The UK demanded ‘control’ over its Iraq strategy a year after the invasion.

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The UK government has questioned control of US military operations in Iraq 13 months after the war began, newly released documents show, underscoring the Blair government’s frustration with its most important ally.

The documents, released by Cabinet Office Internal briefings prepared for Prime Minister Tony Blair on Tuesday raised concerns about whether the US is holding back its invasion strategy.

“The prime minister may question Bush about the existence of effective political control over military operations,” the documents said.

A briefing before his meeting with President George W. Bush on April 16, 2004 indicated that Britain believed “too many military officers were talking too hard[with the American audience].”

In the year A revelation of the UK government’s growing frustration with the US since the first battle of Fallujah began on April 4 led to the victory of the Iraqi insurgents.

Blair’s decision to join the US-led invasion of Iraq undermined his credibility, forcing him to resign under pressure from within the party. In the year In 2007, Blair resigned as Labor leader after 10 years as Prime Minister.

A separate document sent to Number 10 from the British Embassy in Washington after the first week of the war shows that then US Secretary of State Richard Armitage told the British ambassador that Bush wanted to “kick ass” in Fallujah. .

But when “faced with the reality” that the move could bring down the Iraqi government, Bush was forced to back down.

The paper stated that Armitage believes that Bush “still thinks he is on a mission from God in Iraq” and that the United States is “slowly losing the battlefield” and that there is no “coherent strategy” for operations.

He then urged the British to consult with Bush that the United Nations should play an important role in the country’s political process.

Before meeting with Bush, Blair told officials that Fallujah “didn’t reflect the American plan at its best”, adding that US tactics were “corrupt” and their “public rhetoric” had exacerbated the situation.

The British hoped to find a personal agreement at the meeting that the US approach should be “more measured” because both governments are “losing political capital”.

The documents also reveal that UK officials believed that the United States’ coalition government had “never been so good” since the start of the war.

The papers suggest that the US believes the governments of Poland, Spain and Ukraine have “let it down”. The British expressed their frustration with Ukraine for the lack of support for the war.

Before the decision to invade Iraq on March 20, the “coalition of the willing” was formed in early 2003 and at its peak included 49 countries.

The documents came ahead of a planned political transition in Iraq on June 30, when an interim government took control of the country from an administrative council.

The conflict ended in 2011 after a long insurgency by militant groups following the fall of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in 2003.

The Cabinet Office and Armitage declined to comment.