---

Iraq

My Lords, one of the most important documents to emerge in recent years, as far as the military is concerned, did not come from this country. It was produced in America and is called Counterinsurgency Operations. It resulted from a direct and in-depth inquiry into what had happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, and how well the military was prepared for the sort of operations that both entailed. The interesting thing about the composition of that inquiry is that although it was militarily led, it included a large number of experts from right across the field. I am interested that the Minister says that the inquiry is meant to go into "lessons learnt". However, I find in what she said, unless I have misheard, that there is no military member of the inquiry, who might be able to lead such an inquiry into the in-depth lessons which are, after all, hugely important to the future development of our Armed Forces.