We have nothing in common with Tony Blair but on the single subject of war against Iraq his government should have the support of democrats and sovereigntists everywhere.
The main misunderstanding about the war against Iraq is that it is not about to happen, it has been ongoing for 12 years. There has been no peace agreement and so no end to that war. There has been a cease-fire – with conditions laid down by the victors and by the United Nations. All those conditions and those 17 UN resolutions have been flouted by one of the most evil regimes in the history of the modern world. The French Government – which supplied Iraq with a nuclear facility and which now seems to have supplied weapons to Iraq more recently – won’t even apply an “18 strikes and you’re out” rule to their friend Saddam! The German connections with Iraq have been continuous since the first world war when the then Turkish Empire which covered Iraq was Germany’s ally.
The vote at the United Nations is not a last chance for the UK and USA it is a last chance for the UN itself to find a spine and – for a change – actually implement its own resolutions. The UN has repeatedly stood by as tragedies occurred around the world. It stood by at the massacre in Srebrenica, it stood by at the expulsion of Serbs from Croatia and Kosovo and it stood by as thousands were massacred in Rwanda. Its predecessor in the 1920s and 1930s the League of Nations was a disaster serving more as a cover for fascist regimes to establish their power than a deterrent to them.
Furthermore if the UN – or the USA, UK and others acting for them – cannot enforce its 17 resolutions against Iraq then how can it hope to bring peace to the Middle East (the source of so much Muslim and Arab fanaticism) by enforcing the UN resolutions so long ignored by Israel?
Saddam Hussein unleashed mustard gas against Iranians and Kurds in 1983, 1984 and 1987 and he deployed tabun and mustard gas against Iranians at Hawizah Marsh in March 1985 and at al-Basrah in April 1987. Saddam reportedly used the highly lethal sarin gas against Iranians in October 1987 at Sumar/Mehran and of course against Kurds in Halabjah. We know from the 3 million Iraqis who have fled their own country that his murderous rule within Iraq has committed unspeakable atrocities and would have committed many more without the “no fly” zones established by the British and Americans to protect the Kurds in the North and the Shiites in the South (both Muslim of course – so much for the “Western war against Islam”!)
If millions of a nation’s citizens flee their ruler then, for a sovereigntist, that means the sovereignty of the nation – i.e. self government by its people – no longer exists and its ruler can scarcely appeal to the international law which protects sovereign nations. If millions of British people had been driven from Britain by a murderous dictator we should surely expect our friends in other countries to come to our aid.
On Iraq Tony Blair is right. It is perhaps not surprising that a Prime Minister who broke international law on at least 7 counts in the war against Yugoslavia is now hardly believed on Iraq. But occasionally even the worst messenger hits on the right message.
The war will be short (some Iraqi soldiers apparently even tried to surrender to British troops yesterday 8th March, but were told they would have to wait until war started!!). Any suffering of the Iraqis will be a tiny fraction of the toll inflicted on his people by Saddam Hussein himself during his nearly 40 year rule.
