British forces were engaged in a "proxy war with Iran" in the south of Iraq, the officer who planned this week's withdrawal from Basra Palace said today.Lt Colonel Patrick Sanders, commanding officer of the battlegroup which pulled out to an airbase outside the city, admitted there was still a significant threat from militias linked to Tehran. He said: "We are engaged - or we have been engaged - effectively in a proxy war with Iran and if that resumes then they will need us to help."
Lt Colonel Patrick SandersColonel Sanders dismissed as "complete nonsense" suggestions that Monday's pullout amounted to a defeat for British forces and insisted that the UK's presence in Iraq was still useful to the local authorities.
The Basra Air Base makes it easier for us to re-deploy to
But he suggested that the move from Basra Palace to the UK's last Iraqi stronghold at Basra Air Station marked "the beginning of the end" of Britain's four-year involvement in the country, which began with the US-led invasion in 2003. He added: "The militias, and the Jaish al-Mahdi (Mahdi Army) in particular, have thrown just about everything they have got at us.
"They have been unable to engage us in open fighting. We have been able to patrol around the city at will, on foot and in vehicles, any place or time of our choosing.
We just have decided not to choose to do it anymore.
"It's been dangerous and the level of violence that we have been engaged in and the casualties we have suffered are testament to that, but the notion that this is a defeat is nonsense."
Besides, only the trained eye can tell when we are flying our flag upside down.