Cuz he’s a big suckup.
This is not a bad idea in the same sense that curing a cancer patient by poking his eyes with red hot irons is not a bad idea. “Curing a cancer patient” is definitely a good idea.
Invading countries for your own purposes is against international order. It creates instability and distrust. It is immoral. There is just no excuse. And it did not achieve anything because only an ignorant idiot would think Iraqis would suddenly become like western people. Bush and his poodles did not want true democracy, which would only yield anti-american regimes, they wanted a puppet government which would do what America wanted. It’s just not quite working out that way so expectations have been continually lowered.
The move was industrial strength stupid and both Blair and Aznar totally miscalculated the odds. They thought it was going to be a cakewalk which would make history by being the seed which would turn the region into a western-style bunch of democracies friendly to western interests and they did not want to be left out of the making of that part of history. They were totally deluded.
I agree there was no justification really for invading Iraq but if the idea of establishing a friendly representative democracy in Iraq had worked within the first couple of years then it would have a been a good thing. I believe if Cheney and Rumsfeld had not been in charged of the invasion then it could have worked but then again it probably would have never happen. Having too few troops on the ground to begin with and having no good governing plan post Saddam was the biggest mistakes in prosecuting the war. The day Rummy said “democracy was not tidy” while the looting was going on was the day I knew this was gonna be no cakewalk.
Maybe I am being naive about Blair but I think his biggest mistake was buying to the big idea without asking for more details about what happened after Saddam was removed. I believe he thought the problem of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict plus Islamic terrorism would be solved or at least mitigated by a functioning Western style democracy in Iraq.
No, it would not have been a good thing. It would still have been a subversion of international law and order. Maintaining the peace and security of the world is more important than any short term goal.
And, again, “the idea of establishing a friendly representative democracy in Iraq” is so stupid and so far-fetched that, well, it just boggles the mind. In its level of stupidity it is along the same lines of Iraq thinking of invading Britain and establishing an Islamic Republic. Yeah, it would be good if it would work in a couple of years. What would be the chances of that? You’d have to be deluded.
Just curios to what idea would you subscribe yourself to: (1) that Blair for all his intellect, vision and wisdom was just being stupid and shortsighted, or (2) there’s more to it than him saying “I really thought it would work… I guess I was wrong.”?
I do not understand the question. There’s more to it? What more?
It is just an idea, a direction in thought when one idea (or, direction in thought) does not hold water. To me, it is kind of naive and just does not hold water to take his words at face value; i.e. when he says he really believed that what they are doing was feasible, sensible, just and made sense.
For example, if Nixon was any good at holding himself back and did not talk that much, it all might have ended with us never finding what he was really thinking. Recent politicians learned from that.
God knows what some of the retired US or British politicians hold back. Don’t you think so?
I believe Bush, Blair & Aznar really were that dumb. Stupidity is the simplest explanation. I believe many people in positions of power really do lose perspective and believe they can do impossible things. It has happened to countless politicians in historyand it seems like the most fitting explanation here.
Unless you have some concrete alternative you’d like us to consider. But just saying “maybe he was thinking something else he never told us” is not convincing to me. I really believe they were that dumb and missinformed. All three of them but specially Bush who pulled the other two along…
There were three big issues angering the muslim world through the 80s and 90s - Palestine, US troops in Saudi and the sanctions on Iraq. These were the three things cited by Bin Laden in his fatwa against the US.
I think Blair (and Bush etc) wanted to get rid of the sanctions but they couldn’t while Saddam was there because they didn’t trust him so they had to get rid of him before they could get rid of the sanctions. So it was an attempt to diffuse one of the causes of muslim anger (even though it would inflame it in the short term). It became more urgent after 9/11.
I don’t think they were particularly bothered about getting a western style democracy in Iraq. That would be nice but not the main point. The main point was getting rid of saddam so they could drop the sanctions. Any type of government would do for them to drop the sanctions.
Blair is a pretty smart guy, and when a really smart guy does something amazingly stupid, its usually because his own intelligence worked against him, he was smart enough to twist the facts to fit a desired position. And do it so good he convinced himself.
I think Blair was angling to position Britain closer to America with an eye towards poltical and military advantages that Britain simply can’t afford to maintain. And, also as a balance for England’s warmly cordial enemy, France. An opportunity for a graceful and gradual decline, under the protective wings of the Colonials. I can surely see what a tempting scenario that would be. Alas.
It’s not only Blair. It’s that the UK in the last few decades after WWII has never been really sure of its place in the world . It is like a guest feeling awkward at a cocktail party and moving from one group to another without fitting in in any of them.
Of course the UK cherishes its “special relationship” with the USA. In exchange for keeping their pants down and being ready to bend over at a moments notice they get a reach-around once in a while. The problem with the special relationship is that the UK is not America and it is a totally unequal relationship where the UK takes orders. In that club the UK is a nobody.
After WWII, as the foundations of what would later become the European Union were being laid, the UK still thought its place was not to be in the European club among equals but as head of the Commonwealth where it would be the senior partner and leader. That did not work out because many of the Commonwealth countries turned to shit and other wandered off uninterested. The Commonwealth never became the British Common Market. So, as that group dissolved the UK again found itself unsure of what to do next. So it half-heartedly joined the EU while maintaining its special relationship with the USA.
I dunno. I kinda feel for them. They lost the opportunity to be leaders in the EU while France and Germany set themselves up in that position. They hand on to their special relationship with the USA which just means the USA uses them when it suits them… and they have nowhere else to go because all the old friends are now hobos doing crack.
So it’s not just Tony Blair. It’s that Britain has gone from being a world power to being a boring friend who people evade because they’ve heard the same stories to many times.
As GIGObuster has shown, speculation about how wonderful Blair was or that he believed in the WMDs is simply mistaken.
Blair knew perfectly well before the war that there were no WMDs in Iraq.
He knew there would probably be massive casualties and that there was little or no international support.
Blair knew that Bush would invade with or without him. Blair was desperate to be seen as important on the World stage, but also knew Bush’s propaganda about Saddam being linked to 9/11 or having nukes were bllsht.
See Robin Cook’s resignation speech on the eve of the war:
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I have chosen to address the House first on why I cannot support a war without international agreement or domestic support
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The reality is that Britain is being asked to embark on a war without agreement in any of the international bodies of which we are a leading partner - not NATO, not the European Union and, now, not the Security Council
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Our difficulty in getting support this time is that neither the international community nor the British public is persuaded that there is an urgent and compelling reason for this military action in Iraq
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None of us can predict the death toll of civilians from the forthcoming bombardment of Iraq, but the US warning of a bombing campaign that will “shock and awe” makes it likely that casualties will be numbered at least in the thousands
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Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target
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It probably still has biological toxins and battlefield chemical munitions, but it has had them since the 1980s when US companies sold Saddam anthrax agents and the then British Government approved chemical and munitions factories
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Why is it necessary to resort to war this week, while Saddam’s ambition to complete his weapons programme is blocked by the presence of UN inspectors?
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Nor is our credibility helped by the appearance that our partners in Washington are less interested in disarmament than they are in regime change in Iraq
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What has come to trouble me most over past weeks is the suspicion that if the hanging chads in Florida had gone the other way and Al Gore had been elected, we would not now be about to commit British troops
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I intend to join those tomorrow night who will vote against military action now. It is for that reason, and for that reason alone, and with a heavy heart, that I resign from the government
I agree with this.
Aren’t these two ideas contrary to each other? In other words, a person cannot be stupid & dumb yet so cunning & devious.
Doesn’t this behaviour of him and his inner circle qualify as a conspiracy? You know, the one we saw through…
I see no contradiction. Lying and being intelligent are not correlated. They were liars and they, obviously, got in way over their depth. I see no contradiction.
Okay… I guess we differ in the following - you say he’s a liar; technically yes, but I think he’s a bit more than just a liar considering what was coming up behind that lie and he was a major architect of what came afterwards.
I mean, this was not just some local little lie expected from a politician, you know… election promise break, some money shuffling around with no trace, nepotism here, cronyism there. I’m kind of surprised how his image is being held up, again, considering the meltdown and the impact on the world. Just a slightly bit bewildered how someone on the West is making this to be a “regular” issue while for someone “over there” this constitutes a major breakdown of the world they knew.
It’s almost as sub-prime mortgage meltdown and the impact on the world economy – those guys were “intelligent and liars” and they were “in way over their depth”. Very elegant way of turning over the page and pretend nothing happened.
I don’t know… it is kind of mind-boggling but that approach seems to be the only way to keep the current system intact – just change the players. Simply put, there are no guarantees that any of the politicians is telling the truth say about Iranian nuclear program however, West will do what it needs to do once it reaches the point of self-indulgent decision.
Someone famous said… nothing like a righteous “white man”* sense of justice.
Sorry, I’m a bit of a rambler… :o
*- “white man” not meant as a race