Blair facing some tough questions

Dec 3 2009 By The Stirrer

ONLY time will tell whether Tony Blair misled Parliament and lied to the British public over the Iraq war, but the smoke signals emerging from the Chilcott Inquiry aren’t encouraging.

The former PM stands accused of signing up “in blood” to an invasion months before it happened and downplaying intelligence showing Saddam’s Weapons of Mass Destruction had been dismantled.

No one now seriously believes the Iraqi dictator was in a position to launch missiles at this country with 45 minutes’ notice, although at the time this was a key argument in favour of action.

Blair, who will eventually get the chance to put his side of the argument, has already been forced to deny Attorney General Lord Goldsmith was bullied into silence after raising awkward questions about the legitimacy of the conflict.

Whatever he says, expect renewed calls for his prosecution as a war criminal – along with US President George W Bush.

On the face of it, there’s a persuasive argument for taking both men to the International Court in The Hague.

Although Iraq was in breach of various United Nations resolutions, war was never specifically authorised by the Security Council, leaving ample scope for a future criminal prosecution.

Many people will be aghast one of our own Prime Minister could be bracketed with the Nazis who stood trial in Nuremburg – or even latter day monsters like Radovan Karadic or Slobodan Milosevic who wreaked havoc in the Balkans.

Blair, whatever his faults, never rounded up his enemies with the simple aim of exterminating them – and neither did Bush. But given an estimated one million people died as a result of our intervention, most of them civilians, can either man be truly regarded as innocent?

Surely not, especially if they hatched a plot between them, then fabricated the reasons to justify their warmongering.

Most of us recognise civilians die in wars and if our national security is compromised, this is a price, however reluctantly, we are willing to pay. Remove the threat to our own safety and it’s a different matter altogether.

Most Britons do not, in my experience, believe in military adventures in pursuit of some vague foreign policy goal.

Therein lies the problem for Blair.