6-15-05,9:41am

Newly released secret documents leaked from the British government show that advisors to Tony Blair had important insights into the Bush administration’s effort to start a war with Iraq in early 2002.

The most famous of these documents is the “Downing Street Memo,” minutes taken during a meeting of Blair’s advisors in July of 2002, a full eight months before the war began. The memo was leaked to and published by the London Times last month.

At this meeting British policymakers reported on their meetings with Bush officials. One unnamed official stated: Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime’s record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.

The British foreign secretary, Jack Straw (who was appointed to his post in 2001), reported that: It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even if the timing was not yet decided. But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbours, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran. We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force.

In addition to raising concerns that the administration’s rationale for war hadn’t been proven, that “intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy,” that Saddam didn’t seem to pose the threat the administration claimed publicly, and that the White House appeared ready to circumvent the UN, British officials also expressed concerns over lack of military planning.

The document said the only way Bush and Blair could justify military action was to place Saddam Hussein in a position where he ignored or rejected a United Nations ultimatum ordering him to co-operate with the weapons inspectors.

The authenticity of this document hasn’t been doubted by credible sources.

Since this document came to light, several new British government documents have been leaked to the press. NBC News verified the documents. One paper prepared by the UK Overseas and Defense Secretariat was written for Blair in March of 2002 to discuss the government’s options. In it, the authors anticipated a lengthy campaign, a long project of nation building, and aimed to establish a “pro-Western regime.”

The paper presented alternatives to war including tougher containment policies, but doubted the US would support them as the Bush administration favored “regime change,” “distrusted” the UN-controlled containment and inspections programs, and because there appeared to be “unfinished business” from the 1991 war.

The paper also alludes to the possession of WMD by Israel and the contradiction that fact posed for Bush’s WMD argument.

The contents counter the Bush administration’s claim of Iraq’s imminent threat, its prediction of a short war and the stated aim of aiding the Iraqis in creating a sovereign and democratic state.

Another paper prepared by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office to examine legal questions at the same time did not accept the Bush administration’s interpretation of international law regarding the US’s right to assess Iraq’s breach of UN resolutions.

In mid-March, David Manning, one of Blair’s foreign policy advisors flatly explained the administration’s main reason for war, despite Bush’s public claims about WMD and Iraq’s security threat: I said you [Blair] would not budge in your support for regime change but you had to manage a press, a Parliament and a public opinion... Condi’s enthusiasm for regime change is undimmed.... Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions:... what happens on the morning after?

Manning also suggests that from his talks with Condoleezza Rice, then National Security Council head, he felt Bush wanted only to give the appearance of dealing with the UN and the question of international law in order to appease other countries that might oppose his plans on that basis.

Another memo from Peter Ricketts (Political Director, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office) to Jack Straw (UK Foreign Secretary) later that month question Bush’s motives. “For Iraq, ‘regime change’ does not stack up,” advises Manning. “It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam.”

Since regime change itself wouldn’t convince the public to support the war, it had to be scared into war, or so Rickett’s next comment implies: Much better, as you have suggested, to make the objective ending the threat to the international community from Iraqi WMD...

Ricketts then advised Straw that “US scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and Al [Q]aida is so far frankly unconvincing.”

Ricketts further warned that more investigations of Iraq’s WMD programs “will not show much advance in recent years,” including nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons.

Ricketts described convincing the public of Iraq’s imminent threat as “a problem” and warned that other countries in possession of WMD might pose a greater threat.

Rickett’s memo, along with the other documents, states plainly that British officials understood that the Bush administration was not making a straightforward case for war to the American people or the world.

For his part, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw warned the Prime Minister that “no credible evidence of a link between Iraq and UBL [Bin Laden] and Al Qaida.” In fact, Iraq, asserts Straw, posed no greater threat since 9/11.

Further, Straw points out that the administration simply had no explanation as to how regime change, Bush’s real reason for war, would be “secured” nor how a new regime would be any better.

Clearly, an investigation into what the administration knew about Iraq’s WMD program, the fabrication of a link between Iraq and Al-Qaida, the manipulation of public support for war, and whether or not Bush used every measure to avoid war, as he has claimed, is warranted.

So far 1,700 US soldiers and tens of thousands, even as many as 100,000 Iraqis have suffered for this egregious display of politicking, manipulation of facts and fabrication of rationale in order to build public support, and cynicism. It is clear that a serious crime has been committed and the truth must be brought to light.

For more information and to read the documents, go to . To join the effort to publicize the documents and to call for a congressional investigation, go to . To sign a petition demanding an investigation into these facts, see .



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