1.2 | Development of UK strategy and options, September 2000 to September 2001

140. Mr Patey responded to Mr Brummell the following day, stating:

“Underlying this assessment there are different shades of view as to the likelihood

of a grave humanitarian crisis … We are urgently consulting Ministers on

this question.”81

141. On 1 February, Mr Goulty advised the Private Offices of Mr Cook and Sir John Kerr:

“The Attorney General has said he approves the target of a proposed US/UK attack

north of the southern No-Fly Zone … but only on the basis of a specific assurance

from the FCO, which we cannot honestly give. The JIC assessment of 13 December

2000 reflects our views, but the Attorney General regards this as insufficient. Our

failure to join in this attack would risk a major disagreement with the US on the eve

of the Foreign Secretary’s visit to Washington, and increase the threat to our pilots

in the SNFZ.

“The Attorney General’s position on the target reflects his long-standing concerns

about the continued legality of the SNFZ, and his wish to revisit this question as

soon as possible.”82

142. Emphasising the urgency of the issue, Mr Goulty recommended:

“… that the Foreign Secretary speak to the Defence Secretary with the aim of a joint

approach to the Attorney General to persuade him to approve this target on political

and military grounds, without prejudice to his urgent re-examination of the legal

basis of the SNFZ. Legal Advisers concur.”

143. Mr Goulty also advised that the Cabinet Office had been asked “to convene

urgently the official committee on Iraq to review what assessment might properly be

given to the Attorney General”.

144. Sir John Kerr wrote to Mr Cook’s Private Office, endorsing Mr Goulty’s proposal

and commenting:

“I think the Dep[artmen]t, and the Legal Advisers, are right, on the wider issue of

the legality of the SNFZ, that we cannot allow the Attorney to put in our mouths a

‘categorical assurance’ … about which we can’t honestly be categorical. But he

knows what he’s doing: his motive is his concern to secure a real review of the basis

of the SNFZ. So I agree with the proposal for a Hoon/Cook approach, from which

he would get an undertaking that such a review would start forthwith, Hoon would

in exchange get the removal of an impossible condition on the AG’s authorisation of

the target, and the SofS [Secretary of State] would get the removal of the risk that,

just as he has his first meeting with [Secretary] Powell, politico-military Washington

believes the UK has gone soft on Iraq.”

81 Letter Patey to Brummell, 31 January 2001, [untitled].

82 Minute Goulty to PS/PUS [FCO] and PS [FCO], 1 February 2001, ‘Iraq: Southern No Fly Zone’.

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