Quote (dro94 @ 19 Mar 2023 23:35)
Correction: it was a massive mistake for the Americans. They committed 95% of the invading force, and even more of the occupying force. We didn't commit that much.
The main damage we suffered was arguably reputational, but still, that was directed more at Blair than the nation. I've always found it a bit of a shame that the best PM we had since Attlee destroyed his reputation from one foreign policy blunder that didn't have domestic consequences.
Ultimately he acted on MI6 intelligence and pressure from the Americans, he was rational in his decision making and genuinely thought it was for the good of the people there.
purely speculative and rather doubtful in my personal opinion.
the consequences, the damage i'm talking about is not the loss of reputation or even that of soldiers, but the lives of millions of iraqis, syrians, kurds... who died in the wake of that war. it destabilised the whole region and directly led to the creation of ISIS. downplaying the scope of involvement by one particular participant doesn't really change that.
a resolute "no" by UK leadership, not providing them with transparently false "evidence" through UK intelligence, might not have dissuaded the yanks entirely, but who knows what would have happened if they had been made to go in alone, and not with the semblance of international support backing their crusade...
not that any of those speculations would change my conclusion that the likes of blair and bush should at least have faced a trial before the ICC, trying to get to the bottom of the facts. of course that's not the fault of the court, it's a good institution in theory, just useless in practice when the main warmonger nations simply don't acknowledge it.