The Dilemma of US Foreign Policy: Between Oil and Terrorism

My latest post on the British Iraqi Forum.

"As many prepare to protest outside the Saudi Arabian embassy in London on 25 September, over a cemetery that was destroyed 85 years ago, they will also be making a stand against an ideology of intolerance that has affected billions across the world." [More...]

Resolution

Tony Blair - A Journey

Random House: London.

"On 7 March, Peter Goldsmith had submitted his final opinion. As I said earlier he had been over to Washington and had had detailed discussions with the administration lawyers. He set out the arguments for and against and on balance came out in favour. Later, much was made of the 'pressure' on Peter to do so. The truth is he was, and is, someone of genuine integrity. He really wanted to be sure. It was difficult. The world is full of lawyers, and on this, every lawyer was having his or her shout. He felt the responsibility keenly, as he should have. There was clearly a case against in law; but there was also a case for. He debated, discussed, reflected and decided. His opinion was balanced. The argument was balanced. He did his job."

"I understood the importance of the second resolution in terms of political survival and so forth. I confess I always thought it a bit odd in terms of the moral acceptability of the course of action or not. It bestowed more legitimacy, it was true, but whether we got a second resolution or not basically depended on the politics in France and Russia and their calculation of where their political interests lay. We had acted without UN authority in Kosovo. It would have been highly doubtful if we could ever have got UNSC agreement for either Bosnia or Rwanda. I never even thought about it for Sierra Leone. Yet it would be hard to argue that, morally, in each of those situations, we should not have intervened."

"I know that there was never any way Britain was not going to be with the US at that moment, once we went down the UN route and Saddam was in breach. Of course, such a statement is always subject to in extremis correction. A crazy act of aggression? No, we would not have supported that. But given the history, you couldn't call Saddam a crazy target. Personally, I have little doubt that at some point we would have to have dealt with him. But throughout I comforted myself, as I put it in the Glasgow speech, that if we were wrong, we would have removed a tyrant; and as a matter of general principle, I was in favour of doing that."

"Now I would put it differently. Actually there is a parallel [Saddam and Hitler], but it is less about the lead-up to action and more about the general ideology of this extremism based on a perversion of Islam and our attitude to it, and our attitude to the rising threat of fascism. In both cases, there is enormous reluctance to believe we are necessarily in a war. In both cases, our longing for peace blinds us to our enemies' determination to have their way. In both cases, we excuse behaviour on the part of people and states that in other circumstances we would abhor. In both cases, it seems all a bit remote from us and therefore we ask: Why do we need to intervene?"

"The brutality of the repression - the death and torture camps, the barbaric prisons for political opponents, the routine beatings for anyone or their families suspected of disloyalty are well documented. Just last week, someone slandering Saddam was tied to a lamp post in a street in Baghdad, his tongue cut out, mutilated and left to bleed to death, as a warning to others. I recall a few weeks ago talking to an Iraqi exile and saying to her that I understood how grim it must be under the lash of Saddam. "But you don't", she replied. "You cannot. You do not know what it is like to live in perpetual fear." And she is right. We take our freedom for granted."

Iraq: Countdown to War

Tony Blair - A Journey

Random House: London.

“In other words, left to itself, the country could have just about managed. What made the task all the harder, occasionally verging on the impossible, were the activities of the outside influences, hell-bent on chaos and destruction. Both al-Qaeda and Iran knew what was at stake in Iraq. Neither was going to let the nation stabilise without a fight, and as our will weakened, theirs grew. It was then only through Prime Minister Nouri Maliki showing (frankly unanticipated) leadership qualities – and the Bush decision to surge – that the balance of will to win was shifted back towards the forces of democracy and modernisation.”

“Inaction is a decision to maintain the status quo. Maintenance of the status quo has its own result, and usually its own dynamic. So removing Saddam had enormous consequence. Failure to remove him would not have been free of consequence. We can debate the nature of such consequence and how profound it would have been, but unquestionably, there would have been one.”

“Above all, there was a sense of an emergency. In this time, the failure to act was indeed an action with its own consequence and that consequence might be profoundly adverse. At that moment, the fear of history’s judgement was not the fear that came with action, but with inaction. How to change the world was a tough challenge to answer; not to answer it, to be paralysed in indecision, was deemed the greater risk, by a large margin.”

“But I was also aware that the new world taking shape around us, Britain and Europe were going to face a much more uncertain future without America. As the defeat of Communism showed – let’s be clear, without America, it would not have been defeated – our alliance with the US mattered… So when they had need of us, were we really going to refuse: or, even worse, hope they succeeded but could do it without us? I reflected and felt the weight of an alliance and its history, not oppressively but insistently, a call to duty, a call to act, a call to be at their side”

“It’s true to say, however, that at that point [September 2002] the downside risk of military action revolved around how easy or hard it would be to remove Saddam, and any humanitarian fallout. There was, of course, also the Sunni/Shia issue, but never at that state – or indeed until after Saddam’s removal – was the true threat perceived: outside interference by al-Qaeda and Iran.”

“Hans [Blix] was a curious fellow. He was smart and capable, and I liked him, but his problem was that he felt the weight of the politics of the inspection. This was quiet natural, but in truth he just needed to do his job… He kept saying, ‘I have to decide for war or peace’, and I kept saying, ‘You don’t. Just tell us your honest assessment.’

“I was about as isolated as it is possible to be in politics… And worrying, not because I might do down – in a sense, so what? – but because so much was at stake. War and peace. The struggle against terrorism… I tried to work out what was the right thing to do. I was past expediency, past political calculation, past personal introspection. I knew this could be the end politically. I just wanted to know: what is the right thing?”