oldcolner
06-07-2017, 07:32 AM
The report got lost in the result of the EU referendum probably by good design.
Speaking one year on for the first time
He says Blair was emotionally truthful ( I think that means he was a liar?)
Asked if the former prime minister had been as straight as he could have been with the country and the inquiry, Sir John told the BBC: "Any prime minister taking a country into war has got to be straight with the nation and carry it, so far as possible, with him or her. I don't believe that was the case in the Iraq instance."
He went on: "Tony Blair is always and ever an advocate. He makes the most persuasive case he can. Not departing from the truth but persuasion is everything. Advocacy for my position, 'my Blair position'."
He said the former Labour leader gave the case for war based on his own assessment of the circumstances, saying Mr Blair made the case "pinning it on my belief, not on the fact, what the assessed intelligence said."
"Tony Blair made much of, at various points, the need to exert influence on American policy making," he said.
"To do that he said in terms at one point, 'I have to accept their strategic objective, regime change, in order to exert influence.' For what purpose? To get them to alter their policy? Of course not. So in effect it was a passive strategy. Just go along."
Commenting on the documentation revealed when the Iraq Inquiry was published, Sir John revealed that his first response on reading a note sent by Mr Blair to Mr Bush in 2002 in which he told him 'I shall be with you whatever', was "you mustn't say that".
His reaction was: "You're giving away far too much. You're making a binding commitment by one sovereign government to another which you can't fulfil. You're not in a position to fulfil it. I mean he didn't even know the legal position at that point."
I wonder what Alistair Cameron's role in all this emotion was. He doesn't seem an emotional guy at all? Long may Tony squirm. He's lucky not to be getting his days in court in The Hague.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40510540
Speaking one year on for the first time
He says Blair was emotionally truthful ( I think that means he was a liar?)
Asked if the former prime minister had been as straight as he could have been with the country and the inquiry, Sir John told the BBC: "Any prime minister taking a country into war has got to be straight with the nation and carry it, so far as possible, with him or her. I don't believe that was the case in the Iraq instance."
He went on: "Tony Blair is always and ever an advocate. He makes the most persuasive case he can. Not departing from the truth but persuasion is everything. Advocacy for my position, 'my Blair position'."
He said the former Labour leader gave the case for war based on his own assessment of the circumstances, saying Mr Blair made the case "pinning it on my belief, not on the fact, what the assessed intelligence said."
"Tony Blair made much of, at various points, the need to exert influence on American policy making," he said.
"To do that he said in terms at one point, 'I have to accept their strategic objective, regime change, in order to exert influence.' For what purpose? To get them to alter their policy? Of course not. So in effect it was a passive strategy. Just go along."
Commenting on the documentation revealed when the Iraq Inquiry was published, Sir John revealed that his first response on reading a note sent by Mr Blair to Mr Bush in 2002 in which he told him 'I shall be with you whatever', was "you mustn't say that".
His reaction was: "You're giving away far too much. You're making a binding commitment by one sovereign government to another which you can't fulfil. You're not in a position to fulfil it. I mean he didn't even know the legal position at that point."
I wonder what Alistair Cameron's role in all this emotion was. He doesn't seem an emotional guy at all? Long may Tony squirm. He's lucky not to be getting his days in court in The Hague.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40510540