Although located in Qatar, the CAOC is run by the US Air Force Central Command. Its website says it “commands and controls the broad spectrum of what air power brings to the fight: Global Vigilance, Global Reach, and Global Power.”

The CAOC’s mission involves operations in 20 countries including Afghanistan, but is heavily focused on the US-led anti-Isis coalition’s air campaign in Syria and Iraq. The high-tech facility is heavily-guarded and details of its operations are tightly controlled.

Centcom - Photo USAF Centcom - Photo USAF

The centerpiece of the CAOC is a bunker-like building with rows of desks, computer stations and screens on one wall that plot the position of coalition aircraft taking off from the nearby runway for around-the-clock surveillance and bombing missions.

Stuff understands Defence’s work at the CAOC includes planning and intelligence. Asked whether those planning and intelligence roles were in any way related to air strikes, the Defence spokesperson said: “No. NZDF personnel do not have a mandate to engage in the targeting process.”

However, according to its website, “the CAOC relies upon the expertise of joint and Coalition teams” within five divisions “to facilitate superior airpower operations”: Strategy; Combat Plans; Combat Operations; Air Mobility; and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance.

Australian Defence Force personnel, who work closely with New Zealand soldiers in Iraq, are directly involved at Al Udeid in providing intelligence for air strikes. Curiously, while Defence staff attended ANZAC Day commemorations with the Australians and other coalition personnel at Al Udeid in 2016 and 2017 and Remembrance and Veterans’ Day in November, the New Zealanders are not visible in official photos.

Even greater secrecy surrounds the role of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) in the anti-Isis campaign. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s spokesperson deflected questions about its role.

“The PM has no comment.”

A spokesperson for the GCSB said: “We don’t comment on where our staff may or may not be deployed due to national and personal security.”

Two senior defence sources have told Stuff that intelligence operations in the war against Isis are extremely sensitive because they undermine the narrative that New Zealand’s contribution is a “non-combat” mission.

The sources confirmed the involvement of New Zealand intelligence personnel in the anti-Isis campaign in Baghdad and other locations but were reluctant to provide details. One said: “It’s fair to say they wouldn’t be there to sweep the floors.”

Strategic analyst and former Pentagon official Dr Paul Buchanan said it was hard to see how the National or Labour-led governments could define a New Zealand planning or intelligence role as “non-combat”.

“In reality, the intelligence and planning role is as central to the kill chain as that of the pilots.”

Then-Prime Minister John Key was asked on TV3’s The Nation in September 2016 whether he could rule out New Zealand soldiers helping target air strikes through intelligence, “be it out in the field or somewhere in the world on a computer”. He replied: “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I can.”

Questioned whether New Zealand spies were helping with air strikes Key said that “our intelligence guys do work, not in Syria, but they do work in Iraq. But by definition, these things again are always very broad. Because people are in lots of different locations.”

Asked later in the interview: “Does our intelligence get used for air strikes, yes or no?”, Key replied: “Well, I’m pretty sure the answer to that’s no, but again, I don’t sit there and see, you know, what goes through and how it all works.”