Short Too Little, Too Late

Today's papers, at least those that can drag themselves away from over-rated, over-priced footballers, are dominated by the evidence of two ex-ministers to the inquiry into the government's unsubstantiated claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Robin Cook's revelations were largely unsurprising - little more than additional detail supporting statements he made at the time. Clare Short's were rather different.

At the height of the build up to the Iraqi invasion, Cook took what many of us saw as an honourable stand. He declared that he saw no evidence of the need for war, and could not be part of a government that would go to war anyway. Cook's resignation was the brave stand of a principled man, and has endeared him to many in this country. Short, on the contrary, declared publicly that if Britain went to war without a second UN resolution she would resign. We went to war, and she quietly stayed. Okay, she resigned eventually, citing Iraq; but only after it had become clear that she was to be fired anyway. Her resignation was a clear case of too little, too late.

Now we have the Clare Short roadshow rolling into the foreign affairs select committee inquiry. She has claimed that Blair promised the US unconditional support for its invasion, that he told half-truths, exaggerations and what she quaintly referred to as "reassurances that were not the case", that leading intelligence figures were opposed to the war. All exciting stuff, and damning if true. The citation that the intelligence community was opposed to war is difficult for the Government to dispute. Claims that she was not in possession of the full facts won't be enough here - unless she is lying, those with full access to the intelligence did not believe the Government claims.

The problem is, why now? If Short was in possession of such damning evidence, why wait until it can't do any possible good to speak out? Even her half-hearted threat to resign was based around the authority of the UN, not the non-existence of the weapons that were the supposed reason for war. In careful parliamentary language, Short yesterday accused Blair of lying to get us into Iraq. She cited briefings from "senior intelligence figures" as her evidence. Her claim is that she knew, before the war, that we were being lied to.

So why not speak out then? Surely, if Short knew that the Prime Minister was lying to get us into war, her only principled option was to tell us? Her failure to do so suggests one of two possibilities. Either her position was more important to her than the murder of thousands of Iraqis, or she is exaggerating her knowledge now. Contrast Short's aggressive, personal attack on Blair with Cook's more measured performance, Short's vision of Blair as megalomaniac, lying to the world, with Cook's blundering Prime Minister, clutching at thin straws to prop up his already decided world view. Which seems more convincing?

It is difficult to see Short's behaviour as other than self-serving. Her performance seems calculated to make her once more the darling of the left-wing media and self-appointed conscience of the Labour party. Her attacks are aimed solely at dragging Blair out of office, clearing the way for Brown's rise to the Premiership and her own return to the cabinet. Yet her attacks are so over the top that they are detracting attention from the equally damning comments of Robin Cook. And the viciously personal nature of Short's comments make her attack far easier for number ten to deal with - brushing her comments aside as mere sour grapes.

So let us also ignore Clare Short, and concentrate instead on the really damning evidence. Robin Cook's claims of number ten having a "fixation with weapons of mass destruction" and the "selection of evidence to support a conclusion" are damning on their own. Combine it with the other details to emerge recently, and the evidence for deception, both here and in America becomes compelling. The CIA knew for months before the war that there was no link between Hussein and Al Qaeda. A British government ordered investigation has confirmed that the "mobile germ factories" which form the only evidence to date of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were in fact used for producing hydrogen to fill balloons. Eliza Manningham-Buller, head of MI5, has stated that it is only a matter of time before a "dirty bomb" is set off in a western city, and that Al Qaeda were given this capacity, not recently by Iraq, but by rogue Pakistani scientists before 11th September 2001. Since 2001, Pakistan has arrested over 450 suspected members of Al Qaeda and related organisations.

Where does this leave us? We have been shown no evidence to justify the war. Many of those who have seen the full evidence were not convinced, including "senior members of the intelligence services". The only evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction turns out to have been a balloon filling machine. And the head of MI5 claims the greatest single threat is still Al Qaeda, who appear to be active primarily on the borders of Pakistan. The invasion of Iraq is appearing every day to be exactly what many of us believed it to be in the first place - an expensive and unnecessary distraction from the real problem of stopping international terrorism. And that distraction is far from over - despite the reported end of the war, reports come in every day of skirmishes between US troops and Iraqis, while much of the country remains ungoverned and lawless.

Cook's description of the Prime Minister's "monumental blunder" is compelling, and every day further evidence piles up to support his version of events. We need an independent inquiry with the power to uncover how this blunder happened. We need an admission of their mistakes from our leaders. And we need a prime minister we can trust not to make such fundamental mistakes again.

Graham Robinson. 18th June 2003.

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