Sir John Chilcot’s damning report into the Iraq War also revealed that Blair and US President George W. Bush were made fully aware that Iraq could descend into sectarian chaos after the invasion – directly contrary to what Mr Blair told the inquiry. In time, it can be sorted.
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Tony Blair’s former chief spin doctor even accused the BBC of having blood on its hands over the death of weapons inspector Dr David Kelly, rather than him and the former prime minister.
“Unless the findings of the inquiry lead to the impeachment of some or all of the guilty parties”, the organization continued, “the report will be of no real relevance to the Iraqi civilians, and the British soldiers, killed or impacted”.
The former premier said the decision to take Britain to war was the “most agonising” he had ever taken, adding: “I will never agree that those who died or were injured… made their sacrifice in vain”. However, it is unlikely he will face war crimes charges.
The report accepted that Cabinet “was not misled” on the issue and that Mr Blair’s private dealings with Lord Goldsmith did not constitute a “side deal”.
Chilcot passed no judgment on whether the war had been legal, saying only an internationally recognised court could decide that, but said the Blair government’s decision-making over the legality of the war was “far from satisfactory”.
While the report may help Britain draw a line under a hard national episode, it offers little comfort for Iraq.
“Since 2003 until now, our country has been a scene of destruction, killing, massacres, explosions and sectarianism”, Baghdad resident Ali al-Saraji said.
“I express more sorrow, regret and apology then you may ever know or can believe”, he said.
He added: “By any measure, the invasion and occupation of Iraq has been for many a catastrophe”.
The threat posed by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s supposed weapons of mass destruction – the original justification for war – had been over-hyped and the planning for the aftermath of war had been inadequate, it found.
The families would be examining the report to see whether it forms the basis of any legal proceedings, they said.
“All options are open”, said Matthew Jury, a lawyer for some of the families.
“We want to celebrate the report as confirming what we have said for many years”.
“Taking the country to war should always be a last resort, and should only be done if all credible alternatives have been exhausted”, he said.
The US-led invasion was preceded by a long period of diplomacy in which Britain led and failed in efforts to secure explicit United Nations authorisation for military action.
Chilcot and his panel heard from 150 witnesses and analyzed 150,000 documents.
In his letters, many of which are undated, Blair was frequently blunt about the lack of public and political support in Britain and elsewhere for an invasion of Iraq.
Washington routinely disregards worldwide law, but it could have proved problematic for Blair, which is why he encouraged and relied on fabricated assessments of Iraq’s capacity to deploy chemical and biological weapons – Campbell’s “dodgy dossier”. The release of the report coincided with Mr Bush’s 70th birthday.
It remains unclear what, if any, legal action could be taken against Blair or others. “The media, the press, the families, parliament, everybody was lied to”, Reg Keys, whose son was among the British fatalities and who stood as a candidate for parliament against Mr Blair in the 2005 election, said ahead of the report’s publication. As a result, she says, Bush’s intentions have been questioned less by Americans than Blair’s have been by Brits.
The long-anticipated inquiry underscored information already widely known to the British public, which staged large-scale protests in the lead-up to and aftermath of the invasion.
“People don’t feel that the Iraq of today is much better than under Saddam Hussein”, said CNN’s Ben Wedeman, after asking people on the streets of Baghdad what they thought of Wednesday’s report.
“Despite explicit warnings, the consequences of the invasion were under-estimated”.
– The threat from Iraq was “presented with a certainty that was not justified” by then-Prime Minister Tony Blair.
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Raed Jarrar, government relations manager for the American Friends Service Committee, told AlterNet that real accountability requires going beyond restatement of Blair’s well-established failures.
