Howard has said he does not regret his decision for Australia to enter the 2003 Iraqi War, despite the Chilcot Report’s damning response to the US -led invasion.
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“The point had not been reached where military action was the last resort”.
“What we did in removing Saddam had bad consequences which we didn’t foresee – and I understand all the criticisms – but when I look at it today I think still that we moved with where the grain of the future is going to be in these countries and this region”.
In a statement which was twice as long as that delivered by the chairman of the inquiry, John Chilcot, Blair sought to address the full spectrum of criticism levelled at him, saying he accepted total responsibility “without exception or excuse”.
He also said that the legal basis for British military action in Iraq was “far from satisfactory”, stressing that British policy on Iraq was made on the basis of “flawed intelligence and assessments”.
In March 2003, there was “no imminent threat” from Saddam Hussein, according to Chilcot.
“There’s not a single day goes by”, he said, when he does not think about his decision to approve military action, admitting that many mistakes had been made before, during and after the 2003 invasion.
It revealed an eyebrow-raising note from Tony Blair to George Bush in which he says he’ll “be with you whatever”, and stated that Blair had exaggerated the threat of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction in order to make the case for war.
Among the other accused public figures were George Galloway and UN Secretary-General at the time, Kofi Annan.
Chilcot also found that the decision to go to war was taken before “peaceful options for disarmament had been exhausted”, in particular that diplomatic overtures to secure a security council authorisation at the United Nations had not been extinguished.
He said the U.S. had dismantled the Iraqi army and the ruling Ba’ath party without consultation.
“We are not going to examine it, we are not going to try to make an analysis of it or make judgement of the findings one way or another”, a spokesman said.
He argued that many more people had died in Syria than in Iraq “when we didn’t intervene and remove the dictator”.
Mr. Blair did not establish clear ministerial oversight in planning and preparation for the war and his post-war efforts in Iraq “never matched the scale of its challenge”, the report concluded.
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Families of some of the 179 military personnel killed in Iraq described the former prime minister as a “terrorist”, and Jeremy Corbyn offered an apology on Labour’s behalf for what he branded “a stain on our party and our country”.
