The media is currently full of the Chilcot Report into Tony Blair's fateful decision to drag the UK into George W. Bush's war on Iraq way back in 2003.
"Way back" indeed, and that was my first reaction: why has it taken 13 years to produce a report, and what possible relevance or use could it have now? As it turns out, the inquiry was not even launched until 2009, six years after the invasion decision itself, and fully two years after Blair had resigned as Prime Minister (in fact, 2009 was the year in which British troops pulled out of Iraq). Even then, there were delays, disagreements and controversies, such as over how public the evidence should be (it was eventually agreed that public hearings were required). Just the sheer length of the Report (12 volumes containing 2.6 million words) was another reason for the delay, compounded by more disagreements over what documents were to be included, particularly as regards communications between Blair and Bush. So in the end, it still took seven years (or 13 years, depending on how you look at it).
The remit of the inquiry was to answer two main questions: was it right and necessary to invade Iraq in March 2003 in the first place, and should Britain have been better prepared for what followed? Despite the time taken, the report's conclusions are hardly startling: there were other options to war at the time, and the legal basis for the invasion was "far from satisfactory"; furthermore, the planning for a post-war Iraq was woefully inadequate, and the instability that resulted from the invasion probably resulted in the deaths of at least 150,000 Iraqis, and the continuing chaos that reigns there even today.
And what practical value does the Report have now? Not much. It does not provide evidence for a criminal case, and does little other than confirm most people's belief that Blair and Bush were wrong. Blair, an earnest and committed Christian, has probably been suffering his own little hell ever since anyway. It may, or may not, cause future Prime Ministers and Presidents to think a little harder and longer about such momentous decisions.
Blair himself spend two hours responding to the Report, but he has not changed his mind a jot with retrospect. He claims to "express more sorrow, regret and apology than you may ever know or can believe". But, he insists, "Whether people agree or disagree with my decision to take military action against Saddam Hussein, I took it in good faith and in what I believed to be the best interests of the country", adding, "I took this decision because it was the right thing to do based upon the information I had and the threats I perceived".
Much has been made of the note Blair sent to Bush in the summer of 2002 - "I will be with you, whatever" - and in some ways this is the crux of the matter: Blair was more interested in preserving what he saw as his special relation with Bush and the US than he was in justifying or questioning the actions he committed his own country to.
That said, some of the other quotes and comments being bandied around do not seem to me to be appropriate, particularly that of war widow Sarah O'Connor: "There's one terrorist in this world, that the world needs to be aware of , and his name is Tony Blair". Her husband chose a career in the military, and he would probably have been the first to point out to her that the risk of death comes with the territory, and cannot to be pinned personally on one person or one decision. Plenty of soldiers die much more meaningless deaths.
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