Tony Blair 10

The US / UK road to Iraq and the corrupting influence of the Anglo-American “special relationship”
By Christopher King

10 December 2008

Christopher King examines the corrosive effects of the Anglo-American “special relationship” on British politics and argues that, if Britain is to safeguard its civil liberties, democracy and independence, it must bring former Prime Minister Tony Blair to account for that ultimate symbol of the “special relationship”, the Iraq war.

You might have heard of the current political row in the British Parliament. The government set in motion an anti-terrorist police action in which Member of Parliament Damian Green’s office in the House of Commons was searched without a warrant. Allegedly, he received information relating to national security which was, in fact, a leak from a government employee that is embarrassing to the government but not even a criminal offence. The police used a catch-all law that they use to harass civil service employees who upset the government. Particularly if you are not British, you might wonder what the fuss is about. This is the tip of an immense political iceberg that connects the United Kingdom to the behaviour of the United States in Iraq, Afghanistan and now Pakistan.It is not immediately obvious, but the UK has reached the political point at which, in 1793, France removed the heads of its ruling class. Fundamental decisions need to be made. England had an earlier revolution led by Oliver Cromwell, which became a civil war with, in 1649, removal of the head of the king, Charles I. That revolution achieved only marginal gains. Although Parliament won the power struggle and established its ascendancy, the monarchy was restored and continues to have great symbolic power. It was during that 17th century conflict that the doors of Parliament were slammed shut in the face of the king, who was refused admittance. The same struggle between Parliament and the executive re-surfaced last week with the unauthorized entry of the police into a weak Parliament that has lost its identity and its way. On Monday 8 December I watched the government win a vote in Parliament to postpone an investigation of Mr Green’s arrest and the search of his office. Those members who voted in favour did not return to the chamber to hear the outcome. I believe that they were ashamed and if not, they should have been. I have said previously that the British Parliament is politically corrupt and this is further evidence that it is concerned with interests other than the best interests of the UK.Because of the rot at its centre, the country is economically disintegrating – ethical collapse having already occurred. The crisis identifiably dates from Parliament’s vote on the Iraq war. Members followed Anthony Blair who had taken upon himself the royal prerogative to decide for war or peace. Individual members considered Iraq to be, in an infamous phrase, “a country far away, about which little is known”. They considered that it did not matter, that they could vote on the basis of personal interests and allegiances. Issues of war and peace, life and death always matter. Consequently, it is now obvious that Parliament was disastrously wrong in that decision but is unable to admit it. It has continued to assert that Anthony Blair’s and George Bush’s invasion of Iraq (on which I concentrate for clarity) was right and legal when the whole world and Parliament itself knows that it was not. That inner conflict and lack of an ethical base is having a corrosive effect on its effectiveness. To gain Parliament’s consent for the war it was necessary for Mr Blair to present it with gross lies and deception that it failed to examine before abandoning its democratic role of representing the people and its cultural heritage. Parliament thus continues to destroy civil liberties and the country’s morale while maintaining the pretence that there is an external enemy when the enemy is within itself.Gordon Brown’s government has politicized the police, or at least, permitted them to play politics. It is not difficult to see why this has happened. John Scarlett, Prime Minister Blair’s head of the Joint Intelligence Committee, was promoted and given a knighthood for supporting the Iraq war despite his own intelligence analysts’ advice to the contrary. It was seen that patronage pays.Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair and other senior police got away publicly supporting the government by announcing their wish to extend the period of detention without trial for terrorist suspects when this was debated in Parliament. Conceivably, Commissioner Blair wished to ingratiate himself with the government following his shoot-to-kill-on-suspicion security policy resulting in the death of an innocent man, the Brazilian, Jean-Charles de Menezes. This, the London bombings and the suicide of Dr David Kelly are in direct line of causality from the failure of integrity on the part of the politicized civil servants John Scarlett and the attorney-general, Peter Goldsmith, who declared the war legal. '

Lees verder: http://www.redress.cc/global/cking20081210