Responding to the claim reported in an interview with Jonathan Dimbleby,
Bremer said; "I don't know where those words come from but that is not what
David Kay [ head of the Iraq Survey Group ] has said".
Bremer, explaining that he was not making his assessment from a position of
ignorance, added, "I have read his reports so I don't know who said that".
Dismissing the claim as absurd, Bremer was highly critical of
the allegation; "It sounds like a bit of a red herring to me. It sounds like
someone who doesn't agree with the policy sets up a red herring then knocks it
down".
Oh dear ... if only he'd known at the time that the claim had come from
Britain's Prime Minister, Tony Blair.
Faced with excruciating embarrassment when the source of the claim was revealed,
having stubbornly refused to let Dimbleby interrupt him to let him know he
was about to put his foor firmly in his mouth, Bremer back-pedalled furiously
trying to salvage the situation; "There is actually a lot of evidence that had
been made public".
So who's lying ? Blair when he claims the ISG have said something which Bremer
says they did not, or Bremer when he claims he knows what's in the ISG report
and that Blair's claim is not supported by it ?
In all likelihood, both of them. They are each trying to spin the current
situation in Iraq to suit their own agenda and the first casualty in war is
always the truth, and in the case of the war on Iraq, the truth was a casualty
well before fighting on the ground got underway. But there is no reason to
suspect that Bremer would bury any evidence which the US could use to justify
its warmongering.
As Bush is carried along on a wave of populist support in America generated
by the right-wing media, the reason for the war on Iraq has been turned from
protecting the US from imminent dangers of WMD to being the overthrow of
Saddam and his regime. The rewriting of history is designed to steer the Bush
campaign through to another election victory, and the original reason for going
to war has been conveniently forgotten.
While Americans will often loyally support their Presidents no matter what
they decide to do, and quite reasonably will grasp at anything which
justifies their decision to give their support, Blair has no such luxury.
The people in Britain were far from convinced that signing up to the US led
venture was the right thing to do, and the only legal justification that Blair
could find, and which Parliament reluctantly supported him on, was military
action to rid Iraq of WMD. The presence of that WMD is therefore crucial to
legitimising Britain's involvement in the war on Iraq.
Blair is desperate to find evidence of WMD to give his argument to go to
war the legitimacy it needs, and yet it stubbornly refuses to materialise.
The US appears to have accepted that WMD won't be found and glosses over the
fact that it may never have existed by retrospectively moving the goal posts
and spinning the event as a victory, no matter what.
It is becoming increasingly obvious that the coalition is no longer singing
from the same hymn sheet, and many suspect that Blair has been hung out to dry.
Britain served its part, but the US no longer has any real need of her help;
mission accomplished, thanks for the assistance, but goodbye. Many had warned
that the 'special relationship' was shallow and a one-way conduit, and it would
seem that they were right.
Relationships between Downing Street and Washington were reported to be at an
all time low before this latest incident, and the Blair-Bremer double act will
have done nothing to smooth ruffled feathers. Bush was apparently furious that
Blair jumped the gun and declared to the world that Saddam had been captured
before Bush could claim that glory and prestige for himself, and there is
still lingering resentment that falsified intelligence from the UK came close
to jeopardising America's crusade against Saddam. It is
well known that there is friction between the two heads of state over how
British detainees are being treated in Guantanamo and Britain's stubborn
refusal to accept that the death penalty is acceptable, or proposed military
tribunals meet judicial concerns.
To the American Administration, Blair must look like a loose cannon who is
proving to be a major embarrassment to himself and America. Bush needs the issue
of WMD swept under the carpet as quickly and as quietly as possible lest that
should come back to haunt him at the polls, but it is the issue which is at the
core of how the British people will judge Blair. Blair has dug himself into a
hole over what the US Administration now sees as a non-issue, and they will not
want to help pull him out if it compromises their own plans for the future.
Bush must surely be completely flabbergasted that Blair is still worrying about
whether WMD existed or not, and can probably not understand why Blair has failed
to swing the people round like he has in America. To Bush, Blair must
look like an incompetent.
Bush clearly has no comprehension as to just how little support there was for
the war on Iraq within Britain and from the rest of the world, and has failed to
understand that Blair really did put his head on the block when he volunteered
for the role of Bush's poodle. Or he simply doesn't care.
Blair should be realising by now that he simply played the part of the
sacrificial lamb and has been discarded now his services are done with. He went
out on a limb and is there on his own. He is desperately trying to build himself
a safety net before he falls, but his lies and deceit are being undermined and
revealed, even by those he had hoped would be there to save him.
As 2004 opens, reports from the Hutton Inquiry into Dr Kelly's death and from
the Iraq Survey Group will be published. Blair's back will once again be against
the wall and he will be fighting for his political career. He has been abandoned
by Washington and has few friends at home or in Europe.
Blair may one day realise why the Anti-War lobby was against him, and he may
have to accept that what they warned of has come to pass. He may finally see
that he was suckered into supporting Bush and his Neo-Con agenda, and that his
fawning love affair was one-sided. In his clamour to become a world statesman,
rushing around the globe while his master put his feet up in the Oval Office,
he prostituted himself for little more than a pat on the head. So desperate was
he to do his master's bidding that he was prepared to lie to those who had
elected him, and now he must face the consequences.
Discarded by those he brown-nosed on the world's stage, he is left isolated and
alone. He is in a position of his own making. He is a sad and pathetic figure,
who has soured Britain's relationship with much of the world.
As Jim Royale would put it - world statesman; my arse.
