[18] At MacDill Air Force Base, Stirrup headed the 60 strong British team who were contributing to the US-led operational planning.

A particular difficulty faced by Stirrup was the need to place equipment orders with industry before the Government was prepared to publicly commit to the action.

In the end some critical items such as body armour, boots and desert clothing were not available to all the personnel who needed them when they deployed.

[9] In July 2004 Stirrup set out his strategic direction for the RAF which was based upon working to achieve an increasingly modern and multi-role aircraft fleet, reducing the number of RAF stations by creating fewer but larger and better-equipped bases and reducing the number of personnel while maintaining or improving their training.

Noting that neither of two obstacles could be fully dealt with by the British Armed Forces, Stirrup viewed the solution as being essentially political.

[20] In order to take action against the militias, the local British commander in South East Iraq developed a plan to conduct aggressive operations against them.

At the same time Stirrup became increasingly concerned that strong political leadership from the Iraqis was lacking and that without this any gains made by the military actions against the militias would be to no avail.

In July 2006, Stirrup overturned the previous military advice to the Defence Secretary by stating that force levels in South East Iraq would need to be maintained.

In September 2006, the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, blocked the British plan to act against the militias which Stirrup believed was because of Maliki's dependence on Sadrist support at that stage.

Believing that it would not deliver the level of improvements in security that the British wanted, Stirrup began looking at the high risk strategy of withdrawing British troops from inside Basra which would have left the Iraqis in the position of either having to deal with the security problems themselves or losing control of Iraq's second city.

[24] By early September all British troops had been withdrawn from Basra city to the airport to perform what was dubbed an "overwatch" role.

[25] After British troops had been withdrawn from Basra city, violence continued and General Mohan took some time to produce a plan for improving security.

The plan called for a six-week period of disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration starting in June 2008 before forcibly disarming the Mahdi Army and other non-Government/Coalition forces afterwards.

Both Stirrup and the American commanders were taken by surprise and were concerned about the lack of planning but Maliki was determined to launch his operation in late March.

While recognizing that Operation Charge of the Knights had been far from perfect, Stirrup judged it to be a success as the Iraqis were taking responsibility for their own security.

[27] After the conclusion of Operation Charge of the Knights the British were involved in helping to rebuild those Iraq Army units which had suffered from poor cohesion, or even dissolved.

In hindsight, Stirrup took the view that the British forces would have been usefully employed in mentoring the Iraq Army to greater extent earlier in the campaign.

While, highlighting the inadequate force levels provided by NATO and the competing demands on Coalition political and military resources that Iraq had posed until 2008, Stirrup believed that by 2009 NATO forces were successfully taking the fight to the insurgents, driving them out of towns and villages and thereby allowing governance to improve which would lead to the defeat of the insurgency.

[30] By December 2009, Stirrup was expressing his concern about falling levels of public support for the war in Afghanistan which he believed risked undermining the British effort.

[41] In August 2014, Stirrup was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to The Guardian opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum on that issue.

[44] On Remembrance Sunday 2014, it was announced that Stirrup would lead the efforts to raise one million pounds to enable a national memorial to the British service personnel who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan to be erected in central London.

[45] By March 2015 Stirrup was confident that the full amount needed could be raised[46] and by July 2016 work had begun on the memorial in the Victoria Embankment Gardens.

Noting that the Kremlin viewed NATO as weak, Stirrup called for the West to develop a long-term strategy to counter Russia's actions.