Tony Blair's millions

While we have been distracted with the state of our sorry union, the Brits have been entertaining themselves with their Chilcot Inquiry into the origins of the Iraq war and Britain’s part in it.

That would be the war that has caused, so far, an estimated 1 million dead, produced 3 million refugees and created 5 million orphans, according to one account based on government statistics.

But who’s counting?

Tony Blair made his cameo appearance Thursday, sneaking in a side door to avoid people eager to shout ‘War criminal!’ at him.

There have been some interesting revelations in the official inquiry, such as how dissidents were browbeaten into silence or acquiescence, including Lord Goldsmith, the British equivalent of our attorney-general, who for a while told Blair that invading Iraq to depose Saddam would be illegal for the obvious reason that Iraq did not pose a threat to Britain. But Goldsmith was bullied by the war party and buckled like most of his colleagues.

The commission also learned that:

-British intelligence knew Iraq had disassembled its chemical weapons, and

-Blair and Bush had a secret deal (‘signed in blood’, in the words of one) to remove Saddam a year before the invasion and then looked for ways to justify it.

None of which is surprising, and in fact the testimony from senior diplomats and officials had the smell of scapegoating by many of those involved, which is what you’d expect after a debacle on this scale—finger-pointing at the other guy. Britain’s former ambassador to Washington, Sir Christopher Meyer, claimed Blair’s bear-hug with Bush left officials scrabbling to find a ‘smoking gun’ to justify going to war, which Meyer himself promptly did.

Blair deftly parried all the revelations and kept out of the feeble panel members’ grasp throughout his six-hour appearance, an indication of how difficult it is for the political establishment to indict the architect of a failed policy with which it is deeply complicit.

Meanwhile, Blair, untroubled by regret for the destruction he has caused, used the platform to talk up another great idea—going to war with Iran next.

But despite his narrow escape, Blair is being steadily unmasked, revealed drip by drip as a conniving liar determined to do George Bush’s bidding despite massive domestic opposition, even while Britain got little in return.

It’s doubly tragic for Britons that the chauvinistic and brutal episode based on fear-mongering and lies was conducted under a Labour government, leaving decent-minded people nowhere to turn for an alternative. As one commentator put it, ‘We’re all conservatives now’.