|
Commander John
Storm just wants to be left alone to complete his DNA collection, and
explore the uncharted regions on planet
earth. But he always seems to be
in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The
West invaded Iraq based on flawed and fabricated evidence of Weapons of
Mass Destruction (WMD). Saddam Hussein was seen as a force seeking to
unite the Arab nations, making Arabia stronger financially and in oil
export terms, contrary to the interests of the Coalition Forces:
Australia, Italy, Poland, Spain, USA, UK (Operation Babylon). Who,
presumably, all wanted cheap energy to underpin their super-heated
economies.
SADDAM
HUSSEIN
Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 to 2003. He also served as prime minister of Iraq from 1979 to 1991 and later from 1994 to 2003. He was a leading member of the revolutionary Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party and later its Iraqi regional branch. Ideologically, he espoused Ba'athism, a mix of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism, while the policies and political ideas he championed are collectively known as Saddamism.
Saddam was born in the village of Al-Awja, near Tikrit in northern Iraq, to a Sunni Arab family. He joined the Ba'ath Party in 1957, and later in 1966 the Iraqi and Baghdad-based Ba'ath parties. He played a key role in the 17 July Revolution and was appointed vice president of Iraq by Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr. During his time as vice president, Saddam nationalized the Iraq
Petroleum Company, diversifying the Iraqi economy. He presided over the Second Iraqi–Kurdish War (1974–1975). Following al-Bakr's resignation in 1979, Saddam formally took power, although he had already been the de facto head of Iraq for several years. Positions of power in the country were mostly filled with Sunni Arabs, a minority that made up about a fifth of the population.
In 2003, the United States and its coalition of allies invaded
Iraq, falsely accusing Saddam of developing weapons of mass destruction and of having ties with al-Qaeda. The Ba'ath Party was banned and Saddam went into hiding. After his capture on 13 December 2003, his trial took place under the Iraqi Interim Government. On 5 November 2006, Saddam was convicted by the Iraqi High Tribunal of crimes against humanity related to the 1982 Dujail massacre and sentenced to death by hanging. He was executed on 30 December 2006.
The Multi-National Force – Iraq (MNF–I), often referred to as the Coalition forces, was a military command during the 2003 invasion of Iraq and much of the ensuing Iraq War, led by the
United States of America (Operation Iraqi Freedom),
United Kingdom (Operation Telic),
Australia,
Italy (Operation Ancient Babylon), Spain and
Poland, responsible for conducting and handling military operations.
The MNF-I replaced the previous force, Combined Joint Task Force 7, on 15 May 2004, and was later itself reorganized into its successor, United States Forces – Iraq, on 1 January 2010.
LIAR,
LIAR - The Senate Report on Iraqi WMD Intelligence highlighted significant failures in the intelligence-gathering and analysis process. Here are some key points:
Background:
- After the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq agreed to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction
(WMD) programs.
-
UN inspection teams were supposed to verify compliance, but there were complaints of non-cooperation from Iraq.
-
In 1998, President Bill Clinton threatened airstrikes due to Iraq’s noncompliance.
2002 Assessments.
-
On October 1, 2002, the CIA delivered a classified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq’s WMD threat.
-
Three days later, CIA Director George Tenet published an unclassified white paper on Iraq’s WMD capabilities.
False Claims:
Despite intelligence suggesting otherwise, the Bush administration claimed Iraq had WMDs and fabricated a connection between Iraq and
al-Qaeda. No nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons were found after the invasion.
Impact:
The flawed intelligence misled policymakers and the public, leading to the invasion.
The second phase of the investigation, addressing how senior policymakers used the intelligence, was published in 2007.
In summary, the Iraq invasion was influenced by inaccurate intelligence, and the subsequent lack of WMD discovery raised serious questions about the decision-making process.
GEORGE
WALKER BUSH
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the 46th governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.
The eldest son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush and a member of the Bush family, he flew warplanes in the Texas Air National Guard in his twenties. After graduating from Harvard Business School in 1975, he worked in the oil industry. He later co-owned the Texas Rangers of Major League
Baseball before being elected governor of Texas in 1994.
WAR ON TERROR - SEPTEMBER 11 2001 ATTACKS
The September 11 terrorist attacks were a major turning point in Bush's presidency. That evening, he addressed the nation from the Oval Office, promising a strong response to the attacks. He also emphasized the need for the nation to come together and comfort the families of the victims. Three days after the attacks, Bush visited Ground Zero and met with Mayor Rudy Giuliani, firefighters, police officers, and volunteers. Bush addressed the gathering via a megaphone while standing on rubble: "I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon."
In a September 20 speech, Bush condemned Osama bin Laden and his organization al-Qaeda, and issued an ultimatum to the Taliban regime in
Afghanistan, where bin Laden was operating, to "hand over the terrorists, or ... share in their fate". The Taliban's leader, Mullah Omar, refused to hand over bin Laden.
The continued presence of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia after the 1991 Gulf War was one of the stated motivations behind the September 11 attacks. In 2003, the U.S. withdrew most of its troops from Saudi Arabia.
In Bush's September 20 speech, he declared that "our war on terror begins with Al Qaeda, but it does not end there." In his January 29, 2002 State of the Union Address, he asserted that an "axis of evil" consisting of
North
Korea, Iran, and Ba'athist Iraq was "arming to threaten the peace of the world" and "pose a grave and growing danger". The Bush Administration asserted both a right and the intention to wage preemptive war, or preventive war. This became the basis for the Bush Doctrine which weakened the unprecedented levels of international and domestic support for the United States which had followed the September 11 attacks.
Dissent and criticism of Bush's leadership in the War on Terror increased as the war in Iraq continued. The Iraq war sparked many protests and riots in different parts of the world. In 2006, a National Intelligence Estimate concluded that the Iraq War had become the "cause célèbre for jihadists".
Beginning with his January 29, 2002 State of the Union address, Bush began publicly focusing attention on Iraq, which he labeled as part of an
"axis of
evil" allied with terrorists and posing "a grave and growing danger" to U.S. interests through possession of weapons of mass destruction.
Okay
so you invaded Iraq and executed me. But how is it you have not invaded
Russia, China or North Korea, since both Kim
Jong Un, Jinping and Putin have terrible human rights records. It is
because my country was a walkover, easy prey. I don't understand why
there is one rule for the powerful and another for the weak. Iraq was an
easy target, and you did not like me trying to unite the Arab world,
which would then be much stronger and harder for the West to manipulate.
WHAT WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION?
In the latter half of 2002, CIA reports contained assertions of Saddam Hussein's intent of reconstituting nuclear weapons programs, not properly accounting for Iraqi biological and chemical weapons, and that some Iraqi missiles had a range greater than allowed by the UN sanctions. Contentions that the Bush Administration manipulated or exaggerated the threat and evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities would eventually become a major point of criticism for the president.
In late 2002 and early 2003, Bush urged the United Nations to enforce Iraqi disarmament mandates, precipitating a diplomatic crisis. In November 2002, Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei led UN weapons inspectors in Iraq, but were advised by the U.S. to depart the country four days prior to the U.S. invasion, despite their requests for more time to complete their tasks. The U.S. initially sought a UN Security Council resolution authorizing the use of military force but dropped the bid for UN approval due to vigorous opposition from several
countries. The Bush administration's claim that the Iraq War was part of the War on Terror had been questioned and contested by political analysts.
More than 20 nations (most notably the United Kingdom) designated the "coalition of the willing" joined the United States in invading Iraq. They launched the invasion on March 20, 2003. The Iraqi military was quickly defeated. The capital, Baghdad, fell on April 9, 2003. On May 1, Bush declared the end of major combat operations in Iraq. The initial success of U.S. operations increased his popularity, but the U.S. and allied forces faced a growing insurgency led by sectarian groups; Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech was later criticized as premature. From 2004 until 2007, the situation in Iraq deteriorated further, with some observers arguing that there was a full-scale civil war in Iraq. Bush's policies met with criticism, including demands domestically to set a timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq. The 2006 report of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, led by James Baker, concluded that the situation in Iraq was "grave and deteriorating". While Bush admitted there were strategic mistakes made in regard to the stability of Iraq, he maintained he would not change the overall Iraq strategy. According to Iraq Body Count, some 251,000 Iraqis have been killed in the civil war following the U.S.-led invasion, including at least 163,841 civilians.
In January 2005, elections recognized by the West as free and fair were held in Iraq for the first time in 50 years. This led to the election of Jalal Talabani as president and Nouri al-Maliki as Prime Minister of Iraq. A referendum to approve a constitution in Iraq was held in October 2005, supported by most Shiites and many Kurds.
On January 10, 2007, Bush announced a surge of 21,500 more troops for Iraq, as well as a job program for Iraqis, more reconstruction proposals, and $1.2 billion (equivalent to $1.8
billion in 2023) for these programs. On May 1, 2007, Bush used his second-ever veto to reject a bill setting a deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops, saying the debate over the conflict was "understandable" but insisting that a continued U.S. presence there was crucial.
In March 2008, Bush praised the Iraqi government's "bold decision" to launch the Battle of Basra against the Mahdi Army, calling it "a defining moment in the history of a free Iraq". He said he would carefully weigh recommendations from his commanding General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker about how to proceed after the end of the military buildup in the summer of 2008. He also praised the Iraqis' legislative achievements, including a pension law, a revised de-Baathification law, a new budget, an amnesty law, and a provincial powers measure that, he said, set the stage for the Iraqi elections. By July 2008, American troop deaths had reached their lowest number since the war began, and due to increased stability in Iraq, Bush announced the withdrawal of additional American forces. During Bush's last visit to Iraq in December 2008, Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi threw both of his shoes at him during an official press conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Al-Zaidi yelled that the shoes were a "farewell kiss" and "for the widows and orphans and all those killed in Iraq".
PUBLIC
INTEGRITY & FALSE PRETENCES
In March 2010, Center for Public Integrity released a report that President Bush's administration had made more than 900 false pretenses in a two-year period about the alleged threat of Iraq against the United States, as his rationale to engage in war in Iraq.
Bush authorized the CIA to use waterboarding and several other "enhanced interrogation techniques" that several critics, including Barack Obama, would label as torture.
Critics, such as former CIA officer Bob Baer, have stated that information was suspect, "you can get anyone to confess to anything if the torture's bad enough."
The George W. Bush presidency has been ranked as below-average in surveys of presidential scholars published in the late 2000s and 2010s. A 2010 Siena Research Institute survey of the opinions of historians, political scientists, and presidential scholars ranked him 39th out of 43 presidents. The survey respondents gave President Bush low ratings on his handling of the U.S. economy, communication, ability to compromise, foreign policy accomplishments, and intelligence.
TONY
BLAIR
The
former UK Prime
Minister, Sir Tony Blair KG, is taken hostage as part of the plan
of the extreme activists to destroy all life on planet
earth, to enable them to stage a Phoenix like comeback from the ashes,
and takeover from the leaders they see as weak.
Blair
was unrepentant for his part in murdering Saddam Hussein. Calling the
intelligence blunders "little mistakes."
What
then is a "big mistake"? The British seem to sweep criticism
as to illegalities under the carpet, routinely at all levels. Another
example is the Post Office Horizon whitewash.
After which their fate will be decided.
It doesn't look good for a world leader who was party to the fabrication of
false evidence, so allowing the invasion of Iraq to proceed, to depose
Saddam Hussein, who was not producing weapons of mass destruction, as the UN
would have found if they had bothered. But the
West wanted their cheap supplies of oil, and to send a message to the Arab
world.
I'M
PROTECTED & REWARDED BY A CORRUPT SYSTEM - Sir John Chilcot delivered a devastating critique of Tony Blair’s decision to go to war in Iraq in 2003, concluding that Britain chose to join the US invasion before “peaceful options for disarmament” had been exhausted. His report, which amounts to arguably the most scathing official verdict given on any modern British prime minister, concludes:
- Tony Blair exaggerated the case for war in Iraq
- There was no imminent threat from Saddam Hussein
- Britain’s intelligence agencies produced "flawed information"
- George Bush largely ignored UK advice on postwar planning
- The UK military were ill-equipped for the task
- UK-US relations would not have been harmed had the UK stayed out of the war
THE
CHILCOT REPORT
THE GUARDIAN 6 JULY 2016 - TONY BLAIR UNREPENTANT AS CHILCOT GIVES CRUSHING IRAQ
WAR VERDICT
Sir John Chilcot delivers highly critical verdict on Iraq war but ex-PM says: ‘I believe we made the right decision’.
A defiant Tony Blair defended his decision to go to war in Iraq in 2003 following the publication of a devastating report by Sir John Chilcot, which mauled the ex-prime minister’s reputation and said that at the time of the 2003 invasion Saddam Hussein “posed no imminent threat”.
Looking tired, his voice sometimes croaking with emotion, Blair described his decision to join the US attack as “the hardest, most momentous, most agonising decision I took in 10 years as British
prime
minister”.
He said he felt “deeply and sincerely ... the grief and suffering of those who lost ones they loved in Iraq”.
“There will not be a day when I do not relive and rethink what happened,” he added.
But asked whether invading Iraq was a mistake Blair was strikingly unrepentant. “I believe we made the right decision and the world is better and safer,” he declared. He argued that he had acted in good faith, based on intelligence at the time which said that Iraq’s president had weapons of mass destruction. This “turned out to be wrong”.
Blair also said the Iraq inquiry – set up by his successor Gordon Brown back in 2009 – shot down long-standing claims that he had lied about the war to the British public and cynically manipulated intelligence. Where there had been mistakes they were minor ones involving “planning and process”, he said. He said he “couldn’t accept” criticism that British soldiers died in vain.
Blair’s extraordinary two-hour press conference came after Chilcot, a retired civil servant, published his long-awaited report into the Iraq debacle. In the end, and seven years after hearings first began, it was a more far-reaching and damning document than many had expected. It eviscerated Blair’s style of government and decision-making.
It also revealed that in a remarkable private note sent on 28 July 2002 Blair promised Bush: “I will be with you, whatever.”
The head of the Iraq war inquiry said the UK’s decision to attack and occupy a sovereign state for the first time since the
second world war was a decision of “utmost gravity”. Chilcot described Saddam as “undoubtedly a brutal dictator” who had repressed and murdered many of his own people and attacked his neighbours.
But he was withering about Blair’s choice to sign up to a military plan drawn up in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 by the US president,
George W
Bush, and his neo-con team. Chilcot said: “We have concluded that 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 a last resort.”
The report also bitterly criticised the way in which Blair made the case for Britain to go to war. It said the notorious dossier presented in September 2002 by Blair to the House of Commons did not support his claim that Iraq had a growing programme of chemical and biological weapons.
The then Labour government also failed to anticipate the war’s disastrous consequences, the report said. They included the deaths of “at least 150,000 Iraqis – and probably many more – most of them civilians” and “more than a million people displaced”. “The people of Iraq have suffered greatly,” Chilcot said.
Chilcot did not pass judgment on whether the war was legal. But the report said the way the legal basis was dealt with before the 20 March invasion was far from satisfactory. The attorney general, Peter Goldsmith, should have given written advice to cabinet and ministers – one of few findings that Blair accepted on Wednesday.
Lord Goldsmith told Blair that war without a second UN resolution would be illegal, only to change his mind after a trip to Washington in March 2003 and meetings with Bush administration legal officials.
Overall, Chilcot’s report amounts to arguably the most scathing official verdict on any modern British prime minister. It implicitly lumps Blair in the same category as Anthony Eden, who invaded
Egypt in a failed attempt to gain control of the Suez canal. Chilcot’s 2.6m-word, 12-volume report was released on Wednesday morning, together with a 145-page executive summary.
The venue was the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre in Westminster. As families of service personnel killed in Iraq welcomed its strong contents, anti-war protesters kept up a raucous chorus of “Blair Liar”.
THE REPORT CONCLUDED
- There was no imminent threat from Saddam Hussein.
- The strategy of containment could have been adopted and continued for some time.
- The judgments about the severity of the threat posed by Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction – WMDs – were presented with a certainty that was not justified.
- Despite explicit warnings, the consequences of the invasion were underestimated. The planning and preparations for Iraq after Saddam were wholly inadequate.
- The widespread perception that the September 2002 dossier distorted intelligence produced a “damaging legacy”, undermining trust and confidence in politicians.
- The government failed to achieve its stated objectives.
The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, apologised for his party’s “disastrous decision to go to war”, calling it the most serious foreign policy calamity of the last 60 years. Jack Straw, the foreign secretary at the time, and who largely escaped Chilcot censure, said that Blair was never “gung ho” about war.
Other allies also came to Blair’s defence. Alastair Campbell, his former press secretary, said Blair had not given Bush a blank cheque. There were no easy decisions, Campbell added. In a statement on Wednesday Bush acknowledged mistakes but said he continued to believe “the world is better off without Saddam in power”.
The report, however, disagrees. It sheds fresh light on the private discussions between Blair and Bush in the run-up to war. The report says that after the 9/11 attacks Blair urged Bush “not to take hasty action on Iraq”. The UK’s formal policy was to contain Saddam’s regime.
But by the time the two leaders met in April 2002 at Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, the UK’s thinking had undergone “a profound change”. The joint intelligence committee had concluded that Saddam could not be removed “without an invasion”, with the government saying Iraq was a threat “that had to be dealt with”.
I WILL BE WITH YOU WHATEVER
Blair sent Bush a series of private notes setting out his thinking. They included the 28 July 2002 note, released for the first time on Wednesday, in the face of opposition from the Cabinet Office, which said: “I will be with you [Bush] whatever.”
It added: “This is the moment to assess bluntly the difficulties. The planning on this and the strategy are the toughest yet. This is not Kosovo. This is not Afghanistan. It is not even the Gulf war.”
At times, Blair’s notes read more like stream of consciousness than considered policy documents. The note continued: “He [Saddam] is a potential threat. He could be contained. But containment … is always risky.” It says “we must have a workable military plan” and proposes a “huge force” to seize Baghdad.
Asked what “whatever” meant, Blair said on Wednesday his support for Bush was never unconditional or unqualified. He said that he had persuaded the US president to go down the “UN route”. Blair also linked his actions in Iraq with the ongoing global struggle against Islamist terrorism.
According to Chilcot, however, Blair shaped his diplomatic strategy around a “military timetable” and the need to get rid of Saddam. He told Bush in his note this was the “right thing to do”. Blair suggested that the simplest way to come up with a casus belli was to give an ultimatum to Iraq to disarm, preferably backed by
UN authority.
Chilcot rejected Blair’s view that spurning the US-led military alliance against Iraq would have done major damage to London’s relations with Washington. “It’s questionable it would have broken the partnership,” he writes, noting that the two sides had taken different views on other major issues including the Suez crisis, the Vietnam war and the
Falklands.
The report said that by January 2003 Blair had concluded “the likelihood was war”. He accepted a US military timetable for action by mid-March, while at the same time publicly blaming
France for failing to support a second UN resolution in the security council authorising military action.
Chilcot was again unimpressed. “In the absence of a majority in support of military action, we consider that the UK was, in fact, undermining the security council’s authority,” he said.
The report also demolished Blair’s claim made when he gave evidence to the inquiry in 2010 that the difficulties encountered by British forces in post-invasion Iraq could not have been known in advance.
“We do not agree that hindsight is required,” Chilcot said. “The risks of internal strife in Iraq, active Iranian pursuit of its interests, regional instability, and al-Qaida activity in Iraq, were each explicitly identified before the invasion.”
The report is critical of the Ministry of Defence and military commanders who were tasked with occupying four southern provinces of Iraq once Saddam had been toppled. “The scale of the UK effort in post-conflict Iraq never matched the scale of the challenge,” Chilcot said, noting that security in Baghdad and south-east Iraq deteriorated soon after the invasion.
In the end, 179 British service personnel died before UK forces pulled out in 2009. Chilcot said the MoD was “slow in responding to the threat from improvised explosive devices”. He said that delays in providing properly armoured patrol vehicles “should not have been tolerated”. Nor was it clear which official was in charge. “It should have been,” Chilcot said.
As part of his remit, Chilcot also set out what lessons could be learned. He said that Blair “overestimated his ability to influence US decisions on Iraq”.
He added: “The UK’s relationship with the US has proved strong enough over time to bear the weight of honest disagreement. It does not require unconditional support where our interest or judgments differ.”
PROTECTED
& REWARDED BY A CORRUPT SYSTEM - Don't worry old boy, we'll
brainwash the public as usual. We must strike back at terrorists no
matter how illegally. We write history as we want it to appear.
THE GUARDIAN 6 JULY 2016 - THE IRAQ WAR INQUIRY HAS LEFT THE DOOR OPEN FOR TONY BLAIR TO BE PROSECUTED
Sir John Chilcot’s inquiry has not, in his words, “expressed a view on whether military action [in Iraq] was legal”. That question, he said, could be resolved only by a court. Still less does his report deal with the question of whether Tony Blair or others should face legal action.
However, the Chilcot inquiry did find that the circumstances in which the Blair government decided that there was a legal basis for military action were “far from satisfactory”. The report said that
Lord
Goldsmith, the attorney general, should have been asked to provide written advice to the cabinet on 17 March 2003 explaining the legal basis on which the UK could take military action and setting out the risks of legal challenge.
In fact, Goldsmith started to give ministers an oral explanation, based on a written answer to a parliamentary question which was handed round the cabinet table, and the discussion then moved on.
Section 5 of the report – nearly 170 pages – is devoted to a detailed analysis of the legal advice given by Goldsmith and how it developed over time. Chilcot concluded that the cabinet was not misled by the attorney general on 17 March.
However, he said that ministers were being asked to confirm a decision that the diplomatic process was at an end and that the Commons should be asked to endorse military action. “Given the gravity of the situation,” says the report, “cabinet should have been made aware of the legal uncertainties.”
The report points out that no minister asked Goldsmith why the advice he had given 10 days earlier – that the safest legal course was to seek a second UN resolution – had changed. “There was little appetite to question Lord Goldsmith about his advice and no substantive discussion of the legal issues was recorded,” Chilcot finds. Goldsmith should have been asked to explain how it could be said that Iraq had reached the point at which it had failed to take the final opportunity offered by UN resolution 1441.
Publication of the Chilcot report is unlikely to put an end to calls for Blair and others to be prosecuted before the international criminal court (ICC). It’s argued that Blair should be charged with the crime of aggression, which includes a military attack or invasion not permitted under the UN charter.
More than a decade ago, the former ICC prosecutor explained that he had a mandate to examine conduct during the Iraq war “but not whether the decision to engage in armed conflict was legal”. Luis Moreno-Ocampo added: “I do not have the mandate to address the arguments on the legality of the use of force or the crime of aggression.” Since then, the crime of aggression has been defined in the ICC’s governing statute. However, this provision has not yet been brought into effect and will not be applied retrospectively. So there is no prospect of anyone facing charges of aggression arising from the Iraq war.
The ICC also has jurisdiction over genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes committed by UK nationals after June 2002. The current prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, announced in 2014 that she was reopening a “preliminary examination” into allegations that British officials were responsible for “war crimes involving systematic detainee abuse in Iraq from 2003 until 2008”.
In her latest update last November, Bensouda said that in assessing whether “the alleged crimes fall within the jurisdiction of the court and were committed on a large scale or pursuant to a plan or policy”, she would take into account the findings of the relevant investigations conducted by the UK authorities.
A preliminary examination is not the same as an investigation. Its aim is to decide whether an investigation should be opened. The ICC prosecutor has said she will consider the Chilcot report before deciding whether to open a formal investigation. Announcing this on Monday, Bensouda said that a claim in the Sunday Telegraph that she had “ruled out putting Tony Blair on trial for war crimes” was inaccurate.
Bensouda has been kept informed on the progress of investigations by Ihat, the Iraq historic investigations team, and will take its findings into account. This is of immense importance because the ICC steps in only where the state concerned is “unwilling or unable genuinely to carry out the investigation or prosecution”. This is known as the principle of complementarity.
Ihat has nearly 150 staff, including Royal Navy police and civilian investigators. No prosecutions have yet been brought as a result of their work but prosecutors considered bringing charges against two soldiers.
Latest figures supplied to me this week indicate that, by the end of May 2016, Ihat had received 3,363 allegations of potential criminal behaviour. After sifting out cases that did not amount to criminal offences, Ihat is now considering – or has considered – 325 allegations of unlawful killing and 1,343 allegations of ill-treatment, ranging from serious sexual assault to common assault. The figures refer to alleged victims.
Of these 1,668 allegations considered so far, 72 cases of unlawful killing and 18 cases of alleged ill-treatment have been – or are about to be – completed. Ihat has released details of some of its initial decisions. Ihat tells me that the allegation of criminal behaviour was “not sustainable” in 70 of the 72 cases of unlawful killing it has considered.
One allegation of unlawful killing by a soldier has so far been referred to the Service Prosecuting Authority, which takes charging decisions in the same way as the Crown Prosecution Service. The director of service prosecutions, Andrew Cayley QC, decided that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. A second allegation of unlawful killing was referred to the RAF police for further investigation. Allegations of ill-treatment were also found to be unsustainable in 16 of the 18 cases considered.
One ill-treatment case was referred to the director of service prosecutions, who again decided that there was insufficient evidence to proceed. Another soldier who admitted ill-treatment was referred to his commanding officer for disciplinary action and fined £3,000. Video footage of an incident which showed him abusing an Iraqi man was provided to investigators by the Mail on Sunday.
Families of troops who died in the Iraq war are reported to be taking legal advice on whether Blair and others might face action in the civil courts. On Tuesday, General Sir Michael Rose, who has been advising the families, said action might be taken for what he called “malfeasance in a public office”.
Misconduct in public office is, in fact, a common law offence. The crime, which dates back to the 18th century, has recently been criticised for vagueness by the government’s law reform advisers. It may be committed when a public officer, acting as such, wilfully misconducts himself to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public’s trust in him and does so without reasonable excuse or justification.
Although parliament ratified the government’s decision to join the US-led invasion of Iraq, Blair comes in for heavy criticism from Chilcot. Blair presented judgments about Iraq’s capabilities “with a certainty that was not justified”. His conclusions about the aftermath of invasion “did not require the benefit of hindsight”. His omissions “reduced the likelihood of achieving the UK’s strategic objectives in Iraq”.
Blair did not establish clear ministerial oversight of post-conflict strategy. He did not ensure that ministers took the necessary decisions to integrate military and civilian contributions. He did not seek adequate assurances that the UK was in a position to meet its likely obligations in Iraq. He did not ensure that the UK’s strategic objectives were sufficiently tested. He did not press President Bush for assurances about US post-conflict plans. He did not consider whether the absence of such plans was a threat to UK strategic objectives or make post-conflict planning a condition of participation in military action.
Blair’s critics may believe that this amounts to the sort of wilful misconduct envisaged by the judges. On the other hand, authorisation by parliament must surely count as a “reasonable excuse or justification”.
Whether or not the courts would be willing to entertain a prosecution of a former prime minister for what may be seen as political failings, we can be sure that actions such as these were not in the minds of the judges when they developed the crime of misconduct in public office.
Tony
Blair was advised of an aircraft anti-terrorist system, a British Patent application,
but did nothing to investigate the possibilities of such a system with the
military of civilian aviation authorities. He did though reply to a letter
advising of the proposed development, that may be useful against other aggression,
such as the September 11 2001, Al
Qaeda attack on the Pentagon and Twin Towers.
[On
top of that, the public may consider that the British honour system,
sanctioned by the State, with the Queen as the Head of State, calls into
question the level of corruption that Parliament has allowed to creep into
the non-constitution that allows the Royals to sway the Courts, as surely as
if they were sitting in the chamber with the Judges, saying nothing, but
nevertheless, watching as a way of steering the so-called independence of
the British Justice system. Reference: R v Sussex Justices, ex parte
McCarthy 1924]
PROTECTED
& REWARDED BY A CORRUPT STATE - More than half a million people have called on the government to rescind the knighthood given to Sir Tony Blair, but Keir Starmer has defended the former prime minister, saying the honour was deserved.
Is Tony Blair a worthy recipient of the Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter? There is good and bad in all of us. Without doubt, Blair accomplished a good deal of things one might count as political successes, but he failed to tackle planning crime, and the judicial system is as unjust now as it was in his day. Equally, he failed to bring the law up to date to provide British subject with an Effective Remedy. And then, he pulled the flanker of all time, in effect lying to parliament and the people about the reasoning behind launching an attack on Iraq.
If that is rewarded with honours, then there is something seriously wrong with Britain and the thinking of those at the helm. And it is high time for a constitutional revolution, to get UK policies in line with the thinking of the electorate. The reason the Pilgrim Founding Father's striking out in the Mayflower, for America, was to rid themselves of European and British cruelties. As UK citizens cannot strike out like that for a fresh start, the only alternative is to disinfect our societal shortcomings, starting at the top for a national cure, working backwards or local authorities. This must be achieved via political means, by the voter, voting for change. And, to make that happen, we need honest candidates with decent policies. We need fresh faces, with high ideals, untainted by cronyist contact with the evils and comforts of the present system.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jul/06/chilcot-report-crushing-verdict-tony-blair-iraq-war
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/06/iraq-war-inquiry-chilcot-tony-blair-prosecute
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jul/06/chilcot-report-crushing-verdict-tony-blair-iraq-war
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/06/iraq-war-inquiry-chilcot-tony-blair-prosecute
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