RAF Lessons of the War in Iraq
War, in my limited experience, is a series of cock-ups caused mostly by inadequate preparation, poor planning and inadequate equipment. However, one learns much in each conflict and it might be that the only good to come from war is the lessons on how to prevent the next one and how to fight more effectively if prevention does not work.
With this in mind, I look back at recent conflicts and find that in the RAF there is no distributed publication of lessons learned. This contrasts markedly with the lessons distributed throughout the USAF after Vietnam. I remember that CTTO at the time of the Falklands war wanted to publish lessons learned but was stopped with the advice “This was a victory, we do not wish to discuss our failures”.
If we are not to learn from war we are destined to repeat our failures. Will the RAF have learned some lessons in Iraq and will they be published even in classified form?