The latest chapter of "How pathetic is Tony Blair"?

Tony Blair (with his Commander-in-Chief): A man with bad judgment on Iraq, or totally irresponsible?

The Times of London (a Murdoch property) reports on what Tony Blair says about the Iraq War in a new BBC documentary, Tony Blair: ‘I wanted war – it was the right thing to do’ by Philip Webster 11/17/07:

Tony Blair has admitted for the first time that he ignored the pleas of his aides and ministers to deter President Bush from waging war on Iraq because he believed that America was doing the right thing. And he has acknowledged that he turned down a last-ditch offer from Mr Bush to pull Britain out of the conflict. ...

In frank remarks in a BBC documentary, Mr Blair confirmed openly the belief of many of his closest supporters that he never used his position as America’s strongest ally to try to force Mr Bush down the diplomatic rather than the military route.

It was never a "bargaining chip" for him and he was never looking for a way out, he told David Aaronovitch, of The Times, in interviews for The Blair Years. "It was what I believed in, and I still do believe it," he said.

Oddly, the quotation in the article title does not appear in the text of the online version.

I think if I were a British voter, this would tick me off worse than anything else in the article:

The programme also reveals that just before the key Commons vote on war Mr Bush telephoned Mr Blair and offered him a way out. Mr Blair explained why he had declined the offer: "He was always very cognisant of the difficulty I had. He was determined we should not end up with the regime change being in Britain and he was saying to me, 'Look I understand this is very difficult and America can do this militarily on its own and if you want to stick out of it, stick out of it', and I was equally emphatic we should not do that."

That's amazing in more ways than one. First, Blair was reassured by his Commander-in-Chief Bush that Britain's help wasn't needed. At least according to Blair; it does sound odd considering the US position was that any one Bush ordered to participate in the "coalition" was expected to do so. But it could have been a ploy to set up an excuse to cut British oil companies out of the expected postwar bonanza. Which may materialize someday, if we ever get to a "postwar" period.

Secondly, it's stunning that Blair is claiming he was told that Bush didn't expect him to do this, and that "America can do this militarily on its own". And yet Blair insisted on sending British troops to fight in that war, to kill and die in a conflict where Commander-in-Chief Bush said Britain's help was not militarily necessary. Opting out would have saved British lives and avoided the additional enmity toward Britain in the Muslim world they incurred by tagging along with the Americans. It also would have enhanced Blair's image in the European Union, allowing him to show that he was sticking with his European partners on this issues that was not essential to British security.

It's always tempting to assume that when a national and/or world leader makes an historic decision like this, there's some elaborate political or economic or strategic reason for it. It's easy to forget that even exceptionally talented leaders sometimes just do stupid things. (See Citibank and Merrill Lynch on the subprime mortgage fiasco, to name only the two largest companies whose CEO's have so far resigned over the mess.)

Maybe Tony Blair was just a fool about the Iraq War. At the very minimum, he seemed to be so dogmatically attached to what has been the general British policy since the Suez Crisis of 1956 of not getting caught on the other side of the US on a major diplomatic issue, that he saw nothing else he could do.

This also gives us another piece of evidence relevant to the timeline on the war decision suggested by the Downing Street Memo and other material, suggesting that Bush and Blair had decided on war in the first half of 2002 (though it could have been earlier). Nothing in the Times article directly confirms that timeline. But if Blair was so committed to the war and supporting Cheney and Bush that he would even turn down an excellent opportunity to keep Britain out of the direct combat, it certainly lends credence to the notion of any early decision for war.

Tags: downing street memo, iraq war, tony blair