06-10-2003 16:58									#1
	Blair admitted that Saddam had no usable WMD Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

For those who still think that the iraqi war was about finding WoMD:

quote: Cook: 'Blair admitted to me that Saddam had no usable WMD' By Colin Brown, Political Editor (Filed: 05/10/2003) Tony Blair privately admitted that Saddam Hussein could not attack British or United States troops with chemical or biological weapons two weeks before Britain went to war against Iraq, Robin Cook alleges today. The claim by the former foreign secretary that the Prime Minister misled Parliament and committed Britain to an illegal war is made in his memoirs, which he sold to The Sunday Times for a reputed £400,000. Mr Cook recalls how he was given an intelligence briefing on Iraq by John Scarlett, the chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, who has since given evidence to the Hutton Inquiry. Mr Cook said: "The presentation was impressive in its integrity and shorn of the political slant with which No 10 encumbers any intelligence assessment. "My conclusion at the end of an hour is that Saddam probably does not have weapons of mass destruction in the sense of weapons that could be used against large-scale civilian targets." Two weeks later, on March 5, Mr Cook discussed the Scarlett briefing with Mr Blair. Mr Cook told Mr Blair he doubted Saddam had weapons of mass destruction that could strike strategic cities, but he might have battlefield weapons which could be used against British and US troops. "[Blair replied]: 'Yes, but all the effort he has had to put into concealment makes it difficult for him to assemble them quickly for use.' " Those remarks appeared to contradict directly the assertion in the September Iraq dossier that Saddam could make his WMD ready for use in 45 minutes - the claim at the centre of the allegations by the BBC that led ultimately to the death of Dr David Kelly, the Government's weapons expert who killed himself shortly after appearing before the Commons foreign affairs select committee. Mr Cook continues: "There were two distinct elements to this exchange that sent me away deeply troubled. The first was that the timetable to war was plainly not driven by the progress of the UN weapons inspections. Tony made no attempt to pretend that what Hans Blix [the chief UN weapons inspector] might report would make any difference to the countdown to invasion. "The second troubling element to our conversation was that Tony did not try to argue me out of the view that Saddam did not have real weapons of mass destruction that were designed for strategic use against city populations and capable of being delivered with reliability over long distances." Mr Cook also discloses that Mr Blair told him the US President George W Bush wanted to go to war in September last year, but was restrained by Mr Blair from doing so. Mr Cook also discloses details of Cabinet discussions at which ministers raised serious concerns about the looming conflict. However, more surprisingly, Mr Cook claims that Gordon Brown, previously thought to be a sceptic about the war, delivered a "long and passionate statement of support" of the Prime Minister's strategy at a Cabinet meeting on March 13. As Mr Blair flew home last night from an EU summit in Rome, a Downing Street spokesman said: "The idea that the Prime Minister ever said that Saddam Hussein did not have WMD is absurd."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai.../05/ncook05.xml

	06-10-2003 17:01									#2
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funny stuff

	06-10-2003 17:03									#3
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In a related article from the same The Telegraph, more details about Cook's allegations:

quote: 'Bush wanted to start the war last September,' Blair told me (Filed: 05/10/2003) In his memoirs, Robin Cook reveals the twists and turns of the Prime Minister's influence over American policy on Iraq, reports Colin Brown Robin Cook claims in his memoirs that Tony Blair told him that President George W Bush wanted to go to war against Saddam Hussein in September 2002, but was dissuaded from doing so by the Prime Minister. In his new book, serialised today in The Sunday Times, Mr Cook reveals that the President wanted to go to war six months before the attacks were actually launched. On March 5 this year, Mr Cook saw Mr Blair privately after Prime Minister's questions. "I started by observing that he'd gone out on a limb and the first piece of advice that I would offer is that he had to stop climbing further out on it, especially on Friday when Hans Blix presents his next report to the UN. 'Britain has got to be seen on-side with Blix. If he needed months, we should be prepared to give him until autumn.' "Tony was quite frank that he could not deliver that: 'I don't know if I could do that. Left to himself, Bush would have gone to war in January. No, not January, but back in September.' " Mr Cook also says that an "electrifying" report by Hans Blix, the UN arms inspector, failing to identify any evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq was a "nightmare come true" for Tony Blair. His memoirs describe in intimate detail how the former Foreign Secretary opposed the march to war by Mr Blair in private meetings and Cabinet committees. Mr Cook says Mr Blair struggled to justify his conduct "as Sancho Panza to George Bush's Don Quixote". He describes how, on February 6, at a Cabinet meeting, Jack Straw, his replacement as Foreign Secretary, was "beaming with satisfaction" about the success of Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, over his presentation to the UN security council the day before. "However, in a comment which revealed the thin ice on which we are skating, he began with the admission that: 'Powell's presentation went better than I or Powell expected'," Mr Cook wrote. "One issue on which we may have already fallen through the ice is on the rather laboured attempts to prove that Saddam and al-Qaeda are in the same camp despite the mountain of evidence that they heartily loathe each other. "Tony, who has made much of trying to merge Saddam and world terrorism in the public mind, half acknowledged the poverty of evidence when he described it as a 'changing picture' with the two thrown together on the principle that 'my enemy's enemy is my friend'." He adds that there never was a "shred of evidence" found linking Saddam to al-Qaeda, despite a desperate hunt for such a link. "However, leaders in both the US and the UK did not let the facts on the ground get in the way of their allegations on the airwaves," he added. "Tony was far too clever to allege that there was a real link between Saddam and al-Qaeda but he deliberately crafted a suggestive phrasing which in the minds of many viewers must have created an impression, and was designed to create the impression, that British troops were going to Iraq to fight a threat from al-Qaeda." He traces Mr Blair's support for war on Iraq to a minute in January 1998 from John Holmes, Mr Blair's then international private secretary, to the Prime Minister reminding him that he had given an assurance to the then US President, Bill Clinton, that if a resolution were achievable, "there would certainly be support here for further action". On February 20, this year, Mr Cook was given a presentation by John Scarlett, the chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee. He said: "The presentation was impressive in its integrity and shorn of the political slant with which No 10 encumbers any intelligence assessment. My conclusion at the end of an hour is that Saddam probably does not have weapons of mass destruction in the sense of weapons that could be used against large-scale civilian targets." In the midst of the preparations for war, Mr Blair also confirmed that he still wanted to hold a referendum on Britain's entry to the euro this year. On December 10 last year, Mr Cook said he was called to see Mr Blair. "I asked him if we will have a referendum on the euro next year [2003] and he replied: 'If it is up to me, yes. It is not a decision we can keep putting off. The longer we delay, the greater will be the penalty we will pay.' "I offered to make a speech attacking the euro if he thought that would help to bring Gordon [Brown] round to being more enthusiastic. Tony laughed: 'Even the Treasury officials can't find out what's going on over the economic assessment, never mind us here at No 10'."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...05/ncook105.xml

	06-10-2003 17:14									#4
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interesting . . .

I wonder what Bush will come up with to pull the wool over the eyes of his citizens in light of this.

	06-10-2003 17:25									#5
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Of course, Blair denies everything ...

quote: The allegations were rebutted by Number 10, which said: "The idea that the Prime Minister ever said that Saddam Hussein didn't have weapons of mass destruction is absurd."

	06-10-2003 17:33									#6
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The following quote is quite interesting, too:

quote: Mr Cook's allegations are contained in diary extracts taken from his book, Point of Departure, serialised in the Sunday Times. The MP, who resigned as Leader of the House of Commons over the decision to go to war, paints a picture of a Prime Minister at the mercy of the Americans, desperate to influence a belligerent White House. In doing so, Mr Blair was prepared to ignore United Nations weapons inspectors who had failed to identify any evidence of WMD. A full year before the war, the diaries record the Prime Minister as telling the Cabinet: "We must steer close to America. If we don't, we will lose our influence to shape what they do."

Poor Blair, I almost feel sorry for him. He was all the time between the hammer and the anvil.

Edit: the last 2 quotes are from:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai.../ixnewstop.html

	06-10-2003 21:35									#7
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Cook resigned much ealier this year. Why has it taken him so long to reveal this? He could have sabotaged the Prime Minister before the war. Now it just looks like he's making things up.

	06-10-2003 21:55									#8
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Shouldn't the full title of this thread read "Bush admitted Saddam had no useable WMDS says embittered and washed-up political failure with a personal axe to grind against the PM"?

I think this is the first time since 1994 that Robin Cook has been taken seriously on absolutely anything.

	06-10-2003 23:37									#9
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quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara Cook resigned much ealier this year. Why has it taken him so long to reveal this?

What did you expect? He's a politician, for christsake.

At least he took a stance resigning to protest against the war, which gives more weight to his words.

	06-10-2003 23:38									#10
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quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara Now it just looks like he's making things up.

It stinks of it.

	06-10-2003 23:46									#11
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quote: Originally posted by Tiberius At least he took a stance resigning to protest against the war, which gives more weight to his words.

Try plotting Cook's career since 1997 on a graph. It looks like the view down a black graded piste at Val d'Isere. He was a hair's breadth from being reshuffled out of the cabinet altogether, which makes me amazingly cynical about his grand sacrifice.

	07-10-2003 01:05									#12
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Although I'd tend to be a bit cynical about the whole thing, it does tend to coincide a bit with actual facts:

Saddam in fact had no deliverable WMDs, and not much evidence of still-extant programs.

Bush II clearly has had a hardon for Saddam from the get-go, and unlike Bush I, never gave much more than lip service to the idea that he gave a rat's ass about the UN, inspections, or anything else that might derail his timetable.

There are basically only two options, since Bush and Blair both tried to sell the WMD angle to death: Either the intelligence service of both the US and UK are spectacularly incompetent and completely misestimated the level of threat posed by the Iraqis and the state of their WMD programs, or the political leaders decided on a little poetic license to sell what they intended to do anyway.

Given the choice between those two, I'd both prefer and expect lying politicians.

	07-10-2003 01:29									#13
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat Given the choice between those two, I'd both prefer and expect lying politicians.

Ditto.

Clarifying, it's not that I disbelieve Cook, but his timing is terrible and it makes it appear to be more sour grapes than genuine integrity. If these statements had been made to him, I'd have expected him to have revealed them when he resigned, rather than wait 'till now, when it appears all he is doing is trying to force Blair's fall (which I'd like to see, irreguardless).

	07-10-2003 02:25									#14
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quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara If these statements had been made to him, I'd have expected him to have revealed them when he resigned, rather than wait 'till now, when it appears all he is doing is trying to force Blair's fall

When I said "What were you expecting. He's a politician" I was suggesting just about what you're saying now: that he waited for the proper moment to tell the truth, to gain the maximum benefit. Apparently the moment is now, when when Blair's popularity is falling with the iraqi war and weapons inspections scandal, accusations of lying, etc.
If he was simply honest, he would have said the whole story back then. But he's a politician and seeks some advantage out of telling the story.

Of course he is trying to force Blair's fall (not that I'd prefer Cook to Blair). I used to like Blair actually.

	07-10-2003 03:33									#15
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	07-10-2003 03:38									#16
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And what does that have to do with Britain, dumbass?

	07-10-2003 03:48									#17
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What do you guys make of the stories that two Iraqi scientists who actually cooperated with the US since April have been targeted for assassination, one successfully?

Until we actually get Saddam, we are not going to get full cooperation from former leaders of his regime. Until we do get cooperation, we are not going to know the truth, one way or the other.

	07-10-2003 03:51									#18
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quote: Originally posted by Ned What do you guys make of the stories that two Iraqi scientists who actually cooperated with the US since April have been targeted for assassination, one successfully?

Have heard nothing of the sort.

Given that his sons-in-law told the UN back in 1996, that Iraq had destroyed everything I think it unlikely anything will be found. They later went home and were executed.

	07-10-2003 03:51									#19
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What MtG said (for once)

	07-10-2003 03:55									#20
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Bad vibes, Che.
Same could apply to Brits. Someone needs to start a site.

	07-10-2003 03:58									#21
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quote: Originally posted by Ned What do you guys make of the stories that two Iraqi scientists who actually cooperated with the US since April have been targeted for assassination, one successfully? Until we actually get Saddam, we are not going to get full cooperation from former leaders of his regime. Until we do get cooperation, we are not going to know the truth, one way or the other.

Even when you get Saddam, you're not going to get full cooperation - it wasn't a one man show. And there are plenty of people in Iraq who want to send the message that cooperation with occupiers is not going to go without retaliation, regardless of WMDs. Those *******s haven't given up, and until they're all dead, they won't give up.

The truth, no, we won't know that, but we already know the threat level sold by Bush & Blair was exagerated.

	07-10-2003 04:01									#22
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quote: Originally posted by SlowwHand Bad vibes, Che. Same could apply to Brits. Someone needs to start a site.

More whiny reactionaries that can't handle the idea that everyone in the US doesn't have to goosestep in unison? Too bad for those asswipes' vision of what the US ought to be that the founding fathers had the sense to include a little thing called the First Amendment.

	07-10-2003 20:31									#23
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat More whiny reactionaries that can't handle the idea that everyone in the US doesn't have to goosestep in unison? Too bad for those asswipes' vision of what the US ought to be that the founding fathers had the sense to include a little thing called the First Amendment.

Wow -- I completely agree with MTG in this thread.