The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
237.
In an
interview for the Financial
Times published on
its website on 9 December,
Mr Blair
was reported to have stated that war with Iraq was “plainly not
inevitable”
if Saddam
Hussein complied, but:
“… you
would have to be somewhat naive not to be sceptical about the
likelihood of
his
compliance, given his past history … If he fails to co‑operate,
either in any false
declaration
or in refusing access to the sites, or interviewing witnesses, or
any of the
rest of it,
then that is a breach. And in those circumstances, my understanding
is that
the United
Nations are very clear that there should [be] action.
“As for a
second resolution, we said we would go back for a discussion
…
“We want to
do this with the maximum international support and I believe
that
support
will be there … in my view it is clear and right that if Saddam is
in breach
then we
have to impose by conflict, that which we would have preferred to
impose
by the will
of the UN and the inspectors.”76
238.
Asked if he
was saying he did not need a second resolution to take military
action,
Mr Blair
replied:
“If we get
to a situation … where there is a clear breach and … someone puts
an
unreasonable
block … on it [action] … as we have seen before … over Kosovo
you
cannot say
there are no set of circumstances in which you would ever refuse to
act,
because in
my view if he breaches and the UN does nothing, then the authority
of
the UN is
then hugely weakened. But I don’t believe that will
happen.
“I believe
that at the heart of that UN resolution is really a deal … which
said …
the US
and the UK and those who feel really strongly about the threat that
Saddam
and weapons
of mass destruction pose, they are prepared to go the UN route,
to
bring
everyone together … we will put in the inspectors and give him the
chance
to comply.
We’ll go back to the UN route as the way of enforcing this, then
the quid
pro quo is
… if he then having been given the chance to do the right thing
does the
wrong
thing, we are not going to walk away from it.”
239.
Mr Blair
also emphasised the threat posed by WMD and the “enormous”
potential
for them to
“fall into the hands of either unstable states or terrorist
groups”.
240.
During a
discussion of the deficiencies in Iraq’s declaration between
Mr Straw and
Secretary
Powell on 11 December, and in response to probing about the
statement that
“a
deficient declaration would be enough” to warrant action,
Mr Straw told Secretary
Powell that
he did not think Mr Blair had “gone beyond the well rehearsed
UK lines on
76
Financial
Times, 9
December 2002, Tony Blair
on the Iraq crisis and the Middle East.
77
Letter
McDonald to Manning, 11 December 2002, ‘US Secretary of
State’.
44