Unjustified invasion

Are our political leaders stupid or are they dishonest?  How did President Bush and Prime Minister Blair fail to understand a simple truth which millions of ordinary citizens recognised -- that their basis for invading Iraq was fatally flawed? 

Millions of people in the UK and the USA opposed the invasion, but were powerless to stop it. They objected to politicians cherry-picking flimsy 'intelligence' to justify military action that US President George W. Bush seemed determined to take, as if he felt duty-bound to complete something his father failed to do. 

Ordinary people objected to crude manipulation of the facts by politicians, manipulation which was obvious to any impartial observer. And now it seems that British officials admit they felt that the evidence did not back the case for war.

The case against invasion was clear, on moral and political grounds. Millions of people believed that military action to produce 'regime change' could not be justified. It would only result in escalating violence. Quite possibly a slippery slope to a world of mass conflict, where any crackpot leader can claim the right to bomb another country when they don't approve of the regime, or they have a score to settle. 

The day that British Prime Minister Tony Blair stated that "Weapons of Mass Destruction will be found", he lost the trust of millions of UK voters. We cannot see into the future. We live in a world of uncertainty and probabilities. Any leader who tells us with certainty what is going to happen is either deluded or dishonest. No such weapons have been found. And now Blair admits they are unlikely to be found.

One hope for the world is that western democracy has not lost the power of self-criticism and exposing deceit. We should be encouraged that the USA Senate Intelligence Committee has criticised US spy agencies for numerous failures in their reporting on alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, which helped George W. Bush build a case for war.

U.S. Senator John Rockefeller of West Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the committee, has said "The administration at all levels, and to some extent us, used bad information to bolster its case for war. And we in Congress would not have authorised that war, we would not have authorised that war, with 75 votes, if we knew what we know now," he said.

Rockefeller said the Iraq war left the United States less safe and would affect national security for generations.

"Our credibility is diminished. Our standing in the world has never been lower," he said. "We have fostered a deep hatred of Americans in the Muslim world, and that will grow. As a direct consequence, our nation is more vulnerable today than ever before."

The committee chairman, Kansas Senator Pat Roberts, said the intelligence community suffered from "collective group think" in reaching the unwarranted conclusion that Iraq was actively pursuing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs.