Britain took part in mock Iran invasion
Pentagon planned for Tehran conflict with war game involving UK
troops
By Julian Borger in Washington and Ewen MacAskill
04/15/06 "Guardian"
-- -- British officers took part in a US war
game aimed at preparing for a possible invasion of Iran, despite
repeated claims by the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, that a
military strike against Iran is inconceivable.
The war game, codenamed Hotspur 2004, took place at the US base
of Fort Belvoir in Virginia in July 2004.
A Ministry of Defence spokesman played down its significance
yesterday. "These paper-based exercises are designed to test
officers to the limit in fictitious scenarios. We use invented
countries and situations using real maps," he said.
The disclosure of Britain's participation came in the week in
which the Iranian crisis intensified, with a US report that the
White House was contemplating a tactical nuclear strike and
Tehran defying the United Nations security council.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, who sparked outrage
in the US, Europe and Israel last year by calling for Israel to
be wiped off the face of the Earth, created more alarm
yesterday. He told a conference in Tehran in support of the
Palestinians: "Like it or not, the Zionist regime is heading
toward annihilation. The Zionist regime is a rotten, dried tree
that will be eliminated by one storm."
The senior British officers took part in the Iranian war game
just over a year after the invasion of Iraq. It was focused on
the Caspian Sea, with an invasion date of 2015. Although the
planners said the game was based on a fictitious Middle East
country called Korona, the border corresponded exactly with
Iran's and the characteristics of the enemy were Iranian.
A British medium-weight brigade operated as part of a US-led
force.
The MoD's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, which
helped run the war game, described it on its website as the
"year's main analytical event of the UK-US Future Land
Operations Interoperability Study" aimed at ensuring that both
armies work well together. The study "was extremely well
received on both sides of the Atlantic".
According to an MoD source, war games covering a variety of
scenarios are conducted regularly by senior British officers in
the UK, the US or at Nato headquarters. He cited senior military
staff carrying out a mock invasion of southern England last week
and one of Scotland in January.
However, Hotspur took place at a time of accelerated US planning
after the fall of Baghdad for a possible conflict with Iran.
That planning is being carried out by US Central Command,
responsible for the Middle East and central Asia area of
operations, and by Strategic Command, which carries out
long-range bombing and nuclear operations.
William Arkin, a former army intelligence officer who first
reported on the contingency planning for a possible nuclear
strike against Iran in his military column for the Washington
Post online, said: "The United States military is really, really
getting ready, building war plans and options, studying maps,
shifting its thinking."
A Foreign Office spokesman said: "The foreign secretary has made
his position very clear that military action is inconceivable.
The Foreign Office regards speculation about war, particularly
involving Britain, as unhelpful at a time when the diplomatic
route is still being pursued."
After the failure of a mission to Tehran on Thursday by Mohammed
ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency,
Russia announced a diplomatic initiative yesterday. It is to
host a new round of talks in Moscow on Tuesday with the US, the
EU and China.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
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