8.5.5        The British Political Perspective on Invading Iraq

(This is an archived extract from the book Patterns of Power: Edition 2)

Britain’s two largest political parties were each divided on the decision to invade Iraq.  Robin Cook, the Leader of the House, gave the most eloquent summary of the reasons not to invade Iraq during his resignation speech on 17 March 2003,[1] in which he said:

“On Iraq, I believe that the prevailing mood of the British people is sound. They do not doubt that Saddam is a brutal dictator, but they are not persuaded that he is a clear and present danger to Britain.

They want inspections to be given a chance, and they suspect that they are being pushed too quickly into conflict by a US Administration with an agenda of its own.

Above all, they are uneasy at Britain going out on a limb on a military adventure without a broader international coalition and against the hostility of many of our traditional allies.”

Robin Cook resigned because he disagreed with what Tony Blair was trying to do, and because he wished to oppose him in the Parliamentary debate which followed on 18 March 2003, just before the invasion.[2]  The full width of the British political spectrum was visible in that debate and there was vigorous disagreement, including a further ministerial resignation,[3] but Tony Blair was able to persuade the House to support him.  He reminded MPs of the attempts to appease Hitler before the Second World War, and argued that the UN should not fall into a similar trap:

“The UN should be the focus both of diplomacy and of action. That is what [Resolution] 1441 said. That was the deal. And I simply say to the House that to break it now, and to will the ends but not the means, would do more damage in the long term to the UN than any other single course that we could pursue. To fall back into the lassitude of the past 12 years; to talk, to discuss, to debate but never to act; to declare our will but not to enforce it; and to continue with strong language but with weak intentions—that is the worst course imaginable. If we pursue that course, when the threat returns, from Iraq or elsewhere, who will then believe us? What price our credibility with the next tyrant?” [4]

This argument amounted to a declaration that America and Britain would be strengthening the UN by overriding it in the case of Iraq.  The motion to support “the decision of Her Majesty's Government that the United Kingdom should use all means necessary to ensure the disarmament of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction” was carried by 412 votes to 149.

The Parliamentary debate had been dominated by the personality of Tony Blair.  He was able to convince people to follow him, despite opposition.  He was following his own instincts, despite the advice he had received.  Professor Raymond Geuss cited the occasion when Blair was being advised that changing the regime in Iraq would run the risk of unleashing sectarian conflict and that rebuilding the country would be difficult:

“Blair is said to have listened with evident lack of interest and increasing annoyance, and to have repeatedly interrupted the experts with the rhetorical question: ‘But Saddam is evil, isn’t he?’ In his own later formulation, his political credo was: ‘All I know is what I believe’”.[5]

This is an example of hubris in personality politics (6.3.4.2), where an individual leader dominates a political system and is able to override advice.

Tony Blair personally shared George W. Bush’s perception of Saddam Hussein as being “evil”, so he supported the American policy to bring about regime change in Iraq (8.4.5).  He searched for the political message which was most likely to convince both Parliament and the British people that the war was necessary.[6]  Like Bush, he based his argument on Iraq’s WMD,[7] and published British intelligence reports which had had their caveats removed to strengthen his case.[8]  He also tried to harness moral indignation, at Saddam’s behaviour, to persuade the British people that regime change was a cause worth fighting for.

© PatternsofPower.org, 2014