3.4 |
Development of UK strategy and options, late July to 14 September
2002
76.
Secretary
Powell wrote that President Bush had added:
“… if the
UN certifies to our satisfaction that there are no weapons of
mass
destruction
… that problem would be solved, but Saddam would still be in
power.
Is his
elimination worth a war?”
77.
On 12 August,
the MOD reported that President Bush had authorised
preparatory
military
activities and that the inter-agency process in Washington had been
launched.26
78.
An article
published on 15 August by General Brent Scowcroft, the former
National
Security
Advisor to President George H Bush, argued that the US should not
attack
Saddam
Hussein; it should be pressing the United Nations Security Council
to insist on
an
effective no‑notice inspection regime for Iraq.27
79.
Mr John
Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, had also told President Bush
that
“a UN
resolution was essential to win public support”.28
On 1
August, Dr Naji Sabri, the Iraqi Foreign Minister wrote to
Mr Kofi Annan, UN
Secretary‑General
proposing a further round of technical talks in Baghdad between
Iraqi
technical
experts and UNMOVIC:
“… to
review what was accomplished in disarmament issues between May
1991
until
December 1998, to look into the remaining issues … included in the
report
of
Ambassador Amorim to the Security Council on 30 March 1999, and to
study
and assess
their importance and decide upon measures to resolve them when
the
inspection
team returns to Iraq.”29
Dr Sabri
wrote that the aim to reach “common ground on the scientific and
practical
criteria
that will be adopted to treat and resolve what UNMOVIC might see as
pending
issues”.
That would
be part of the process “to progress towards a comprehensive
solution
and
concurrent implementation of all the requirements of relevant
Security Council
resolutions”.
On 12
August, Mr Mohammed Saeed al‑Sahhaf, the Iraqi Information
Minister was
reported to
have rejected calls for weapons inspectors to return to Iraq on the
grounds that
their work
had been completed.30
Mr Sahhaf
was also reported to have said that it was
“a ‘lie’
that Iraq still had weapons of mass destruction”.
26
Letter
Davies to Wechsberg, 12 August 2002, ‘Iraq: US Contingency
Planning’.
27
Wall Street
Journal, 15 August
2002, Don’t
Attack Saddam.
28
Bush
GW. Decision
Points. Virgin
Books, 2010.
29
BBC
News, 2 August
2002, Iraq’s
letter to the United Nations.
30
BBC
News, 12 August
2002, Iraqi
Minister rejects inspections.
107