Ministers round on Cook over diaries serialisation

[Khephra]

Ministers round on Cook over diaries serialisation

Patrick Wintour, chief political correspondent
Monday October 6, 2003
The Guardian

The former foreign secretary, Robin Cook, was facing attacks from his former cabinet colleagues over claims in his serialised diaries that Tony Blair went to war in Iraq knowing that Saddam Hussein had no viable weapons of mass destruction.

It is the first time that Mr Cook has accused Mr Blair of knowingly misleading parliament over the threat posed by Iraq, as opposed to making a grievous misjudgment. Until now, unlike his fellow former cabinet minister Clare Short, he has gone out of his way to insist he was not accusing Mr Blair of deception.

His harsher charge of deceit led to renewed calls from the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, Menzies Campbell, for an independent inquiry into the government's decision to go to war.

In the main new allegation in the book, Mr Cook states that he was given an intelligence briefing by the joint intelligence commitee chairman, John Scarlett, on February 20 that left him convinced that "Saddam probably does not have weapons of mass destruction in the sense that weapons that could be used against large scale civilian targets".

more.....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1056777,00.html

[AP]

1. It should be noted that Cook says that the dossier was accurate and that

Blair, in September, was right to believe SH posed a threat.

Cook says that in March, just before the invasion, Blair said that SH had hidden everything and, to do so, dismantled it so that it was impossible to put it all together and use it defensively or offensively.

Cook said a few other things about Blair's motivations (that he wanted to have influence in Washington).

Cook doesn't point out, but I think it's obvriou, that by March the US had made its decision to go in and Blair's options were to state out, watch from the sidelines and, not so much lose influence over Washington, but to totally lose influence for Europe over what was going to happen in Iraq which would then mean that the US would go completely unchecked.

[Capt_Nemo]

2. No AP

Cook just says that he thinks in September Blair believed the
dossier's claims.

He never says that the dossier is accurate.

[T_i_B]

6. Take a look at the published extracts

There is a LOT of info here, but it is well worth a look.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-841557,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-841557_2,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-841557_3,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-841557_4,00.html

[tinnypriv]

7. You've read the book of his?

Can I get your advanced copy? :eyes:

[emad]

3. He's a whingeing has been, but he's right on this one, even if

if sounds like a case of sour grapes given that he is in political oblivion on the Labour backbenches right now....

One obvious point about all this public dissecion of WMDs: no one who gave evidence about them/UK intelligence gathering pre-Iraq/Dr Kelly's death in the Hutton enquiry did so under oath.

[Capt_Nemo]

4. I don't buy the sour grapes thing

It was him that broke away with the government and not the other
way round.

He is just defending his country by denouncing Blair as a neo-con
infiltrator.

[emad]

5. Blair dumped him from Foreign Secretary and made him

Leader of the House of Commons - a relatively admin post as opposed to cutting edge stuff dealing with Ariel Sharon and Koffi Annan etc. There was a time when 'old' Labour types favoured Cook as a potential future PM and they backed his tenure at the Foreign Office for over four years, where he resolutely stuck to the Clintonesque line that Saddam was a sabre-rattler who had been contained under the UN well-patrolled no-fly zone solution.

Cook was also known to be strongly anti-Bush, warning late in 2000 that the Republicans' agenda was firmly set on an invasion or Iraq before Dumbo slithered his way into office. He also said that Saddam was the world's No1 poker player when it came to hyper-bluff and that his experience as For Sec showed that most Arab states concurred with that assessment.