“The UK chose to join the invasion of Iraq before the peaceful options for disarmament had been exhausted. Military action at that time was not the last resort” Sir John Chilcot Report on Iraq war, June 2016 “George W. Bush jnr “has no foresight” and “cannot think properly” Nelson Mandela, in 2003 when America invaded Iraq.
The British public inquiry into the nation’s role in the notorious Iraq War of 2003 is out. The Inquiry conducted under the chairmanship of a retired civil servant, Sir John Chilcot has commendably come out with a damning verdict which as observed by Daily Trust of Sunday July 10 Sunday 2016 “vindicates the world” that the brutal bombing of a modernizing state of Iraq into Stone Age by the coalition of over 40 nations led by the USA, on account of non-existent Weapons of Mass Destruction, WMD was uncalled for afterall. The Inquiry significantly noted that the “Military action at that time was not the last resort”.
Reading through some 700-words of Tony Blair, it is clear that the man at the centre of it all as the prime (sorry; Crime) minister is yet to learn lessons of failure of leadership and that international prosecution of duo Bush-Blair for war crimes is imperative to prevent similar global impunity.
On the one hand he accepts responsibility for criminally going to war with Bush based on the “Intelligence statements” that turned out. “…to be wrong”. Yet he was in denial that the “intelligence was not falsified, and the decision was made in good faith”. Pray on what intelligence reports did he persuade the parliament to go to war if not the one sexed up by his war cabinet?
Is Tony Blair saying if he had another chance he would again with same impunity go to war without just cause beyound regime change and whose end the world has not recovered from? Most unacceptable was his dubious claim that those who have been killed in the senseless war of attrition caused by his reckless leadership decision did so not in vain but as heroes of a so-called “global struggle of the 21st Century against the terrorism and violence”. Happily Blair’s conscience tells him that “…some of the families” of the bereaved “cannot and do not accept this is so”.
Certainly millions of observers would definitely disagree with Tony Blair that 200 British dead, including 179 soldiers, some 5000 Americans and almost a million Iraqis killed in an avoidable war are heroes. On the contrary, many would agree that the dead and the dying in the unending wars were victims of his irresponsible leadership. The late Robin Cook was the Foreign Secretary in Tony Blair’s cabinet. He commendably resigned in 2003 because of the unilateral commitment of both Blair and Bush to based on any other reason other than Sadam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.
In his celeberated book entittled; The Point of Departure, he documents that the dead, soldiers and civilians like of the Iraqi war were largely innocent victims of an ill- thought senseless war. One instance of the genocidal war of attrition of Bush-Blair in the book is worth being quoted here; at the height of the war in 2003, he wrote that “…the US Airforce mistook an open wedding party for a clandestine gathering of foreign fighters. Over forty civilian were annihilated in the subsequent bombing raid.
Despite the irrefutable evidence of a dozen small children and a popular wedding singer among the dead, the Coalition Forces refused even to admit there had been a mistake”. Some commentators have described Tony Blair’s defiant reaction and non- acceptance of the war as mistake to “self-delusion, denial and vanity”.
Whatever is it an international prosecution of both Tony Blair and George W Bush for war crimes will bring out the truth. But so far Tony Balir has not shown sufficient sobriety and sense of regret over his 2003 decision. Indeed Tony has shown that ideologically as he had indicated in note written in late July 2002 he remains with Bush “…whatever”.
Again Tony’s reaction confirms the validity of Robin Cook that Tony Balir as a prime minister “…approached relations with the incoming Bush US Administration as a question of power politics. He never comprehended the perplexity he would cause his supporters at home by becoming the truly partner of the most reactionary U.S. Administration in modern times”. The Chilcot report has also raised the nolstagia of the similar Bi-partisan America Study Group on Iraq published in December 2006.
The report acknowledged dire situation in Iraq in contrast to Tony Blair’s romantic view of post-Sadam Iraq. The executive summary of the report of the ten members group co-chaired by James Baker111, former secretary of state and Lee H. Hamilton opened with the acknowledgement of global open sour: that the “situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating”. The group’s singular admittance of the grim reality of the atrocities and mass human misery caused by senseless and criminal invasion of Iraq contrasts sharply with false grandstanding and whitewashing of a failed adventure by Bush-Blair war-cabinets.
Many certainly loathed the despicable regime of Sadam Hussein and his litany of governance crimes but there is global consensus today that the American-British occupation had brought total ruination to Iraq and threatened world security than Sadam Hussein. In fact, former secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Kofi Annan accepted as much that Iraq fared better relatively under Sadam Hussein.