UK troops ‘not ready’ for deadly mission in Mali
BRITISH troops lack resources against jihadist insurgents for a mission to wartorn Mali later this year, senior officers have warned.
The main worries are the threat of roadside bombs and a lack of sufficient medical air cover.
Britain plans to send 250 troops from the Light Dragoons and Royal Anglian Regiment to support the UN mission in Mali in December.
More than 700 Islamic State fighters and their affiliates are now operational across the country, striking the 13,000-strong UN peacekeepers on a regular basis.
But officials have warned that UK troops are not yet correctly prepared.
The use of the Jackal opentopped patrol vehicles for the operation instead of the Mastiff heavily armoured motors was also criticised.
Yesterday, one senior serving officer said: “We seem to have learned very little from our early experience in Afghanistan.
“We should be deploying Mastiff. Granted, it is not as fast as the Jackal, but it will offer more protection against improvised explosive devices. No one has been killed in a Mastiff.
“The other issue is medical evacuation. These extremists are very active and they are hitting both UN and French forces hard.
“We have three Chinook helicopters in Mali but they are engaged with supporting the French mission and will not be used to medivac injured British soldiers. And there will be both injuries and fatalities.
“We must rely on Romania to supply medivac through its Russian MI-8 helicopters.
“My concern is we find ourselves with the situation we faced during the initial stages of Afghanistan where there simply weren’t enough helicopters.”
General Sir Richard Barrons, joint forces commander until 2016, said: “We have committed a total of 300 people, which is a very small contribution to tackle a very big problem.
“Relying on other nations to round out capability is not new, but it does increase risk.
“It may also mean that our force is limited to things it can do, rather than what must be done.
“Using Jackals in a reasonably benign environment is fine, and this isn’t Aleppo, though there is a danger that commanders on the ground will be caught out, and I anticipate casualties. But if your aim is to protect your force 100 per cent, leave them in bed at home.”
The deployment of the 250 troops will be in addition to the 100 RAF personnel and three Chinook helicopters who have supported the French part of the UN mission for the past four years.
Commanded by Lt Col Thomas Robinson, they will act as a long range reconnaissance force for the UN by providing intelligence that will help protect civilians.
The plan is to progress towards a sustainable peace in Mali. The region is one of the most violent areas in Africa.
Since the Operation Minusma peacekeeping mission started in 2013, a total of 209 UN peacekeepers and 41 French troops have been killed, including 13 who died in a helicopter crash last November.
More than 580 civilians have been killed in central Mali this year alone due to increasingly audacious attacks by IS.
The death toll was revealed by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet.
Roadside bombs are now said to be on the rise with the jihadist activity in Mali.
The soldiers will be sent for two-week long sorties on Jackals – open-topped patrol vehicles which have been armoured at the bottom to protect them from the impact of improvised explosive devices.
Though they have off-road capability, their fully laden weight of 3.5 tons means they are not suitable for sand.
Fewer Foxhounds – fully enclosed seven-ton command vehicles – will also be sent.
Though deployed as force protection vehicles at the tail end of the Afghanistan conflict, the Foxhound has never been operationally trialled in sand and is fraught with reliability issues.
The British Army’s Mastiff heavily armoured patrol vehicles are being sold so will not be available for deployment.
They have served inafghanistan and Iraq without casualty and can better withstand the blast of a roadside bomb, it was said.
The warnings follow the deployment of a 45-member SAS unit to the French base at Gao, in Mali, last week.
The special forces soldiers will make an “intelligence threat assessment” for commanders amid increasing instability in the region and a rise in attacks on peacekeepers.
To mitigate some of the risks for the troops, the SAS team will attempt to secure intelligence sources – through payment – to ensure warnings of any jihadist presence in villages or towns through which the vehicles will be forced to pass.
The SAS team will present its report to the Permanent Joint Headquarters in December and will continue to shadow troops in a move to counter any attempt by extremists to attack them or use roadside bombs against their vehicles.