Iraq War Public Inquiry: ‘British Government & Sir John Chilcot’…

GUARDIAN ARTICLE

RESPONDING to Richard Norton-Taylor, after an article written by Mr. Norton-Taylor entitled “Another Whitehall Whitewash” appeared on the website of the Guardian newspaper, dated 15 June 2009.

Richard Norton-Taylor writes:

… The reason why the government wants it to be held behind closed doors – a weapon allowing Whitehall to control proceedings – is to enable it to protect itself, and individuals, from embarrassment. To drive home the point, the members of the inquiry, led by Sir John Chilcot, the epitome of a Whitehall mandarin, will be made privy counsellors, told to swear an ancient oath of secrecy.

… We already know a great deal about how the Iraqi banned weapons dossier was manipulated by Whitehall officials and intelligence chiefs, at the behest of their political masters – most notably, Tony Blair. We know from a leaked Downing Street memo, marked ” secret and strictly personal – UK eyes only”, that, at a meeting Blair chaired on 23 July 2002, nearly a year before the invasion, Sir Richard Dearlove, then head of MI6, warned that in Washington “the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy”; and Jack Straw, then foreign secretary, said “it seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action … But the case was thin.”

 

RESPONSE

From the desk of MD

IT DOES concern me somewhat when, again, another private examination is to be held into the Iraq War. The very definition and mention of ‘private’ does not meet anywhere near what the general public had demanded from Day 1, since the fatal error was made of joining the United States to invade Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein. Intelligence, as we now know, was bereft of credibility; the government machinery used in reaching the political decisions that were made, crucial to underpin in any further public inquiry, will again remain absent from public scrutiny. The Government promised a more open and transparent approach once troops had left Iraq, and now – after waiting several months – the British Government seems to be denying an inquiry to those many families whose lives have been shattered and torn apart after having been lost on active service in Iraq.

The premise of its invasion was based on Saddam Hussein having acquired weapons of mass destruction (WMD) capability that was a threat not only to the Middle East, but to the wider stability of the world. British troops invaded Iraq on the clear assumption that Iraq’s WMD programme was capable to deploy within 45-minutes. The Attorney General at the time, Lord Goldsmith, reckoned such intelligence was enough for the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, being justified in the decisions he took. These are matters, now, for open public argument, not a right of Government to continue to hide behind its veil of secrecy.

What seems likely, though, is that an inquiry will run along similar lines to that of the Franks inquiry. Margaret Thatcher had asked the academic and diplomat Lord Franks to examine claims that her Government had been caught unawares by the 1982 invasion and that the ensuing war had been avoidable. The Falklands War, albeit on a smaller scale, both tactically and operationally, in comparison with Iraq, shares (politically) similar backdrops.

Political commentator Hugo Young, for instance, wrote at the time: “It itemises one unfortunate misjudgement after another, producing a catalogue of errors and missed opportunities which provide the raw material for a formidable indictment.” Indictment, is of course, a key concern and fact which is why no-doubt the British Government has opted, again, for a behind closed-doors inquiry into the Iraq war.

© Mark Dowe 2009: all rights protected

mark.dowe@googlemail.com

The best in journalism and a voice for equitable public debate.