Iraq issue erupts as Britons set to vote

[seemslikeadream]

By DOUG SAUNDERS

Monday, May 2, 2005


The Sunday Times newspaper yesterday published leaked cabinet minutes from July, 2002. They indicated Mr. Blair and his colleagues believed the United States was bent on invading Iraq and toppling dictator Saddam Hussein, and concluded that such action should be justified on moral rather than legal grounds.

"This record is extremely sensitive," the document begins. "No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents."

It continues: "Saddam's regime was tough and based on extreme fear. The only way to overthrow it was likely to be by massive military action . . . . Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and . But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

It concludes that an invasion should be conducted and a political justification should follow: "If the political context were right, people would support regime change . . . . whether the military plan worked and whether we had the political strategy to give the military plan space to work."


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050502/BRITAIN02/TPInternational/Europe

[DoYouEverWonder]

1. Moral rather than legal grounds?

Would Tony like to try to explain the difference. Especially, since the Pope told them no?

[seemslikeadream]

2. Tony Blair is a liar and a war criminal

Xymphora

Sunday, May 01, 2005

The B-liar timeline is fairly simple:


1. From a letter <1> from Gordon Logan to Reg Keys (the guy who's running <2>against Blair!; see also here<3>) dated April 29, 2005:
"All the discussion on the Iraq war is essentially a diversion. There is a secret clause in the Trident submarine treaty that was signed by Mrs Thatcher in 1983. The secret clause states that the British Prime Minister is required to go to war if he/she gets the order from the President of the United States. You will appreciate that this information explains a lot, notably why Blair has repeatedly gone to war, but only when required to by the Americans. It also explains why Blair is so different from his Labour predecessors, such as Harold Wilson, who refused to send our troops to Vietnam in 1968. The secret agreement was designed by Thatcher to secretly tie the hands of British Prime Ministers for many years to come. Without naming sources, I received this information from a British Army officer a couple of years ago."

2. In March 2002, Blair received <4> legal advice from the Foreign Office that an attack on Iraq was illegal under international law. The advice was drafted by the Foreign Office's deputy legal adviser, Elizabeth Wilmshurst, who resigned on the eve of war in protest at what she called a 'crime of aggression'.

3. Blair met with Bush in Crawford <5> April 2002 and received his marching orders - literally! - that Britain must support the American attack on Iraq.

4. Blair chaired a war meeting <6> with his inner circle in July 2002, in which it was planned to arrange a reason for war. From The Independent:
". . . the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, had warned that the case against Saddam was 'thin'. He suggested that the Iraqi dictator should be forced into a corner by demanding the return of the UN weapons inspectors: if he refused, or the inspectors found WMD, there would be good cause for war."

MORE
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m11448&l=i&size=1&hd=0

[seemslikeadream]

3. Iraq, the secret US visit, and an angry military chief

May 02, 2005
Antony Barnett, Gaby Hinsliff and Martin Bright
Observer
Sunday May 1, 2005

...

On the other hand, it enables for the first time the tangled threads of argument that led London and Washington to a still fiercely disputed war to be unravelled in public. In a series of interviews with key players on both sides of the Atlantic, The Observer can for the first time reveal the remarkable Washington summit attended by the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, with leading legal officers in the Bush administration. Goldsmith came back more 'persuaded' that the case for war was 'reasonable'.

The anger and fear over lack of legal cover can also be shown, with some of Britain's most senior military staff still concerned, more than two years later, that an appearance before the International Criminal Court is possible.

The path by which Blair's government travelled from doubt, confusion and ethical struggle to the bombing of Baghdad is now clear as never before: the ramifications may yet be felt all the way to the ballot box, and perhaps beyond it to the courts. There are 96 hours to go before polling day and each of the party leaders will be fighting every last minute. Blair, nervous as he watches his poll lead drift; Michael Howard, hopeful that he can do enough to stave off another Tory disaster; Charles Kennedy, eyeing a Liberal Democrat breakthrough. Against the background rumble of Iraq, the election campaign is now, finally, entering the home straight.

The US connection

On the sixth floor of the State Department in Foggy Bottom sits the recently vacated office of William Taft IV. Despite the peculiarity of his name, few in Britain will have heard of him or his distinguished Republican pedigree.

Yet The Observer can reveal that this great-grandson of a former Republican president played a critical role in persuading Goldsmith's that the war against Iraq was legal. Taft was one of five powerful lawyers in the Bush administration who met the Attorney General in Washington in February 2003 to push their view that a second UN resolution was superfluous.

more
http://www.occupationwatch.org/headlines/archives/2005/05/iraq_the_secret.html

[seemslikeadream]

4. A great summary of why this is important:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3580316&mesg_id=3580509&page=

"Iraq bombshell this morning" re: Bush's prewar planning.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3580316&mesg_id=3580316

[LynnTheDem]

5. Perhaps bLiar will explain how his "morality" is better than the world's

religious leaders' morality, seeing as how the very overwhelming majority of the world's religious leaders -including bLiar's own, and including bush's own, denounced this war as ILLEGAL, UNJUSTIFIED...and IMMORAL.

[seemslikeadream]

6. Iraq still gnaws at Blair's credibility

FRASER NELSON
POLITICAL EDITOR


Key points
• More Iraq problems for the PM
• Leaked documents reveal decision to go to war taken a year before events took place
• Also, Foreign Office was convinced war was illegal without UN authorisation

Key quote
"Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even though the timing was not yet decided. we work up a plan for an ultimatum to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors." - Jack Straw, Foreign Secretary
http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=467742005