A class act

Dee Ranged

.

I'm with you one this one Melanie.

The mass hysteria against Blair is quite incredible.

One the downside - it will now be much more difficult, if not impossible, to go to war when it will really be appropriate.

.

John Birch

Ms. Phillips says “the issue was not that Iraq was thought to have been involved in 9/11 – no-one had ever suggested this.”

So the 70 percent of Americans who believed Iraq was involved in 9-11 got the idea from thin air?

And if Iran is a "grave danger" it is even more so thanks to the removal of its arch enemy in Baghdad. Military action against Iran is less likely because of the Iraq debacle. And the Shias will dominate Iraq. Iran is ultimately the big winner of the invasion of Iraq and should be sending a big thank you to Tony Blair.

Dixon

I dont give a proverbial monkeys what Blair says or how he says it, the only good thing he ever did as PM was join Bush in the invasion of Iraq. I want to loathe Blair, but I am forever mindful of the fact that...in the real world, in the long run, as opposed to the rarefied ectoplasmic, legalistic fantasy-land of the peaceniks we must endure babbling about us...in that real world, in the long run, that invasion may have saved my neck and the society I live in.

Beer Moth

Dee Ranged

You make a very important point. This whole ridiculous business has not been arranged primarily to look at what happened in the past.

It's main function is to push the understanding into the minds of Western governments that even to think of going to war with any muslim nation in any any future situation, risks the media hounds of hell.

The vacuous Liberal combine trundles us on into oblivion.

Rachael

"So the 70 percent of Americans who believed Iraq was involved in 9-11 got the idea from thin air?"

What's this got to do with anything?

Who do you think you are?

Andrew my-colleague-Susan-Watts-refuses-to-corroborate-me Gilligan?

Today is not a day for amateurs, John Birch.

JOHN ROOSEVELT

Dixon: wonderful posts!!!!!:))

Raymond Douglas

One thing Blair got right , was the threat we face from Islam and terrorism. I still remember that speech he made back in 2004, and how good his analysis was. That is why so many wanted rid of him. He gave us a an analysis rare among mainstream politicians regarding this topic.

Andre

What we are witnessing at the Chilcot hearings is the affirmation of the collective loss of nerve by Great Britain, the United Sates and Europe - no change there, mes braves. Blair's nervousness and boz-eyed puzzlement is the nearest we will ever get to him admitting that he hadn't realised this. Blair and Bush wanted a fight but the collapsing West doesn't have the stomach for it. That was their great mistake and I for one am glad they made it. God help western civilization if Bush and Blair are the best defenders we can throw up.

Odd

There's a lot of oil in Iraq, of course. I suppose that the Bush administration had no interest in securing that.

jordan

Tony Blair, the first neocon to hit the international stage... people should give this man more credit

arnoldo

Today's session vindicates totally the decision to have the Inquiry in public. Blair has been able to remind us of the total picture and all of the arguments, not just the tunnel vision points of the Bliar brigade.

And is it not shameful that Blair's "2010 question" alluded to by Melanie, has hardly ever been put to the war's opponents since 2003 by the BBC?

Even though it has been the obvious question to ask since then?

Phil T

Well, Blair got his war. If the Tories had been in, it would have been theirs instead.

All's well that end's well.

So who cares what the public thinks?

John Birch

Rachael: The Bush administration repeatedly connected Iraq to 9/11 no matter what Melanie Phillips says. They did so to generate public support for attacking Iraq.

Dixon: I supported the invasion of Afghanistan but opposed Iraq because it was not connected to 9-11. One of reasons why Afghanistan is such a mess today (and this is yet another point Melanie Phillips never addresses) is because resources were quickly shifted from there in preparation for invading Iraq.

alan stoddart

The relevance of 9/11 was that the secular Saddam was turning ever more to Islam to garner support and was making ever more strident attacks on Israel. Who would not think, as Blair indicates with Iran, that Saddam would not use Islamic terrorist groups to further his foreign policy at arms length?
Iran is a warning of how Iraq would have developed given the freedom that inevitably would have come once Menzies Campbell got his way and sanctions were officially ended.
A new war between these two countries would be a likely outcome.

Boudicca

"And if Iran is a "grave danger" it is even more so thanks to the removal of its arch enemy in Baghdad. Military action against Iran is less likely because of the Iraq debacle. And the Shias will dominate Iraq. Iran is ultimately the big winner of the invasion of Iraq ...."
------------

Precisely. Iraq and Iran were joint and balancing powers in the region. They had fought a vicious war for many years and neither side came out victorious because they WERE balanced. Iran is an Islamic Theocracy - where Islamic extremists have been allowed to florish and which directly threatens Israel. Iraq was secular; the religious nutters were contained and controlled - ruthlessly, but at least they were controlled.

Bush and Blair took away one side of the regional balance of power - arguably the wrong one - and completely c0cked up the aftermath. Did they seriously expect Iran to just sit by, watch and not try to exploit the situation.

In the European Cold War, if NATO had (for whatever reason) not been there as a balance to the USSR, does anyone seriously think the Russians/Warsaw Pact would not have exploited the opportunity!

We are now left with a dangerous and regionally unopposed Iran - with many extremists in southern Iraq supporting them - and with Blair hinting that if he were PM, Iran would be next on his target.

Morons!

Neil Saunders

This is one issue where Melanie and I part company.

Blair is a thoroughgoing scoundrel, who has been prepared to stir up the hornets' nest of the Middle East (at the cost of enormous loss of life) for personal aggrandisement and financial gain.

How Raymond Douglas can say that Blair took the threat of Islam seriously, when his government presided over unprecedented levels of mass immigration (much of it from the Muslim world), refused to outlaw extremist organisations and employed known terrorist apologists and sympathisers as advisers, is utterly beyond me.

alan stoddart

If Iran/Iraq were so balanced how is it that they went to war?
and how much more likely if Saddam thought he had an edge with nuclear weapons? or turn his attention to Israel.

alan stoddart

BBC finally come clean about Iraq war: 'In fact, George Bush's predecessor, Bill Clinton, in 1998, finally took the view that regime change in Iraq was necessary because he could not trust Saddam to disarm.' So says BBC correspondent Iain Watson

Robin Shepherd

Absolutely right Melanie on all counts. Blair sailed through today's questions. I was watching it the whole day on SKY and on BBC World. Typically, BBC reporters made no attempt to hide their contempt, constantly refering to Blair's "refusal" to offer any expressions of remorse or regret. It was a remarkably convincing performance which left his critics floundering...

De Rigueur

Regime change?

Why not, in he case of Iraq.

Regime change?

In the case of Iran - yes - if we can manage it.

Allah being on our side.

Baron Pippin II

WMDs, Sadam’s barbarism, non-compliance with UN resolution and stuff all sound plausible and defensible reasons for the war. Who can tell, even Blair seems to have been unsure which one to plump for as the prime one.

Legality doesn’t enter into it, the law’s drafted so vaguely it allows for any interpretation from the illegal to legal with as many shades in between as there are lawyers. Neither does morality, as Bush & Blair could justifiably point to Orwell’s ‘in real life we don’t chose between good an evil, but between two evils’. Only history will show whether the joint judgment of the two chums to topple Sadam was the lesser evil.

The un-said motive for the Iraq venture may lie deeper in the geo-political scheming of those in charge. Amongst the world regions, the whole of the Middle East, except for Israel, strikes as the most un-democratic, politically backward, and diplomatically hard to de-cipher. The mullah bailiwicks have little to offer to the younger, better educated classes, too. The region also happens to sit on quite a chunk of oil reserves. It implies not the Americans 'had interest in securing it’ as Odd @ 5.47 seems to think. If that were their aim, Sadam would have been more than willing to deliver it on a silver plate. Just making sure the oil fields don’t get blown up by a fanatical religious nutcase like Ahmadinejad would do nicely for the West. More importantly, giving the unwashed of the region more say cannot be bad either.

If changing the profile of the region is what we are after, Iraq may be but a start. Blair’s skilful weaving of Iran into the proceedings may not have been totally unintentional.

Oflife

The problem is, Blair's actions since the war (and that of his other half) have disgusted the British - this one included. Further, and this was public knowledge, he or his party where paid a considerable some of money by BP prior to the war. And today, a man who is supposed to represent the working class is making a huge sum of money by speaking to people whose values are the direct opposite of those his party represent. In effect, he has betrayed those who supported him. And that is one of the reasons no one really cares for the rights or wrongs of the war from a historical perspective.

Further, this has all harmed Israel. The war really was ALL about oil and nothing to do with protecting Israel. However, the concept that it was all about protecting Israel has been allowed to make it's way into the media, leading to many of the comments being made by the left and 'chattering classes'. IE, the government and oil companies are allowing the Israel factor to detract from the real reasons for the war.

If the war really was about regime change, why are we neglecting Haiti and Zimbabwe?

My own view is that if there is a legitimate effort to introduce democracy into the ME and Africa, fantastic, but then if that is the case, allowing current and former leaders to be paid for their involvement / support stinks. And again, Israel loses out to this slimy behaviour that has appalled so many of us.

edie

Mel you haven't mentioned anything about the West negotiating with the taliban and karzai paying insurgents to put down their weapons.

What do you think will come out from all these negotiations with terrorists and letting them back into power?

They have seem to have won this war.

Percival Picasity

The reason for invading Iraq was to keep Iran out and establish a base to keep a watch over Iran.

mitcheltj

I dipped in and out of Mr Blair's testimony today -saw about 2-3 hours - so was not able to follow any particular theme in detail, but three points struck me.

First, what a hopeless lot of wafflers the Chilcot committee members are! God, I nearly fell asleep so convoluted were some of the questions. Why on earth did they not employ a barrister to ask the questions, so they could at least listen to the answers. This is one thing that even the lamentable Hutton inquiry got right.

Second, although I suspect a large degree of ex-post facto justification, it was interesting that Blair did start to expound a coherent view linking 9/11 to his changed perception of risk in relation to Saddam, and from there the threat to the West from islamic terrorism and rogue regimes. I hasten to add that I do not agree with this view, but at least I understood where he was coming from. That said, I am very glad that Bush is not President and Blair is not Prime Minister as we now grapple with Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, never mind the Middle East. Self-confessed visionaries, as I have observed elsewhere, are too dangerous to be trusted in high office. the rest of us tend to have to pay the price of their convictions.

Third is a question that others have touched on namely the impact of Iraq War 2 on the balance of power in the region. Was Blair questioned on how much consideration he/Bush gave to the de-stabilising effect of deposing Saddam? I thought I heard him say that he thought Iran was welcome Saddam's removal - they surely did - but neither he nor Bush anticipated that they - Ian - would then exploit it as much as they could by stirring up trouble in Iraq - is that naive/stupid or is it not? He did say, I think, that if Saddam had not been removed and UN sanctions relaxed, there would be a nuclear arms race between Iran and Iraq - the 2010 question as called. Instead of course we have potentially several races - definitely Israel and Iran, possibly Egypt and Saudi Arabia with Iran. I cant truly judge that this is worse or better but how can he say that the world is safer for Saddam's removal, quite apart from the continuing Islamic terrorist threat to the West? Was he asked about any of this? If not he should have been.

John A. Davison

I have great admiration for Tony Blair. He stood with Bush when few others did. He sure was a cut above your present leadership and ours in the States as well. What a pair of losers Brown and Obama are.

jadavison.wordpress.com

ade

blasphemy! your not allowed to say such things now. the media elite as Sarah Palin would say has decided Blair is the devil and no dissent is allowed

Graeme Thompson

John Birch
January 29th, 2010 4:47pm
>>Ms. Phillips says “the issue was not that Iraq was thought to have been involved in 9/11 – no-one had ever suggested this.”

So the 70 percent of Americans who believed Iraq was involved in 9-11 got the idea from thin air?<<

This is the mentality so many in our country have descended to, or succumbed to. Mr JB can't give one quote from Bush, Blair or any of the great men who led us to war saying this. There were plenty in the media lying through their back teeth to the public they had said this though. Seems rather obvious where this misconception had come from. For those who care about truth that is. A dwindling minority.

Jez

@ alan stoddart 7.37pm,

Then let the major players in this issue put a few billion together and subvert a (quite easily obtained) unwanted regime with a home-grown change.

Smell the coffee. Two out of two places, so far are teetering on the edge.

From the bottom up- instead of uniting resistance from the very ones that could have at the start supported you.

Let's start thinking maybe?

Jack R

Yes, Blair put an intelligent case, understandably emphasising the impact of 9/11 on the West.
And bringing things up to date, we now have Iran to resist; and appeasement is not an option, as Blair implied.

But, sticking politically close to the U.S., Blair supported the invasion of Iraq on a somewhat dodgy legal basis, and the invasion was flawed because:

1. there were no WMDs;

2.)no coherent post invasion plan ;

3.)For Blair, Islam is not the threat, but only 'aberrations' of Islam are the threat; so he still underestimates the prospects of co-operation between Al Qaeda-Sunni-Shia.

david elder

Melanie, I in Australia would be interested in your thoughts on recent payments by Mr Rudd among others to the Taliban in return for peace. This is a hot topic here. Many see it as outrageous, treasonous, the ultimate in appeasement. But some say it was done during the Iraq surge to get the Sunni insurgents onside. Any thoughts?

To Odd: it certainly is, when you attribute the invasion of Iraq to its oil. It's now owned by Iraq not the US. And why on your conspiracy-laden hypothesis did the US go into Afghanistan, which doesn't have oil, and not into Saudi Arabia, which does?

John Birch: can you give any concrete evidence that the Bush administration incited the public to think Saddam was behind 9/11? NB don't bother quoting Rice's comments on this from Michael Moore's movie, because those comments were edited totally out of context, as is Moore's custom.

Noa Zrk

Dixon @ January 29th, 2010 4:59pm

"...in the long run, that invasion may have saved my neck and the society I live in...".

I rather suspect the invasion has actually distracted from saving both our necks and our society. The enemy was then and remains now within the warp and weft of our society, a part of it, a parasite within it, able to move freely, without hindrance, plotting our destruction.
What do poor old Iraq do to deserve such destruction? Crucially, it did not promulgate or enable the 9/11 atrocity, unlike Saudi Arabia.
Our politicians, afraid to address the real problems of a Western-Islamic fault line allied to globalism and an acute oil dependancy,cravenly opted for the easy but false targets of an "axis of terror". Far easier to demonise Saddam, the Taliban and Kim Il Jung than rectify the security flaws manifested by an open, free west.

Michael

@davidelder - its not about de facto control of Iraqi oil, rather the chance to exploit favourable partnerships built within the political system established in Iraq in order to get the best deal for our chums in companies like this:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8407274.stm

But you know that and you're just being pedantic and disingenuous, a bit like Melanie and some who post on here, championing Tony Blair despite despising his politics because his decision to support an invasion of Iraq satisfied a certain regional nuance perhaps?? Of course everyone has cared soooo much for the plight of poor old Iraq over the years, why the archives of this venerable blog must postively bulge with pleas to help the suffering Kurds, to relieve the plight of the Marsh Arabs?

Who knows, who knows....

Augustus

"Thou loseth labour:
As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air
With thy keen sword impress as make me bleed:
Let fall thy blade on vulnerable
crests;
I bear a charmed life, which must not yield,
To one of woman born."

Steve Rolles

the US administration may not have made a direct accusation re Iraqs involvement in 9/11 but they certainly made repeated rhetorical plays pre invasion that led to the widespread perception of such a link. That perception was key to public support for the election:

"Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror."

President Bush in his State of the Union address, January 2002. The speech was primarily concerned with how the US was coping in the aftermath of 11 September.

"We also must never forget the most vivid events of recent history. On 11 September, 2001, America felt its vulnerability - even to threats that gather on the other side of the earth. We resolved then, and we are resolved today, to confront every threat, from any source, that could bring sudden terror and suffering to America."

President Bush speaking in Cincinnati, Ohio, in October, 2002, in which he laid out the threat he believed Iraq posed.

"Before 11 September 2001, many in the world believed that Saddam Hussein could be contained. But chemical agents and lethal viruses and shadowy terrorist networks are not easily contained. Imagine those 19 hijackers with other weapons, and other plans - this time armed by Saddam Hussein. It would take just one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known."

President Bush in his State of the Union address, January 2003. He made these comments in the context of the links he perceived between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda.

"The terrorists have lost a sponsor in Iraq. And no terrorist networks will ever gain weapons of mass destruction from Saddam Hussein's regime."

President Bush in his speech to the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, September, 2003.

"For America, there will be no going back to the era before 11 September 2001, to false comfort in a dangerous world. We have learned that terrorist attacks are not caused by the use of strength.

They are invited by the perception of weakness. And the surest way to avoid attacks on our own people is to engage the enemy where he lives and plans.

We are fighting that enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan today so that we do not meet him again on our own streets, in our own cities."

President Bush in a televised address to defend his administration's policy on Iraq, September 2003.

"We've learned that Iraq has trained al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases. And we know that after 11 September, Saddam Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.

Some citizens wonder, after 11 years of living with this problem, why do we need to confront it now? And there's a reason. We've experienced the horror of 11 September."

US Secretary of State Colin Powell in a presentation to the UN Security Council, setting out the US case against the Iraqi regime, February 2003.

"We don't know."

Vice-President Dick Cheney when pressed on whether there was a link between Iraq and 11 September during a TV interview, September 2003.

"We will have struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who've had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11."

Mr Cheney in the same interview, commenting on the war against Iraq.

"We've never been able to develop any more of that yet, either in terms of confirming it or discrediting it."

Mr Cheney in the same interview, while recounting the controversial claim that one of the hijackers, Mohammed Atta, met an Iraqi official in Prague before the attacks.

"[Saddam Hussein posed a risk in] a region from which the 9/11 threat emerged."

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice defending the reasons why the US went to war against Iraq, September, 2003.

just Louise

Blair soared in my estimation for his cogent and plausible defence of his actions - and especially for his clear appreciation of the danger posed by Iran.
It will be interesting (and probably depressing) to see how the shifty and uncharismatic Gordon Brown will respond to the Enquiry.
Had he not ruined this country in other ways, I could almost say "Bring Back Tony!"

solemnman

Going to war was justified.Being bogged down was not."Shock and awe" plus the total route of the Iraqi army would have been enough to curb the ambitions of the delusional others.

Harold

One would like to see Blair (and Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld) on trial at the Hague.

I suspect he would be disinclined to give such glib answers there. One day, perhaps. We can but hope. Let's not forget that 100,00 Iraqi civilians died as a consequence of these mens' lies and mendacity.

Neil Craig

My memory is different from yours Melanie. I think the issues are well put by Robin Cook in his resignations speecch, even though or perhaps because he explains why the Kosovo war was, if not legal, at least not so damaging to British interests. He said "Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term" so that was clearly an issue at the time.
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo030317/debtext/30317-33.htm

anglicus

Dee Ranged
The only time it will really be appropriate to go to war is when the shores of the British Isles are being threatened, and that hasn't happened since the Battle of Britain. Why can't we just concentrate on making our own country a better and safer place to live. The only people that profit from war are the arms companies, and they don't care which side they are supplying.
david elder
It's (the oil) now owned by Iraq. How is then that Royal Dutch Shell have just signed a massive contract in Iraq, is that an Iraqi company?
Oh and there is a major gas pipeline to be built in Afghanistan, could this be the reason.

Richard

Blair is a fool.

He now insists that Iran may need to be tackled by intervention. I agree with him. But whose fault is it that politically selling an intervention in Iran is now practically impossible, hey Tony?

By dishonestly selling the Iraq War Tony Blair has made selling future interventions much more difficult which means that our true enemies in Iran (rather than the phantom menace that was Saddam) can now plot against us with impunity.

This is Blair's greatest crime, but he is so deluded he cannot see it!

Sam Murray

I thought the episode was occasionally compelling but basically a sham; a six hour network-broadcast opportunity that was ostensibly set up to examine the legality, the planning problems and the social breakdown during and after the Iraq invasion - clearly two things happened instead.

Firstly, Blair appeared nervous and emotionally unstable, but was also determined to present his arguments in the light of "good leadership" and, ahem, "happy endings" for the people of Iraq. Blair offered anecdotes, false moral and historical equivalences and avoided answering specific questions. Most importantly,he didn't express sincere empathy or apology to the families affected by his decision-making.

Secondly, Tony Blair was interrupted by a refugee aid worker, some audience members were in tears and others shouted "Liar", "Murderer" at the former PM as he left.

Tony Blair also sought to present plenty of nasty information about the Iraqi regime, some of it new to audience viewers. I would suggest reading Samantha Powers award-winning 2002 book 'A Problem From Hell' if this sort of stuff interests you, its a lot more objective and doesn't have Tony Blairs do-gooder Christian crusader spin wrapped around the whole ordeal, along with his slick legalizing and bullshit political doubletalk.

Isaac Bickerstaff

Graeme Thompson
January 29th, 2010 10:04pm
"Mr JB can't give one quote from Bush, Blair or any of the great men who led us to war saying this. There were plenty in the media lying through their back teeth to the public they had said this though."

From 9/11 until the invasion of Iraq and beyond, the US administration, with Bush and Cheney very much to the fore, repeatedly, indeed insistently, associated Saddam with al qaeda.

I had thought your previous display of profound indignant ignorance had perhaps chastened you, and prompted you to some study of the facts. Evidently not.

Philo

We kill hundreds of thousands of innocents for no good reason, and then grub about in the documentary detritus of dishonest government for something, anything, however far-fetched, that will let us feel comfortable that our crime was justified. In the end, after all the minutiae and special pleading, it is simply shameful.

Edward McLaughlin

Neil Craig

There are thousands of dead Kurds and Iraqis who were destroyed en masse by weapons directed by Saddam.

What other commonly understood sense of the term do you think Robin Cook meant? And would the above slain people have been interested in such fine points?

Well done and thank you Mr Blair for standing up to idiots, then and now.

Groovy Times

Odd Bod, there's huge untapped reserves of oil in Alaska and the Antarctic too. Why not break international law and start digging. Seems a safer bet than toppling Middle Eastern despots, if getting your grubby hands on shed loads of black gold is all you're after. (Not you personally of course, you as in those nasty neocons).

McLeod

Well done, Mr Bickerstaff! A perfect example of how our great media twists and distorts.

The well-established FACT that Saddam had high level contacts with al qaeda does in no way lead to the conclusion that Saddam was in involved in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Watt Tyler

I just want to say that as I watched Blair yesterday, he didn't tell me anything that I really didn't already know.

I have to wonder what is wrong with people who say that the Iraq war was/is illegal. I really have to wonder. They are like those people who pay money to send texts to "Most Haunted Live" to tell of the impossible paranormal things they have seen during the coverage, and which naturally didn't happen.

I think the truth of it is that people feel tricked by Blairs Labour. They voted for him, he didn't deliver, they realise now that they should have voted for Hague, they feel ashamed, they take it out on Blair.

Political Dissuasion

Cracking post Melanie.

Thank goodness someone in the press has some sort of logic, reason and rationale.

"In other words Blair returned us to reality" - well done, brava...

Finally someone who has a brain and doesn't spout bile. Like Guiness, where have you been all my lives?

Graeme Thompson

@ Steve Rolles
January 30th, 2010 7:45am

Thanks awfully for proving exactly what others and myself have stated that you cannot find one statement from the Bush administration or Blair that says Iraq was behind 9/11.

Do you want to try dredging up the way these comments were reported Steve? I think you'll find that the wanton distortion by the MSM and the huge overbalance of lefties they 'interview' accounts for the misperception.

As any objective reader can plainly see, what you've quoted proves the *exact opposite of what you claim.

What is an undeniable fact though, and I'm sure we've all come across an uncomfortable number of people who swallow this literal insanity, is that Bush is blamed for 9/11, .. as well as 'the Joooos' of course.

Here's someone who really knows what goes down in the world (see #42):

http://www.democracyforums.com/showthread.php?t=10971&page=5

Augustus

As Tony Blair couldn't make it as President of Europe, perhaps he can atone for his sins by running for President of Iraq in March?

Michael

@Graeme Thompson - in what scenario, exactly, is a quote acceptable to you? Most quotes, interviews, life television addresses are relayed to us by the mainstream media, so do these people have to come and speak to you in your front room or something?

You asked the man, he delivered, you got anything to come back with apart from that, er, link you provided?

Cheers.

Augustus

This was supposed to be the big week for the Chilcot Inquiry, with not just Blair being heard, but also Lord Goldsmith. And one is left with the impression that the whole exercise is a ridiculous waste of time. One knows nothing at the end of the week that one didn't know at the beginning of it. But that was always going to be the case anyway. The Hutton Inquiry disappointed the anti-war crowd by failing to condemn Mr Blair and by castigating the BBC instead. The Butler Inquiry into the intelligence on WMDs also frustrated them by failing to bury Blair in toxic material,
so now they should be starting to sense that they will not have their pound of flesh for a third time. But if so, look out for further accusations of an establishment cover-up of the alleged 'big lie'. Of what? Of anything you want to allege including, yet again, WMDs and legality issues. The animostic roundabout will spin again, sooner or later. But can there never be an acknowledgement from them that there just might have been a possiblity that what Bush or Blair 'got wrong' they did at least act in good faith and without deception? History will tell who has proved more right than wrong.

In the Wilderness in America

Just a note about how the left in the United States were hypocritical about Tony Blair and the Iraq War.In March 2003, Congress awarded Tony Blair the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor in recognition of his “outstanding and enduring contributions to maintaining the security of all freedom-loving nations.” The finding by Congress stated that “Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom has clearly demonstrated, during a very trying and historic time for our 2 countries, that he is a staunch and steadfast ally of the United States of America.” This award is not a gift from the President of the United States like the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which Bush awarded to Blair in 2009. It is an honor bestowed by the representatives of the American people. It requires the sponsorship of two thirds of the members of the House of Representatives and 67 senators. Only 18 other foreigners have received it, including Winston Churchill, Mother Theresa, and Nelson Mandela. Ironically, the following liberal senators, who ultimately condemned the Iraq War, were co-sponsors of Senate bill, S 09, which approved the award:

Robert Byrd
Hilary Clinton
John Corzine
Tom Daschle
Christopher Dodd
John Edwards
Russ Feingold
Diane Feinstein
Chuck Hagel
Tom Harkin
Edward Kennedy
Patrick Leahy
Barbara Mikulski
John D. Rockefeller IV
Chuck Schumer
Debbie Stabenow

Not one of the above ever said that they wanted the medal back.

Ian Infidel

While I am no fan of Tony Blair I think the free world should be eternally grateful for his decision to assist America in removing Saddam.You do not need an excuse to remove a Murdering Dictator you just do it...
"The common element of radical Third Worldism is an obsession with American power, as though the US were so intrinsically evil that any enemy of the US must be our friend, from Mao to Kim Jong-il, from Fidel Castro to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And if our “friends” shower us with flattery, asking us to attend conferences and sit on advisory boards, so much the better.. Why do leftists continue to discredit their critical stance by applauding strongmen who oppress and murder their own critics?"
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article717720.ece

Isaac Bickerstaff

McLeod
January 30th, 2010 2:06pm
Graeme Thompson
January 30th, 2010 2:19pm

I have been slow to understand what it is you are saying.

The point you were making is not too subtle. It is just that I am not subtle enough.

When Bush and Cheney and anyone who was anyone repeated again and again the mantra "al qaeda: Saddam", they meant the people of the US to understand not that they intended to imply that al qaeda and Saddam were linked and that Saddam was in part responsible for 9/11. They intended simply to say that there were (alleged) high level contacts between the two on one or two occasions...possibly (just to put that information out there in case any electors find it interesting or whatever).

For the record, bin Laden considered Saddam an evil "socialist" who shouldn't control OPEC's second largest reserves. (Just as, for the historical record, he considered the Soviets unfit to control the oil reserves of the Caspian. And, for future reference, he considers Iranians Shia "dogs" who shouldn't control OPEC's third largest reserves; and considers the House of Saud unfit to govern Saudi Arabia and its oil reserves and holy sites. The agenda is no secret.

Also for the record, the US did not think high level meetings between al qaeda and the Saudis a casus belli. The Saudis met representatives of al qaeda to pay them off - in other words, to persuade them to attack anyone but the Saudis.

And also for the record, insiders in the US administration were equally careful in private to say only "al qaeda:Saddam" and not to imply any link between Saddam and 9/11. For example, Richard Perle on September 10th on his way out of the West Wing to George Tenet "Iraq has to pay a price for what happened yesterday. They bear responsibility." (Or maybe - I don't know - Mr. Perle was just reflecting administration policy to use 9/11 as a pretext. As Treasury Secretary O'Neill reported, the administration was planning "regime change" in Iraq from "day one" ie well before 9/11. - Nevertheless, the most important thing to repeat again and again is "al-qaeda: Saddam".)

As you say, those scurrilous journalists! And how gullible those citizens to take away from the administration's infomercials that Saddam had anything to do with 9/11!

Isaac Bickerstaff

Dixon
January 29th, 2010 4:59pm

I can well believe that you take comfort from the thought that millions died to keep you safe, even although the threat you thought you faced was a fiction - in the real world you so proudly wield as an argument-stopper.

David Raynes

Odd that Melanie states so firmly that no one had ever suggested Iraq was involved in 9/11. She normally does her homework. On many subjects I agree with her, not on this.

I know personally a lot of US citizens who believe it, a very quick search shows a report by CNN that says this (there will no doubt be others):

INSERT>
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Vice President Dick Cheney said Thursday the evidence is "overwhelming" that al Qaeda had a relationship with Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, and he said media reports suggesting that the 9/11 commission has reached a contradictory conclusion were "irresponsible."
END INSERT>

The fact is the US was shell shocked after 9/11. Unlike the British they are not used to terrorism, as a nation they panic & over react more and are prone to extremes of emotion.

The link with 9/11 was promoted in the States just as "45 minutes" was promoted here, to manipulate public opinion. Manipulating US opinion is much more easy in my observation than doing the same to UK opinion but the promotion of the 9/11 to Iraq link fed across the Atlantic just as the phoney dossier went the other way. Blair is too smart not to know what he was about.

Those who have not done so should watch Blair closely:

http://www.iraqinquiry.org.uk/transcripts/oralevidence-bydate/100129.aspx

The opening is of a truly terrified Tony Blair-not the one strutting his stuff and backslapping with Dubya-watch the opening sequence. The taught pallid skin the tired face, the choking in the voice, the strangled vowels.

I have interviewed a lot of crooks in my time. This is one seriously terrified man.

The comparisons with him in front of select commitees are striking.

If he had nothing to hide, he surely had nothing to fear?

This was Blair fearful. I draw my conclusions, as will history.

********************************
"How is the world ruled and led to war? Diplomats lie to journalists and
believe these lies when they see them in print."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article387374.ece

Steve Rolles

David: agreeing with me and disagreeing with Melanie about a war - whatever next?

Finzi Holst

@John Birch
'So the 70 percent of Americans who believed Iraq was involved in 9-11 got the idea from thin air?'

No, Mr Birch, they, being the lazy sheeple they are, those 70%, were fed that misinfornmation by the mainstream media, which equates to 'thin air'.

Mr Bush expressly came out and said that there was no connection between the two.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/3118262.stm

Educated Americans knew that there was no connection between 9/11 and Iraq.

You are obviously not one of them.

Thank you for your work, Melanie.

Findlay Niederle

Having been there I can tell you that not only did Saddam fail to disarm but he prepared to invade Kuwait again, placing large troop and armour concentrations on the border. We were prepared to leave through the desert in a hurry, with corned beef, beans and water, a frightening combination! Our allies started to rebuild our forces and he pulled back. By this time the Marsh Arabs had been mostly expunged, partly by draining the marshes. Unchecked, Saddam would have taken Saudi too! The big error was not taking out Saddam in Gulf I but Americans grievously fail to understand Arabs. Unlike those at home, those in theatre during and after Gulf I understand the necessity of a change of government. American ineptitude in handling the aftermath does not detract from this basic fact.

Neil Craig

Edward we have killed our thousands too & dissecting them for their orgasns may not be a weapon of mass destruction but it is rvrn nastier for our victims.

The point is that Saddam didn't have WMDs at the time we attacked allegedly to remove them. I assume Cook used the phrase because he would not have been surprised if a shell or 2 of nerve gas had turned up - though, as we now know, this was giving to much credit to the WMD story. The term WMD is often used as synonimous with any chemical or biological weapon but, literally, many of them do not have that mass effect whereas our own cluster & daisy cutter bombs, not commonly called WMDs, do.

Graeme Thompson

@Michael
January 30th, 2010 3:23pm

Ahem, Michael, you seem to find it hard to understand the concept of 'difference of opinion'. Just as you've read into Bush's and Blair's statements what you want to read, you've done the same with mine.

For the 'Bliarites' any disagreement with the way they see things is either a lie or illegal, the mentality of totalitarians the world over.

Heartening to know though, that as much as you insist Bush & Blair said Iraq was behind 9/11 and has hard as you try to prove it, the truth is not something that you want it to be and it really bugs you. I dont like having to say this, but try growing up instead.

Graeme Thompson

@Isaac Bickerstaff
January 30th, 2010 12:58pm

A nice bit of selective copy & paste Mr Bickerstaff. Not to say moving of goalposts.

As much as it pains you, the claim by 'Bliarites' such as yourself that Bush & Blair said Iraq was behind 9/11 is completely false.

I guess we have to be thankful for small mercies that (to my knowledge) noone has said yet that Bush was behind 9/11.

Graeme Thompson

David Raynes
January 31st, 2010 4:22pm
>>Odd that Melanie states so firmly that no one had ever suggested Iraq was involved in 9/11. She normally does her homework. On many subjects I agree with her, not on this.

I know personally a lot of US citizens who believe it, a very quick search shows a report by CNN that says this (there will no doubt be others):

INSERT>
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Vice President Dick Cheney said Thursday the evidence is "overwhelming" that al Qaeda had a relationship with Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, and he said media reports suggesting that the 9/11 commission has reached a contradictory conclusion were "irresponsible."
END INSERT> <<

Ermm, let me try and help you out here Mr Raynes. That CNN report. If you read it carefully, word by word, you'll see it does not say a thing about Cheney saying Saddam was behind 9/11. It reports Cheney as saying media reports that the 9/11 Commission hadn't reached a conclusion that there was a relationship between Hussein and Al Qa'eda were "irresponsible". That the evidence for this relationship is "overwhelming".

If you have further trouble understanding the meaning of the words you've just quoted, I suggest you go to a child who has just learnt to read and I'm sure they can explain them to you. Unless you threaten to hit them of course for getting the 'wrong' answer.

I'm sure I should feel deeply ashamed of myself for this, but I am really enjoying watching the 'Bliarites' blowing a gasket that the facts stack up to prove them liars and not Blair.

arnoldo

Neil Craig - this is what Robin Cook actually said:-

"Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term—namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target. It probably still has biological toxins and battlefield chemical munitions, but it has had them since the 1980s when US companies sold Saddam anthrax agents and the then British Government approved chemical and munitions factories"

So Cook clearly believed that WMD materials existed, unless you think he was lying, of course. Cook resigned predominantly because our EU partners would not join the coalition, unlike the "illegal" war in Kosovo.

This is what Blair said about chemical and biological weapons at the time:-

“Let me explain the dangers. Three kilograms of VX from a rocket launcher would contaminate 0.25 sq km of a city. Millions of lethal doses are contained in one litre of anthrax, and 10,000 litres are unaccounted for. What happened on 11 September has changed the psychology of America—that is clear—but it should have changed the psychology of the world.”

Since Blair never claimed that Saddam could in 2003 deliver a strategic long-range missile, Cook and Blair's line on Saddam's WMD was therefore pretty similar.

As with most issues involving Iraq, if you look at what was actually said rather than the anti-war lobby's spin machine, you will find that Blair has been consistent from the start.

Isaac Bickerstaff

Graeme Thompson
February 1st, 2010 3:46pm

I would not have believed, unless you had shown me, how easy it is to create a memory hole for what it is inconvenient to recall.

Was the incessant repetition of "al-qaeda: Saddam" "9/11:Saddam" intended to convey absolutely no connection between the two? Bush, Cheney et al. were simply yoking together two random and unconnected assertions? They absolutely did not intend the great American public to acquire the belief that Saddam somehow had something to do with it all and so deserved what he got?

...a bit like sneering at anyone who believes that Bush et al.'s intentions were the painfully obvious ones, and adding the totally unconnected smear, "What is an undeniable fact though, and I'm sure we've all come across an uncomfortable number of people who swallow this literal insanity, is that Bush is blamed for 9/11, .. as well as 'the Joooos' of course." Of course, there is no suggestion that those who question the rewriting of history are also insane and anti-Semitic. The yoking together of these statements was purely random.

I notice you have not felt it necessary to explain what Bush, Cheny et al. did mean by their mantra.

David Raynes

Graeme Thompson. You are probably are not aware that I supported the war. I am not concerned with the small print of legality or 1441, I am though very concerned about the way public and parliamentary support was obtained on a false pretext and by the deception that Blair and his few allies perpetrated on the UK public and a supine parliament. War in Iraq was against my better judgement, I thought it would make the region more unstable and give much power to the greater danger, Iran. My support like that of many people was based on the plainly false belief that Blair would not mislead on so serious a topic. I am not one of those who ruled it out forever. Now on the nexus with 9/11, it did not have to be spelled out explicitly, it only had to be regularly hinted at by important players. Steve Rolles shows how that was done. Similarly, in the UK, the 45 minutes and other nonesense which implied a possible strike on Israel, only had to be a hint. The fact is the evidence was over egged, Chilcot will certainly conclude at least that. In government the words that were used by Blair and others were carefully selected for their effect and to mislead. We have the evidence of that. Similarly it is no accident that in the US so many people believe there was an Iraqi influence on 9/11. The US opinion was manipulated.

arnoldo

David Raynes:-
"Similarly, in the UK, the 45 minutes and other nonesense which implied a possible strike on Israel, only had to be a hint."

David - please read the September 2002 dossier. It stated that Saddam still had some Al Hussein missiles, illegally retained from the first Gulf War.

These could and did reach Israel in that conflict in 1991.

Hardly earth shattering new information designed to "mislead the public"

Isaac Bickerstaff

For those who have fallen down a memory hole:

A Pentagon investigation in 2008: Wolfowitz in January 2002 to Feith "We don't seem to be making much progress pulling together intelligence on links between Iraq and Al Qaeda". So Feith set up his own intelligence outfit to produce the necessary intelligence (ie concoct it). The Pentagon inquiry concluded that Feith's office "developed, produced and disseminated alternative intelligence assessments on the Iraq Al-Qaeda relationship" whose "conclusions were inconsistent with the consensus in the intelligence community." - This is bureacratese for Feith's office created the intelligence Feith's bosses needed of a link between al qaeda and Saddam.

Or as General Wesley Clark reports of a conversation around 20th September 2001 with a fellow general at the Pentagon: "He says, "We're going to war with Iraq". I said "Why?" He says, "I guess they don't know what else to do." I said, "Did they find some information connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda?" He said "No, no...I guess it's like we don't know what to do about terrorists, but we've got a good military and we can take down governments. I guess if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail."

This shows that five star generals can know a great deal about the intelligence etc. and still be out of the loop. Cheney was going after Iraq to implement one of two competing plans (both in the public domain), one by the oil industry and State Dept., and the other by the neocons. All that was needed was a pretext.

As Bob Woodward reported, on 9/11, Rumsfeld was ready to raise "the possibility offered by the terrorist attacks to go after Saddam immediately." "Rumsfeld raised the question of Iraq. Why shouldn't we go against Iraq, not just al Qaeda?"

I remind you of what Richard Perle said to George Tenet on 10th Sep, "Iraq has to pay a price for what happened yesterday. They bear responsibility."

The two competing plans,by the way, had nothing to do with terrorism and everything to do with oil.

If this is not sufficient to jog your memory, you'll just have to wade through all the reports at the time in the dutiful media - Judith Miller of the NYT is a particularly dutiful source or mouthpiece. Or watch the documentary Buying the War broadcast in 2007.

By the way, the question about Blair is not so much whether he was lying. He has always had an enviable (dangerous) gift for believing with absolute faith whatever it suited him to believe. The question is, assuming he was not simply lying (with the cynicism required of British statesmen who know precisely what the UK's role is in these adventures), had he any business believing such stuff, and, if he believed it, had he any business being Prime Minister?

Graeme Thompson

@ Isaac Bickerstaff
February 1st, 2010 4:49pm

Isaac, Isaac, what are we to do with you? If you want to understand why Bush and Blair would mention Saddam and Al Qa'eda in the same breath .. errmmm, you just have to look at what they said, which has been kindly quoted here at length.

Now if you want words to mean what you want them to mean then you are of course perfectly at liberty to do so, but people with self-respect will opt for objectivity instead.

I hope this helps.

Isaac Bickerstaff

Graeme Thompson
February 1st, 2010 11:31pm

Your contributions have been interesting: faux naif in your willed credulity when the statements of politicians are in question; incurious to a fault when urged to look at the evidence already in the public domain (plentiful before the invasion and even more so now); and eager to assert your superiority - it shows what a trivial mind I have, but I was tickled that you resorted to the old favourite on this site of repeating my name to convey pity, contempt, or condescension. Oh, Graeme, Graeme!

However, I am glad that you have taken on board that, if we wish to understand what Bush, Cheney et al. and their national security teams, and their oil lobbies et al. and their predecessors and successors are all about, we should read what they have had to say.

I was going to give you some further pointers, but I feel it is now time for you to put some intellectual work in.

Neil Craig

Arnoldo if you are going to quote the Cook statement I linked to lets go further "but it has had them since the 1980s when US companies sold Saddam anthrax agents and the then British Government approved chemical and munitions factories. Why is it now so urgent that we should take military action to disarm a military capacity that has been there for 20 years, and which we helped to create?"

He has indeed explained, as i suggested, that it would be possible he had some chemical etc weaponry but not enough to be capable of "massive destruction". As I said previously this turned out to be giving Blair's line to much credit while demolishing it. The final question is a genuine one - if we helped give him this capacity how would that be a legal justification for invading to remove it, even had it still existed? Whatever that may be it is not consistency.

Olgordo

A "class act" indeed. How disappointing for all his vilifiers and demonizers !

What a contrast with Mr Brown and his 'danegeld' proposal to buy off the Taliban, following in the footsteps of the Anglo-Saxon King Aethelred "The Unready" who, in 991, on the advice of Archbishop Sigeric of Canterbury(a man who must have been in much the same mould as the present Archbishop) thought he could buy off the attacking Vikings with 10,000 Roman pounds(3,300 kg) of silver. They were bought off again in 994.

As Rudyard Kipling wrote in his poem on the subject:

" But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane."

arnoldo

Neil Craig, whether he agrees with it or not, is clearly having trouble getting to grips with Blair's argument.

Neil quotes Robin Cook:-
"Why is it now so urgent that we should take military action to disarm a military capacity that has been there for 20 years, and which we helped to create?"

Tha answer that Blair gave (you couldn't have been listening) is that 9/11 changed everything. His concern was the future possible nexus of suicide terrorists and Saddam's WMD material.

Was there enough chemical and biological material to cause mass death? I am no expert, but I quoted Blair's estimates to you. Presumably some government expert would have given him these figures, and they must be valid, otherwise he would have been accused of lying by now.

As for the source of the material - I deplore this as strongly as you - but you can't blame Blair for 1980's weapon sales.

Olgordo

Re the Anglo-Saxon danegeld, after the words: "They were bought off again in 994", I inadvertently omitted the words: "and subsequently". There were further payments in 1002,1007,1012, and 1016.

Neil Craig

Arnoldo I have no "trouble getting to grips with Blair's argument" as you so courteously put it - I simply don't believe it.

9/11 is irrelevent because Iraq was not involved & Saddam's regime had been less supportive of al Quaeda than the American & British ones. It would also not justify America bombing Britain or vice versa.

The contention that Blair's claims about possession of WMDs must rely on some unreavedled government advice that "would" have said he had them is ridiculous, not merely because no evidence whatsoever has been produced but because, having occupied the place, we know there were in fact no WMDs.

arnoldo

Neil,
How could anyone possibly take issue with what you are saying?

Lilliputia

From Australia my most vivid memory is the lynching by Andrew McKenzie on television of David Kelly. That repellant little man, possessing not a fraction of Kelly's education or intellect, has never been brought to book, as far as I know, and I do not know whether the fate of Kelly is within the terms of reference of the Chilcot inquiry.

Aidan Mann

Thanks for this article. I still think Tony did the right thing.