…only a few minutes before icebreaker drinks and dinner so only a quick update on life at CLAW 09.

This morning was a series of admin and intro briefs followed by a couple of very good briefs by the guys who conducted some of the operational lessons collection efforts this year and then a fascinating insight into lessons that the UK is identifying from its time in Iraq, Op TELIC.  A ton of great material for some more Thursday-Friday War papers on homecoming…This afternoon saw the first cut of OIL sorting and analysis which turned out to be quite painless so I think that the CLAW processes are slowly osmosing out into the wider community – definitely our hosts have done a top job of setting it all up and have fallen on their feet on Day 1…

They have a assembled a great and very diverse group here for this CLAW and it’s very exciting to see ASIC representatives for the first time – here to observe CLAW processes as part of an air drive into the lessons world as well. It’s also been great to catch up with the old CLAW hands from Oz, Canada and the US and t0 hear of developments and intentions  for next year’s International Lessons Learned Conference.

We all had a bit of a session in the mess last night (yep, much as I swore not to this time – well, not every night anyway!!) which was quite quiet but entertaining and certainly sleep was no problem (nor rising this morning!) when we finished up around half 11.

Tomorrow, the real work starts…