How our troops were let down

One in four soldiers still had normal green uniforms by the end of combat operations. Only 40 percent of the desert clothing needed had arrived by 13 April, when operations were well under way.

Weapons

SA-80 A2 rifle worked well in battle for the first time. But of 520 grenade launcher attachments ordered for 30 March, only one-fifth were sent to the Gulf on time. And 587 Minimi machineguns arrived days into the war with insufficient spare parts and aiming attachments.

Body armour

Insufficient numbers of bullet-proof plates and the vests which hold them were available. Troops were left with inadequate protection. Of 200,000 outfits ordered since the Kosovo campaign, many had disappeared.

Night vision

Insufficient numbers of helmet-mounted systems were available during the war.

Most were delivered at the end of May long after combat operations has ended.

Armour

British Challenger II tanks were being fitted with extra armour 48 hours before they spearheaded the invasion of Iraq.

Tank crews had no chance to train with the new armour, which changed the handling of their vehicles.

Vital filters designed to make them and all other British armour, including AS90 self-propelled guns and Scimitar light tanks into rolling "citadels" protected against nuclear, chemical or biological attack, were only fitted after hostilities ceased.

Spare parts failed to turn up in time, so tanks still in Britain and Germany were cannibalised, with 29 per cent of all nondeployed AS90s stripped for parts.

Ammunition

A series of supply ships was dispatched to Kuwait with ammunition - but the last one to arrive was carrying the transport equipment needed to move it to the frontline.

Bad planning meant that ammo was waiting on the dockside and everything depended on the last ship arriving. A total of 30 per cent of Maverick anti-tank missiles which had been ordered failed to arrive on time for the invasion.

No frontline units ran short of ammunition during the combat phase, but tracking of supplies was a major problem.

Supply system

The whole supply chain faced a series of problems. Equipment arriving in Kuwait was not getting to units where it was needed.

There was no coherent supply tracking system in place once it arrived in the theatre of operations.

Frontline units frequently sent scouting teams to find their supplies, while senior officers made multiple orders to try to get what they needed.

The four-stage priority system to indicate the need for speed collapsed as commanders-made everything high priority to make sure they could get supplies on time. The average time to meet a high priority request slipped from the target of 48 hours to the reality of 127 hours.

Peace-keeping

British troops started peace-keeping duties within hours of combat ending but they suffered severe problems.

Units found Iraqi infrastructure such as ports and railways in a far worse condition than intelligence had suggested and were forced to improvise basic repairs.

Military commanders did not have enough back-up. In Basra, the British brigadier was running the economy's cash supply from two containers full of dollars and local currency. The US organisation dealing with recontruction failed to plan for the "huge challenges".