the makings of a strong political campaign.

Had such a campaign been effective, this equipment maybe would have been procured earlier, possibly saving some lives. In any event, the MoD now having decided to buy it, had the Conservatives earlier demanded precisely that, they could have claimed a moral victory, illustrating their effectiveness as an opposition.

Certainly, this blog and our partner Defence of the Realm had been convinced of the value of the Buffalo. We highlighted it again in June 2006, in December of that year and many times thereafter – some 19 times in all. For the record, copies of some of our posts were sent to the Conservative Party defence team.

When it came to calling for such equipment to be provided, however, the first mention of the "USA Buffalo armoured vehicle" in Parliament came from backbencher Ann Winterton, acting in a "freelance" capacity. She asked in November 2005 whether the department planned to introduce it "for work against roadside explosive devices". The MoD told us that it had "carried out a broad assessment" of the "Buffalo Mine Protected Clearance Vehicle" but had "no current plans" to procure it.

Three months later we got an intervention from an official Conservative spokesman, Gerald Howarth, in February 2006. He asked what assessment the MoD had made of the requirement for "South African manufactured Buffalo" for use in Afghanistan and Iraq. But, from the context and the answer – which referred to the "Buffel" (pictured) – it was evident that he was asking about a completely different vehicle.

In September 2006, Owen Paterson had a go, asking specifically about the Force Protection Buffalo. This was shortly after the announcement on the purchase of Mastiffs and the minister missed the point of the question. He declared that the Cougar (which was to become the Mastiff) was "the vehicle best able to meet our requirements". There was no comparison between the two.

Then, however, we got a most extraordinary intervention from Conservative backbencher Mark Lancaster. Not only an MP, this man is a Major in the Territorial Army. In the summer of 2006, he had been on detachment in Afghanistan. Thus enlightened, on 10 October 2006, he tackled the MoD during a session of the defence committee – of which he was then a member – on the role of the "urgent operational requirement".

Lancaster's concern was that the UOR process could lead to the wrong equipment being bought. The example he chose was:

… the route clearance package, which is a combination of vehicles, American vehicles, Buffalo and Huskies, and they go and clear IEDs off the road. It has come in because the threat is changing in Afghanistan, but when you actually go and talk to the American soldiers using this equipment you discover that one piece of equipment (because this package was designed for Iraq for the nice Tarmaced roads there) is completely unsuitable for Afghanistan …

The route clearing package, he thought, was then subject to a UOR and his information as to its lack of suitability came, apparently, from "the first sergeant who is using this equipment in Kandahar."

As it turned out, Mr Lancaster was mistaken in more than one way. From a formal MoD response on 28 November 2006, we learned that there was then "no formal UOR for the procurement of either Buffalo or Husky" (the latter pictured). The requirement for a route clearance capability to support current operations was being assessed by the Equipment Capability Manager and, we were told, "this may lead to a UOR in the future if required."

On the substantive point, given that the equipment was in use and continued to be in use with evident success, neither could there be any validity in Mr Lancaster's claim that the equipment was "completely unsuitable for Afghanistan", and especially now that the MoD has committed to buying it.

For sure, we know that MRAP vehicles present problems, demonstrating – as with all things – that there is rarely a perfect, single answer to all eventualities, but we also know equipment such as the Husky has a significant off-road capability.

But, in terms of an "official", or at least semi-official Conservative intervention – as opposed to the "freelance" actions of Ann Winterton and Owen Paterson - Mr Lancaster's offering was the totality of the effort. No official Conservative spokesman ever called for the equipment or questioned its absence, which means that the nearest thing to a Conservative "line", albeit semi-official, was to speak against it.

To say that the Conservative Party "missed a trick" is to put it mildly. With the announcement today of an urgent operation requirement, and DefenceNews writing of the equipment being rushed into service, this speaks volumes for the pressing need for this equipment in theatre.

Yet it was raised formally, in Parliament by Ann Winterton nearly three years ago and we know it was being assessed in November 2006 by the MoD – for how long we do not know. Given the now urgent need – which was no different two and three years ago – for "off-the-shelf" equipment that has been in service with the US forces for over five years, why has it taken so scandalously long for the MoD to procure these machines?

Had the Conservatives been on the ball, they could have made a real issue of it. Given the inexplicable delays in bringing the Buffalo in service, they should have made a real issue of it. Had they done so, now that the equipment is to be introduced, they would have gained the political kudos of having "forced" the government's hand.

Instead, their front-bench team was silent while Mr Lancaster, now a Conservative whip, branded it as "completely unsuitable". So much, incidentally, for "expert" Army officers, doubling as MPs.

As much as is this a measure of the government's failure quickly to bring vital equipment into service, therefore, this is also a failure of the Conservative opposition to recognise the need for it and to press the government for its speedy introduction.

That is but one small example of where the Conservatives so consistently fail as an opposition – to their own disadvantage. They could have been trumpeting a "success". Instead, they have nothing to say. Until they re-learn the art of opposition, there can be little confidence that they are fit for the greater and more demanding task of government.

COMMENT THREAD