§ 2.52 p.m.
§ LORD KENNETMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government what was the plan for our defence against Iraqi armour in the Kuwait operation in view of our numerical inferiority in armour.]
§ LORD CARRINGTONMy Lords, it would not be in the national interest to disclose the details of our military dispositions. I can assure the noble Lord that the defence preparations were fully adequate to meet the known threat.
§ LORD KENNETMy Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for his Answer, and appreciating that one must be careful of the national interest in such cases, may I ask: assuming that there was a superiority of armour on the other side, and assuming that our plan was to hold it up by air-to-ground action, what sort of plan could there have been to deal with the fact that the Iraqi "Migs" have a higher speed than our own aircraft?
§ LORD CARRINGTONMy Lords, that seems to one to contain too many assumptions for me to deal with it on this sort of Question.