Iraq War Had Already Begun While UN Voted

More from the Sunday Times of London today, following up on the revelations of the Downing Street Memo.

It seems the Labour Governments legislation to promote government transparency and accountability is turning around to bite Blair (and Bush) on the bum. In response to a parliamentary question by Liberal Democrats, the new Minister of Defence has revealed that the air war was begun as early as May or June 2002. The UN didn't pass resolution 1441, which threatened Iraq with "serious consequences" for failing to co-operate with the weapons inspectors until November 8th.

The new information, obtained by the Liberal Democrats, shows that the allies dropped twice as many bombs on Iraq in the second half of 2002 as they did during the whole of 2001, and that the RAF increased their attacks even more quickly than the Americans did.

During 2000, RAF aircraft patrolling the southern no-fly zone over Iraq dropped 20.5 tons of bombs from a total of 155 tons dropped by the coalition, a mere 13%. During 2001 that figure rose slightly to 25 tons out of 107, or 23%.

However, between May 2002 and the second week in November, when the UN Security Council passed resolution 1441, which Goldsmith [attorney general] said made the war legal, British aircraft dropped 46 tons of bombs a month out of a total of 126.1 tons, or 36%.

By October, with the UN vote still two weeks away, RAF aircraft were dropping 64% of bombs falling on the southern no-fly zone.

So the war had begun in advance of the vote that the UK's Attorney General says gave the war legitimacy.

Gen. Tommy Franks , the allied commander, has since admitted this operation was designed to "degrade" Iraqi air defences in the same way as the air attacks that began the 1991 Gulf war. However, systematic targeting of Iraqi air defences appears to contradict Foreign Office legal guidance appended to the leaked briefing paper which said that the allied aircraft were only "entitled to use force in self-defence where such a use of force is a necessary and proportionate response to actual or imminent attack from Iraqi ground systems".

Given this and the evidence of the Downing Street Memo, it is clear that Tony Blair and those in his cabinet who conspired to mislead both their colleagues in the government and the British people should face impeachment and trail.

George W. Bush and his colleagues who did the same to the American people should soon follow them.