The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
no
difference. Saddam had already had years to comply.” Asked “one
last time how
he planned
to vote”, President Lagos had “said no”.
236.
Mr Campbell
wrote that President Bush had apologised for Secretary
Rumsfeld’s
comments,
describing them as “one of those attempts to be helpful that
wasn’t
237.
Mr Campbell
added that President Bush had described his latest telephone
calls
with
President Fox and President Lagos as “difficult”; that they “had to
give us their
votes”; and
that “we had to get this over with”. President Bush was “determined
we could
not let the
date slip”.
238.
The record of
the conversation confirms Mr Campbell’s
account.81
239.
Mr Campbell
also wrote:
•
When
Mr Blair had “said we needed to hold their feet to the fire”,
President Bush
had
responded that he was “waiting your instructions. If it falls apart
I’m going
to make a
speech to the American people saying I tried, and now Saddam
has
forty-eight
hours to leave the country.”
•
Mr Blair
“still felt Chile would come round and not walk away”.
•
President
Bush “felt seven days was too big a stretch to give them …
Congress
was getting
restless and all the polls were showing criticism of the UN
for
inaction.
‘We just got to go.’”
•
Mr Blair
had “said we had to do something to change the diplomatic weather
and
get on the
front foot but if we can’t get anything, we’re in real trouble and
there is
no point in
pushing the UN beyond what it will take”.
•
President
Bush said “We know he’s not going to disarm. We already
had
benchmarks.”
He had told President Lagos “it was time to stand up and
be
counted. I
want your vote. He said no.”
•
Mr Blair
said he would speak to President Lagos again, and that “a week’s
delay
was the top
end for us”. If we were “on the front foot” it would be possible to
gain
altitude
again.
•
President
Bush “said these guys [Presidents Fox and Lagos] were just
playing
for time.
He felt maybe we stand up on Thursday [13 March] and say there
could
be no new
UNSCR, that it had failed in its mission …”
80
Campbell A
& Hagerty B. The
Alastair Campbell Diaries. Volume 4. The Burden of Power:
Countdown
to Iraq.
Hutchinson,
2012.
81
Letter
Cannon to McDonald, 11 March 2003, ‘Iraq: Prime Minister’s
Conversations with Bush and Lagos,
11
March’.
440