THE CASE FOR WAR

Today the British version of the Senate Intelligence Committe report comes out, and the rumour is that the "Butler report" is going to be very critical of the British decision to go to war and possibly of Tony Blair. That's fine, and just as we think they should stay out of our debate, we should probably stay out of theirs. But I do want to make one point before the communitariat and the chattering classes get well and truly rolling.

It is often said that President Bush was not clear enough and eloquent enough about the humanitarian case for the war in Iraq. I think that's true. I don't think he waited to make those arguments until it became clear that the WMD stocks weren't there, but he certainly did not front, or elaborate on, those arguments as powerfully as he could have or, in my opinion, should have.

But the same absolutely and positively cannot be said of Tony Blair. It amazes me how often it is said that Tony Blair did not make the humanitarian case for war. That is, to put it as simply as possible, false. He made that case regularly, powerfully, and eloquently.

The speech that he made to the Labour Party conference -- many of whose delegates were overtly hostile to the idea of British participation in a war in Iraq -- the same day that hundreds of thousands were to march against the war in London was one of the most powerful defenses for a purely humanitarian justifications for war (and one of the best indictments of the anti-war movement) made at any point during the pre-war debate.

And today, when I suspect we are about to hear a great deal about how an indictiment of Tony Blair's WMD justification for war is an indictment of Britain's participation in the war at all, would be a good time to look over that section of the speech in its entirety.

If I am honest about it, there is another reason why I feel so strongly about this issue. It is a reason less to do with my being Prime Minister than being a member of the Labour Party, to do with the progressive politics in which we believe. The moral case against war has a moral answer: it is the moral case for removing Saddam. It is not the reason we act. That must be according to the United Nations mandate on Weapons of Mass Destruction. But it is the reason, frankly, why if we do have to act, we should do so with a clear conscience.

Yes, there are consequences of war. If we remove Saddam by force, people will die and some will be innocent. And we must live with the consequences of our actions, even the unintended ones.

But there are also consequences of "stop the war".

If I took that advice, and did not insist on disarmament, yes, there would be no war. But there would still be Saddam. Many of the people marching will say they hate Saddam. But the consequences of taking their advice is that he stays in charge of Iraq, ruling the Iraqi people. A country that in 1978, the year before he seized power, was richer than Malaysia or Portugal. A country where today, 135 out of every 1000 Iraqi children die before the age of five - 70% of these deaths are from diarrhoea and respiratory infections that are easily preventable. Where almost a third of children born in the centre and south of Iraq have chronic malnutrition.

Where 60% of the people depend on Food Aid.

Where half the population of rural areas have no safe water.

Where every year and now, as we speak, tens of thousands of political prisoners languish in appalling conditions in Saddam's jails and are routinely executed.

Where in the past 15 years over 150,000 Shia Moslems in Southern Iraq and Moslem Kurds in Northern Iraq have been butchered; with up to four million Iraqis in exile round the world, including 350,000 now in Britain.

This isn't a regime with Weapons of Mass Destruction that is otherwise benign. This is a regime that contravenes every single principle or value anyone of our politics believes in.

There will be no march for the victims of Saddam, no protests about the thousands of children that die needlessly every year under his rule, no righteous anger over the torture chambers which if he is left in power, will be left in being.

I rejoice that we live in a country where peaceful protest is a natural part of our democratic process.

But I ask the marchers to understand this.

I do not seek unpopularity as a badge of honour. But sometimes it is the price of leadership. And the cost of conviction.

But as you watch your TV pictures of the march, ponder this:

If there are 500,000 on that march, that is still less than the number of people whose deaths Saddam has been responsible for.

If there are one million, that is still less than the number of people who died in the wars he started.

Let me read from an e-mail that was sent by a member of the family of one of those four million Iraqi exiles. It is interesting because she is fiercely and I think wrongly critical of America. But in a sense for that reason, it is worth reading.

She addresses it to the anti-war movement.

In one part, she says:

"You may feel that America is trying to blind you from seeing the truth about their real reasons for an invasion. I must argue that in fact, you are still blind to the bigger truths in Iraq.

Saddam has murdered more than a million Iraqis over the past 30 years, are you willing to allow him to kill another million Iraqis?

Saddam rules Iraq using fear - he regularly imprisons, executes and tortures the mass population for no reason whatsoever - this may be hard to believe and you may not even appreciate the extent of such barbaric acts, but believe me you will be hard pressed to find a family in Iraq who have not had a son, father, brother killed, imprisoned, tortured and/or "disappeared" due to Saddam's regime.

Why it is now that you deem it appropriate to voice your disillusions with America's policy in Iraq, when it is right now that the Iraqi people are being given real hope, however slight and however precarious, that they can live in an Iraq that is free of its horrors?"

We will give the e-mail to delegates. Read it all. It is the reason why I do not shrink from action against Saddam if it proves necessary. Read the letter sent to me by Dr Safa Hashim, who lives here in Glasgow, and who says he is writing despite his fears of Iraqi retribution.

He says the principle of opposing war by the public is received warmly by Iraqis for it reveals the desire of people to avoid suffering. But he says it misses the point - because the Iraqi people need Saddam removed as a way of ending their suffering.

Dr Hashim says:

"The level of their suffering is beyond anything that British people can possible envisage, let alone understand his obsession to develop and possess weapons of mass destruction. Do the British public know that it is normal practice for Saddam's regime to demand the cost of the bullet used of in the execution of their beloved family members and not even to allow a proper funeral?

If the international community does not take note of the Iraqi people's plight but continues to address it casually this will breed terrorism and extremism within the Iraqi people. This cannot be allowed to happen".

Remember Kosovo where we were told war would de-stabilise the whole of the Balkans and that region now has the best chance of peace in over 100 years?

Remember Afghanistan, where now, despite all the huge problems, there are three million children in school, including for the first time in over two decades one and a half million girls and where two million Afghan exiles from the Taliban have now returned.

So if the result of peace is Saddam staying in power, not disarmed, then I tell you there are consequences paid in blood for that decision too. But these victims will never be seen. They will never feature on our TV screens or inspire millions to take to the streets. But they will exist nonetheless.

Ridding the world of Saddam would be an act of humanity. It is leaving him there that is in truth inhumane.

And if it does come to this, let us be clear: we should be as committed to the humanitarian task of rebuilding Iraq for the Iraqi people as we have been to removing Saddam.

And, courtesy of the Labour Party, are the two emails he refers to in their entirety.

Comments

[Athena]

I think Bush has done a poor job at communicating the humanitarian justifications for war, but I often wonder if that also has to do with the audience of the American public in general?

Perhaps I'm being critical of the American people, but do we have a collective memory allows us to focus heavily on "moral" crises? My first inclination is that we do not.

I wrote some time ago, "I would think the humanitarian issues would be enough cause for intervention for 'sensitive' people who decry the war.

But I guess that's the case only when you think America stands to lose nothing in the process of a greater good.

Your idealism shouldn't be a flag that you wave only when the wind is blowing in your perceived favor."

And I realize this can be argued for both Left and Right.

And God Bless Tony Blair, "I do not seek unpopularity as a badge of honour. But sometimes it is the price of leadership. And the cost of conviction."

[dauber]

Well, Pres. Clinton made arguments that both Bosnia and Kosovo were national interest interventions. But I don't really think anyone bought those arguments in a big way.

[Richard Meixner]

Thanks, Cori, for posting some of the prime minister's eloquent words about why Iraq under Saddam was a problem. As the unfolding oil-for-food-kickbacks story reveals, the problems extend into many places, not least, the UN. Sometimes I wish I could just cry my way into an exhausted oblivion...