http://au.news.yahoo.com//040518/2/p236.html
Thursday February 24, 06:45 PM
Australian troops were heading into a danger zone in Iraq ill-prepared and without proper equipment, the federal opposition says.
The warning came as Prime Minister John Howard accused the opposition of tripping over itself on claims the government misled voters before the last election.
Opposition Leader Kim Beazley said the Defence Department's annual report showed Australian forces were not prepared for some of the activities they are expected to do in southern Iraq.
The report said the army's Darwin-based tank crews and soldiers, who will replace Dutch forces guarding Japanese engineers in Al Muthanna province, had some deficiencies in equipment, ammunition and preparedness levels.
"I don't like to hear of Australian troops being put into dangerous situations without the proper preparation," Mr Beazley said.
Labor defence spokesman Robert McClelland went further, saying troops' lives were at risk as the Dutch had lost two soldiers in fighting in the same area.
"You would be extremely naive to suggest that Australia won't suffer casualties in this engagement," Mr McClelland told reporters.
"We are looking at 450 troops ... with questions regarding their proper equipment."
Mr McClelland said the government could not have carried out sufficient intelligence and risk assessments in the short time it had leading up to the decision to commit the troops.
"The government hasn't fulfilled the duty of care because they haven't, they couldn't possibly have, conducted adequate intelligence research and quite clearly they haven't got our equipment up to speed," Mr McClelland said.
Defence force chief General Peter Cosgrove said his soldiers would be ready.
"Of course we will rectify any deficiencies," General Cosgrove told the Nine Network.
"We always get our troops ready very well indeed. They will be hard at it now getting ready and they'll be at a very high state of readiness when they go.
"I think the troops and all Australians ought to be very clear that they'll be well prepared and well trained."
The prime minister said he also believed the troops would be ready and that their mission area was a lot safer than other parts of Iraq.
"I hope and pray we don't take any casualties," Mr Howard told Perth radio 6PR.
"Any part of Iraq is dangerous, although this part of Iraq is a lot less dangerous and a lot more benign than other parts of Iraq, particularly the Sunni triangle."
Mr Howard seized on Mr McClelland's claim of a last-minute decision, which appeared to contradict Mr Beazley's claim that the government had misled the public before the October election of committing more troops.
"This is Mr Beazley on every issue - he walks both sides of the street," Mr Howard said.
"He sort of test-runs both sides of the argument and if it doesn't work he then changes to another argument."
No comments:
Post a Comment