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O n the night of April 12, 2003, Australias military commander in the Middle East, Brigadier Maurie McNarn, was woken by a phone call telling him that a RAAF Hercules would soon fly into Baghdad airport to deliver medical supplies for the Iraqi capitals looted hospitals.

The caller was his boss, then Chief of the Defence Force General Peter Cosgrove. Nevertheless, McNarn protested, saying the airport was not secure and there was no safe way to distribute the supplies to 40 hospitals across the crumbling capital. Cosgrove, now Sir Peter, the nations Governor-General, told him to make it happen. It was being announced to the press in 30 minutes.

Operation Baghdad Assist went ahead and became a media triumph for then prime minister John Howard and Sir Peter amid a deeply unpopular war. The Hercules, carrying three journalists and 13 commandos to provide protection, was the first Australian plane to land in Baghdad after the invasion a month earlier.

But the medical supplies never made it out of the airport. They rotted. A second planeload was diverted to the city of Nasiriyah, whose hospitals were already relatively well stocked. McNarn would go on to dismiss the whole thing as a photo opportunity. Special forces commander Lieutenant-Colonel Rick Burr, who learned of the operation on CNN, was equally upset, writing in his diary that the operation made a mockery of our approach.

Its one of many startling revelations in a 572-page, declassified internal report on the Iraq War obtained by Fairfax Media under freedom of information laws. Written between 2008 and 2011 by Dr Albert Palazzo from Defences Directorate of Army Research and Analysis, it is by far the most comprehensive assessment of our involvement in the war. Originally classified Secret, it was finally released last week after more than 500 redactions.

The report concludes that Howard joined US president George W. Bush in invading Iraq solely to strengthen Australias alliance with the US. Howards and later Kevin Rudds claims of enforcing UN resolutions, stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction and global terrorism, even rebuilding Iraq after the invasion, are dismissed as mandatory rhetoric.

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Howard and Sir Peter, facing domestic political pressure, ensured that Australian lives were exposed to as little risk as possible. The result was a contribution that was of only modest military use and, in many cases, made little sense. Politically, delivering the right force was secondary to the vital requirement of it just being there but it led some American military officers to grumble that Australia was providing a series of headquarters.

It was managed from the top with a keen eye for the politics and the public relations, yet frustrated commanders often asked what they were doing in Iraq and many took to writing their own mission statements. One commander wryly summed up his time in Iraq thus: We did some shit for a while and things didnt get any worse.

The report, which Defence says is an unofficial history that represents the authors own views, is the product of three years work and includes more than 75 interviews with military figures, correspondence with other sources, and full access to classified documents.

Palazzo planned it as an unclassified book to be published by the Army History Unit, aimed at teaching junior officers about the Iraq War, but it grew into a larger, classified project that Palazzo hoped would be distributed internally, including to senior Defence leaders.

That did not happen. Instead the report was shelved.

Its release comes as Australia once again ponders the US alliance in the era of Donald Trump, with Australian troops back in Iraq, and with the Pentagon poised to release a new game plan to defeat the Islamic State terror group that could involve asking for more help from Canberra.

Prime Minister John Howard and President George W. Bush in 2003. Photo: AP

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Planning for war - The Sydney Morning Herald

The military administration in eastern Libya has banned men and women between the ages of 18 and 45 from traveling abroad without explicit permission, a week after introducing a ban on women traveling alone.

The chief of staff in the eastern Libyan government, Abdel-Razek al-Nadhouri, said the measure was imposed to prevent people from joining terrorist networks abroad, the BBC reported.

Libyans who wish to to travel outside the country will now require permits from the ministry of interior or intelligence agency in the administration.

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Libyans take part in a celebration marking the sixth anniversary of the Libyan revolution, which toppled strongman Muammar el-Qaddafi, in Benghazi on February 17. Since Qaddafi's demise, Libya has been split by rival governments. ABDULLAH DOMA/AFP/Getty

Libya has several rival governments competing for power: There is a U.N.-backed administration, known as the Government of National Accord, based in Tripoli, while the eastern government is backed by the Libyan army and overseen by Khalifa Haftar, a top military general. A third administration has recently emerged in Tripoli, calling itself the National Salvation Government.

Al-Nadhouri announced an order on February 16 banning women under 60 from traveling abroad without a male companion. The chief of staff said women were being used as spies under the guise of working for civil society groups, but womens rights activists in Libya denounced the move.

The eastern government backtracked and suspended the order on Tuesday, following a meeting between al-Nadhouri and the director of eastern Libyas civil society commission, Abir Mneina, the BBC reported. But now the eastern administration has broadened the scope of travel restrictions in the country.

Since the toppling of longtime leader Muammar el-Qaddafi in 2011, Libya has been in a state of instability, with rival factions competing for political control and militias multiplying across the country. The chaos has allowed militant groups to take root in the country, including al-Qaeda and the Islamic State militant group (ISIS,) although forces allied to the U.N.-backed Tripoli government recently liberated the coastal city of Sirte, which was ISISs main stronghold in Libya.

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East Libya Bans 18-45-Year-Olds From Traveling Abroad - Newsweek

Tripoli - Armed groups traded fire with heavy weapons in the centre of Tripoli, injuring at least nine people and paralysing the Libyan capital, residents and the Red Crescent said on Friday.

"Our team... rescued nine people injured in the indiscriminate firing," said the Libyan Red Crescent, which has set up a field hospital on a roundabout on the fringes of the urban combat zone.

There was no official casualty toll from the clashes which raged most of Thursday night and resumed the following day after a truce collapsed.

The fighting between two rival armed groups in eastern Tripoli erupted after one accused the other of kidnapping four of its members, the Tripoli-based news agency LANA reported.

It said families trapped in the conflict zone of Abu Slim were appealing to the authorities to intervene to halt the violence which has closed down the city centre.

Mediators had secured an overnight ceasefire but fighting later resumed, LANA said.

"Two apartments in housing blocks on the airport road were hit by rockets. I can see columns of smoke," local resident Nuria al-Mosbahi told AFP.

Other residents said tanks and trucks mounted with heavy anti-aircraft guns had criss-crossed the zone, leaving behind several burnt-out cars.

In the absence of a statement from the Government of National Accord which is based in Tripoli, a leading political figure, Aguila Saleh, issued a condemnation of the violence.

"What's happening in Tripoli is a terrorist and criminal act which destabilises... citizens and the institutions of state," he said.

Libya has been submerged in chaos since the fall and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed 2011 armed uprising.

Rival political authorities and militias have since been vying for control of territory and Libya's oil wealth.

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At least 9 hurt as heavy fire paralyses Libya capital - News24

CAIRO At least 74 bodies of African migrants have washed ashore in western Libya, the Libyan Red Crescent said Tuesday, the latest tragedy at sea along a perilous but increasingly popular trafficking route to Europe.

The bodies were found near the western Libyan city of Zawiya on Monday, Red Crescent spokesman Mohammed al-Misrati told The Associated Press, adding that he feared more might surface. He said a torn rubber boat, the kind that usually carry up to 120 people, was found nearby.

The Red Crescent's branch in Zawiya said there are bodies still floating out at sea but it has no means to retrieve them.

The International Organization of Migration said the traffickers took the engine and left the boat to drift. Another 12 migrants remain missing and are "presumed drowned," and a sole survivor was transferred to a hospital in a coma, the U.N. migration agency said on Twitter.

FRENCH FARMER CONVICTED FOR HELPING MIGRANTS

The Red Crescent posted photographs of dozens of bodies in white and black bags, lined up along the shore. Al-Misrati said the bodies would be taken to a cemetery for unidentified people in the capital, Tripoli. The Red Crescent appealed for help on Facebook, saying there are no vehicles to transport the bodies.

Al-Misrati had initially said the bodies were found overnight Tuesday, but later clarified that they were recovered Monday afternoon and evening.

Libyan coast guard spokesman Ayoub Gassim said over 500 migrants were rescued at sea on Friday and Saturday off the coast of Sebratha, a city to the west of Zawiya. The migrants' boats were about 5-7 miles (8-11 kilometers) from the coast.

Gassim said the smugglers pack larger rubber boats with up to 180 people, dramatically increasing the risk of capsizing.

"We are seeing the new boats, which are not equipped with anything, but they carry more people," he said. "This is going to be even more disastrous for the migrants."

AMI HOROWITZ DEFENDS SWEDEN REFUGEE CLAIMS FROM BACKLASH OVER TRUMP REMARKS

The Libya to Italy smuggling route across the Mediterranean has seen record numbers of migrant drownings in 2016, Fabrice Leggeri, director of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, said last week. Some 4,579 migrant deaths were documented in 2016, up from 2,869 deaths the previous year and 3,161 in 2014. The real number of deaths is believed to be much higher.

Leggeri blamed the small dinghies and poor vessels used by the smugglers for the high death rate. The smugglers also appear more willing to brave the choppy winter sea. January alone saw 228 recorded deaths, by far the biggest monthly toll in recent years. IOM says the latest tragedy brings the total death toll this year to 365.

More than 180,000 people made the crossing last year, an increase of 17 percent from 2015.

Libya was plunged into turmoil by the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi, and has since emerged as a popular, if extremely dangerous, route to Europe for those fleeing poverty and civil war elsewhere in Africa.

Libya is largely governed by local militias, many of which profit from the trafficking. Rights groups say migrants traversing Libya have been tortured, raped and subjected to forced labor.

SPAIN RESCUES 112 MIGRANTS OFF LIBYAN COAST, 36 MORE AT SEA

The European Union has plans to halt the tide by training the Libyan coast guard and stepping up cooperation with neighboring Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt. But rights groups fear that such measures could leave tens of thousands of migrants stranded in the restive country.

The plan would also require a much stronger Libyan government capable of controlling the country's waters. At present, Libya is split between two competing governments which convene in different parts of the country.

The head of Doctors Without Borders, Arjan Hehenkamp, says the EU plan shows that it is "delusional about just how dangerous the situation in Libya really is."

His organization, also known by its French acronym MSF, has aided in the sea rescues. He said survivors have recounted starving in Libyan detention centers and other abuses.

Earlier this month, Italy reached a deal with the U.N.-brokered government in Tripoli, which is not recognized by rival authorities in the east, to train and equip the Libyan coast guard and improve conditions in detention centers.

Mohamed Siala, the foreign minister of the U.N.-backed government, told the AP that 70 coast guards have received training and a second group will follow. He denied allegations by critics that the deal would pave the way for the resettlement of migrants inside Libya.

He expressed fear, however, that the flow of migrants would increase this spring, saying rescue operations have encouraged more migrants to risk the journey.

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Bodies of 74 migrants heading to Europe wash up in Libya - Fox News

GENEVA

The International Organization for Migration reports a surge in the number of migrant deaths on the Mediterranean Seas central route linking Libya to Italy in the first two months of the year.

The IOM estimates 326 migrants and refugees have died this year while transiting by sea from Libya to Italy, compared to just 97 fatalities during the same period last year.

While the numbers are alarming, IOM spokesman Joel Millman said they do not reflect the full scope of the sea tragedies as many bodies are never recovered and an unknown number of victims remain missing.

He said most of the victims are migrants from sub-Saharan Africa. However, he told VOA not everyone making the perilous sea journey in smugglers' boats is a migrant who intended to go to Europe.

FILE - An image taken from video shot on Jan. 27, 2017 by the Italian Coast Guard shows migrants being rescued from members of Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti in the central Mediterranean sea.

There is a thriving business in kidnapping right now in Libya," said Millman, "where people are being taken off the street, held to paid ransom and forced into these boats just because the ransom takers are done with them and they do not want to try to pick them up again and go through the long process of trying to ring a few hundred euros out of a family somewhere thousands of miles to the south.

Millman said that is not the only horrendous crime being perpetrated against the defenseless people. He said human smugglers have been employing another, potentially lethal tactic stealing engines from the boats and leaving the vessels drifting in the water with people aboard.

They do not know whether this is the Mafia that is cracking down on competition, that is not paying and punishing them by taking the engine, or weather and it could be a mixture of both," he said. "Parts and vessels are so hard to come by now, with the amount of migrants that are coming through, that the smugglers just feel that they need to recover the expensive parts of their operation, the components as quickly as they can.

Millman said passengers are promised that a rescue ship is on its way. He said in many cases that has happened, but there have been other instances where the migrants have been left adrift without any help on the horizon.

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Migrant Fatalities Surge on Libya-Italy Mediterranean Route - Voice of America