And another thing…

COLONEL Gadaffi’s rather odd outburst against Switzerland yesterday (but then, I suppose “odd” is a relative term when referring to Libya’s leader) reminded me of this post I wrote last year.

What is it about the Land of the Cuckoo Clock that so antagonises such a disparate group of people?

I GAVE an interview to Radio Scotland this morning on the only subject the media are interested in today: Iraq.

I spent so much time in 2003 defending the government and the Prime Minister from criticism of the war and it’s been an awful long time since I had to revisit those arguments. But my! How they all came flooding back!

Amusingly, one of the BBC journalists who interviewed me more than once at the time was Iain Macwhirter, whose anti-war views he failed to conceal even then. Today, as a freelance no longer employed by the BBC, he feels no need to offer even a pretence of objectivity. He was interviewed after me and immediately dismissed my comparison of Kosovo in 1999 with Iraq in 2003. He either couldn’t understand the point I was making or, more likely, deliberately chose to misinterpret it. The two events were, as Macwhirter correctly pointed out, entirely different. Unlike in Kosovo, there was no immediate humanitarian emergency in Iraq four years later which demanded an international response. But the point I was making was on international law. There was no specific UN mandate for military action by Nato against the Serbs in 1999. None of the nations taking part was acting in self-defence. Very few people at the time even raised the subject. But in 2003, it was all about international law, wasn’t it?

Well, no. It wasn’t. It was all about politics. It was about polticians making political decisions and about those who disagreed with those decisions using whatever arguments that came to hand to oppose them. You never hear the Guardian-reading classes demanding that Tony Blair (note the correct spelling) be tried for war crimes committed in Kosovo, where there were civilian casualties resulting from the Nato bombing. Why? Because those same Guardian-readers agreed with that particular policy, irrespective of its legality.

The greatest ever political failure of the international community was in deciding to do nothing to try to prevent or mitigate the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990s. I’m quite sure that had we sent troops in to prevent the massacres, we would have been breaking international law. And I’m sure there are plenty of people who would have cared about that, though I’m not one of them. Refusing to get involved in Rwanda while hundreds of thousands of men, women and children were brutally slain was entirely immoral and cowardly. But it was legal in international terms, so maybe that’s alright then.

So we can talk all we want about the legality or otherwise of the Iraq invasion and war, and no doubt we will. But if you think that’s what the controversy is all about, you’re dead wrong. It’s about the politics. It’s always been about the politics.

I HAVE no intention of re-opening up the whole “Kelly was murdered” conspiracy theory on this site. But I will take this opportunity to point out a ridiculous – possibly intentional – factual inexactitude by the King of the Tinfoil Hat Brigade, Craig Murray, who today wrote this piece of sexed-up tripe:

Kelly’s death was extremely convenient for Blair, Cheney and a myriad of other ultra ruthless people. It paved the way for war.

Paved the way for war? You mean, in a Doctor Who, timey-wimey paradox sort of way, obviously? Dr Kelly died on 17 July 2003. The invasion of Iraq by Allied forces began on 20 March 2003 – nearly four months earlier. (Note to Craig Murray: July comes after March. Check your calendar if you don’t believe me.)

And if you really think Dr Kelly’s tragic death was “extremely convenient” for Tony Blair, then you really haven’t been paying attention, Craig.

LORD Turnbull is peeved, apparently, at Alastair Campbell’s suggestion that Clare Short was excluded from discussions about the Iraq war because she couldn’t be trusted not to leak the information.

Such remarks were “very poor”, says the former head of the civil service. The former International Development Secretary’s views should have been respected.

But which views are they? The ones which led her to tell BBC Radio 4 that she would not support going to war without a specific UN mandate? Or her views – put in a letter from her to every Labour MP a few days later – that we should support the government motion to do just that?

And then, after Robin Cook and John Denham had stolen her thunder by taking a principled stand against the war and resigning from the government, she used post-war planning (or lack of it) as an excuse finally to give up her own ministerial Mondeo two months later.

Yeah, that’s clearly someone whose judgment could be relied upon when critical discussions were being held…

AS THE date of Tony Blair’s appearance before the Chilcot Inquiry draws ever nearer, news editors start to salivate and the Stop The War Coalition place an order for some new placards (get the spelling right this time, eh lads? It’s “AI”, not “IA”. Honestly, standards these days…).

The thing is, everyone knows what he will say when he gives evidence. You know it, I know it. Some of us will believe him. Others won’t. No-one will change their minds.

The Telegraph will be pompous and self-righteous in its reporting of the event, and will probably try to detract attention away from the fact that the Tories supported the move to war.

The Guardian will be reluctantly and cautiously critical, but will also be careful to point out that there are two sides to every story.

I’ve no idea what David Aaronovitch in The Times will say but I know that he’ll be right and I’ll wish I’d said it first

The Daily Mail will claim that Blair’s decision to invade Iraq resulted directly in record numbers of immigrants coming to the UK.

The Daily Express will complain that Chilcot didn’t ask Blair about his involvement in the Diana cover-up.

The Independent will carry a front page headline calling on everyone to switch their car engines off while waiting at traffic lights.

And in The Sun, Tina, 22, from Essex, will say that what’s important is that we support our troops.

Actually, I’m with Tina on this one.

YOU OFTEN hear claims that the treaty under which Gary McKinnon’s extradition is being sought was constructed specifically for dealing with terrorists.

This is false.

The explanatory notes to the Extradition Act 2003 state:

The Government set out its proposals to reform the law on extradition in a consultation document “The Law on Extradition: A Review” in March 2001.

That was six month before 9/11, incidentally. Crucially, it states:

Crime, particularly serious crime, is becoming increasingly international in nature and criminals can flee justice by crossing borders with increasing ease. Improved judicial co-operation between nations is needed to tackle this development. The reform of the United Kingdom’s extradition law is designed to contribute to that process.

Extradition is an important tool in dealing with international crime: no one should be able to escape justice by simply crossing a border. The law should provide a quick and effective framework to extradite a person to the country where he is accused or has been convicted of a serious crime, provided that this does not breach his fundamental human rights.

So, no mention specifically of extraditing terrorists, although we can assume that terrorism falls under the “serious crime” heading.

And yet a myth – one of many in this case – has developed that Gary is to be extradited under legislation “intended” for terrorists. And I have been asked quite a few times on my Twitter page whether I think Gary is a terrorist. To which my answer, of course, is “no”. If he were facing terrorist charges in the US, the indictment would have made mention of the fact.

The Extradition Act 2003 was framed in order to deal with serious crimes. And, as Alan Johnson told the Commons today:

Gary is accused of serious criminal offences. He is alleged to have repeatedly hacked into US Government computer networks over a period of 13 months, including 97 US military computers from which he deleted vital operating systems and then copied encrypted information on to his own computer, shutting down the entire US army’s military district of Washington’s computer network for 24 hours. During interviews under caution, Mr. McKinnon admitted to much of the conduct he is accused of.

And another thing…

Regarding our allegedly “imbalanced” extradition trearty with the US, Alan told the Commons:

…members of both main Opposition parties have argued about this point. That argument was made in 2003, when the treaty was being concluded. What has happened since? In how many cases have we failed to get extradition from the US? None. Zilch. Nil. None whatsoever. Every case we have made to the US using probable cause has been successful. In contrast, there are seven cases in which the US has sought extradition from this country that are still held up in the system

I wonder if that fact will be covered by tomorrow’s Daily Mail? Hmm…

(You can read #1-6 of the Gary McKinnon myths here.)

LET’S explode some myths on this one, shall we?

MYTH #1: Computer hacking is not a serious crime.

Yes it is, and it causes millions of pounds of damage every year. People who hack into other people’s computers should be charged and tried. If convicted, the sentences should be severe.

MYTH #2: McKinnon was pursuing a harmless obsession about UFOs.

In that case, why did he leave this message on one of the US Defense Department computers?

US foreign policy is akin to government-sponsored terrorism these days? It was not a mistake that there was a huge security stand-down on September 11 last year…I am SOLO. I will continue to disrupt at the highest levels

Doesn’t this suggest that his motives were not only political but malicious? Doesn’t sound much like a “moral crusade” to me.

MYTH #3: Asperger’s sufferers shouldn’t be extradited.

Why not? Would this argument be made in favour of an Asperger’s Syndrome sufferer who had committed a less “acceptable” crime, like murder or child abuse?

MYTH #4: The extradition treaty with the US is one-sided.

There is some truth in this, but because of the role of the US constitution, not the UK legislation itself. But are we saying that because of this, no British citizen should ever be extradited to America? If Gary Glitter’s extradition was demanded by the US authorities, would there be the same level of oposition on the grounds of a lack of reciprocity?

MYTH #5: McKinnon cannot expect a fair trial in America.

Nonsense. The US legal system is one of the fairest in the world and McKinnon will have his chance to plead his case in open court in exactly the same way as any US citizen. And the highest courts on this side of the Atlantic – including the Court of Appeal and the European Court of Human Rights – have already given McKinnon a fair hearing and have found against his request to remain in the UK.

MYTH #6: McKinnon will receive an unduly harsh sentence.

Unlikely. This is from Corante Blog:

(Federal) sentencing guidelines are referred to in Lord Brown’s ruling, but they are rarely referred to in UK coverage. McKinnon was offered a plea agreement if he pleaded guilty to two of the seven charges.

From the ruling: “On this basis it was likely that a sentence of 3-4 years (more precisely 37-46 months), probably at the shorter end of that bracket, would be passed and that after serving 6-12 months in the US, the appellant would be repatriated to complete his sentence in the UK.”

If you are seriously interested in the facts of this case, and not the unthinking Daily Mail spin, I would recomment Gary McKinnon: The truth is out there, just not in the British press and Socialist Unity, which has taken a brave and principled stand on this issue, unlike many on the Left.

UPDATE at 4.45 pm: There’s a fantastic comment by a “paddy garcia” on this subject over at Socialist Unity which I reprint here in full:

Please tell me what is wrong with hacking into US military computers? How can any socialist oppose bringing down the US imperialist war machine by this or any other means? Anyone who tries to this is a hero. Please explain all this alleged Brit nationalism stuff? I have not heard Gary McKinnon say anything that could be interpreted as such. Obviously the gutter press have their own agenda but that doesn’t mean that this man should be extradited.

Doesn’t add much to the debate, I’ll grant, but a real hoot!

AS THE fifth inquiry into Iraq kicks off, I wonder how many opponents (or indeed, supporters) of the war will be prepared to change their minds as a result of its conclusions?

More importantly, how many opponents will already be calling the Chilcot inquiry a “whitewash” and demanding another (sixth) inquiry if it concludes that the government acted in good faith in committing us to the invasion and occupation? How many inquiries must we have before someone comes up with the “right” answer?

I’VE ALWAYS hated “Gestapo” comparisons. You know the kind thing I mean: “That officer gave me a funny look – Honestly! It;s like Hitler’s Getapo!”

“Police state” is another one: “I was only doing 140, and they send me a court summons! It’s like Pinochet all over again…”

Not only are most of these comparisons plain silly, they’re incredibly offensive to those who actually lived through Nazi Germany or whose family were actually killed and tortured by Pinochet’s regime. It’s not just that the British police are being compared to the Gestapo: the suggestion is that the Gestapo were no worse than the Met. Or that people living in Britain have it as bad as Chileans in the 70s.

And so we return to the old “Is Tony Blair a war criminal?” nonsense, repeated today by Oliver Miles in the Independent on Sunday. As John Rentoul so sensibly points out, it’s number 180 in his series of “Questions to which the answer is ‘no’.”

If, by “war criminal”, we mean someone who led his country into a war that was unpopular with some people, then, yes, Tony Blair is undoubtedly a war criminal. But generally speaking, war criminals are people who deliberately ordered the targeting of civilians during a military engagement, or who either ordered, or did nothing to prevent, the execution or torture of their opponents. In other words, someone who “committed war crimes”.

No-one except the feeble-minded are seriously suggesting that Tony Blair is guilty of this second definition. And, as with “police state” and “Gestapo”, such accusations devalue the force of such accusations. The Gestapo? “Well, arguably some of their officers overstepped the mark, but most of them were quite helpful if you needed directions to the Reichstag.” Police state? “Not so bad, really, so long as you don’t mind being stopped and searched at railway stations once in a blue moon.”

War criminal? “Tony Blair’s as bad as Hitler, innit? I mean, taking Britain to war in Iraq after two votes in Parliament, then imposing democracy then withdrawing troops… I mean, two peas in a pod, eh?”

CHERIE Blair’s comments in the Independent on Sunday today ring true: that in 2003, Tony was probably 51-49 per cent in favour of committing British troops to Iraq.

When discussing the subject with non-politicians, they’re always surprised to hear that such important decisions can – and sometimes have to – be taken on a balance of argument, rather than on an overwhelming moral conviction one way or the other. Most opponents of the war I’ve spoken to tend to fall into that category; they are utterly convinced that the war was totally unjustified in any respect.

If only life – and politics – were that simple.

A few months ago, I wrote:

Within the question there is often an assumption that those of us who voted for war had the same single-minded conviction as those who opposed it. And it’s true that many who voted for the war did in fact have an absence of doubt that was shared by their opponents. I envied them, for I did not, and I still don’t.

I simply couldn’t comprehend how any MP could walk into either division lobby on such a controversial and complex issue without a glimmer of doubt in his mind, whichever lobby he was walking into. For my part, I wrestled long and hard with the various arguments, changing my mind about a dozen times about how I intended to vote. Those who marched against the war, who now hate everything about Labour and Tony Blair because their protests had no effect, will not understand such agonising. After all, war is either good or bad, right or wrong, yes?

No.

So on the night of the first vote, in February 2003, I supported the government, then went home with a very heavy heart, fretting in case I had made the wrong decision. A few weeks later, I had made up my mind and was probably two-to-one (in my head) in favour of invasion. It was then that I decided the time for equivocation had ended. If you’re going to make a decision, stick to it, defend it, and live with the consequences.

Amusingly, John Rentoul reckons Cherie’s comments represent just about all there needs to be said, so the Chilcott enquiry can pack up and go home.

One thing I trust that critics of Blair’s (and my) decision will bear in mind is that the UK never voted for an invasion and occupation of Iraq – that was going to happen anyway. The question before us was whether we should commit British troops to the US effort. But had the Commons voted “no” more than six years ago, it would have made precious little difference to Iraq’s fate.