Siege of UK bases in Basra

Map of UK bases in Basra.
Airport on the left.
Basra Palace on the right.

Date	27 February - 3 September 2007 (6 months and 1 week)
Location	Basra, Iraq
Result	British withdrawal from inner city Basra. Denmark withdraw and exit the war.

Belligerents

United Kingdom

Denmark

Mahdi Army

Commanders and leaders

Muqtada al-Sadr

Wissam Abu Qader †

Strength

6,200

unknown

Casualties and losses

32 killed (UK)
1 killed (DK)

unknown

Muqtada al-Sadr

The Siege of UK bases in Basra was conducted and maintained by the Mahdi Army in Basra for most of 2007. Following the reported success of the coalition Operation Sinbad, whose purpose was to stabilise Basra and prepare it for the turning over of security to Iraqi government forces, the city was overrun by insurgent forces from three different militia forces, including the Mahdi Army, and the British found themselves under siege in their bases and capable of conducting only limited raids in armoured convoys into the city.

By this point in the war there were only two British bases left in Basra. One was on the outskirts of the city at the Basra Airport with a garrison of 5,000 personnel from all three Services, although mostly Army and RAF personnel. The second, which faced much of the fighting, was in the city center at Basra Palace, a former palace of Saddam Hussein, with a garrison of 700 soldiers.

The first British soldier that was killed in the city, following operation Sinbad, was killed on 27 February returning to the Shatt-Al-Arab Hotel.

The airport base was being constantly hit by mortar and rocket fire during the siege, being struck dozens of times per day. Despite the weight of fire, there was relatively little disruption to operations, as considerable effort had been put into Force Protection measures. These included passive measures on the base, such as physical hardening of structures, and active measures, such as fighting patrols conducted by RAF Regiment squadrons in the Base's ground defence area, beyond the perimeter.

The Uti Triangle, a flat zone combining open wasteland, marsh and clustered buildings, was being used by the Mahdi army to conduct the mortar and rocket attacks on both the airport and the palace. Aggressive patrolling activity had denied the militias the opportunity to use the airport's ground defence area for launching anything other than a small number of rockets. However, this may have had the effect of forcing the militias to use firing points that were further away, which meant that larger rockets, with correspondingly larger warheads were used.

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Wikipedia