by John Howard
UNSCOM noted that Iraq’s industrial capacity and knowledge base had given it the ability to make large amounts of new biological agents quickly, if it wanted to. UN inspectors were unable to establish that Iraq had destroyed all the ballistic-missile warheads it had filled with chemical and biological agents. Iraq never fully accounted to UNSCOM for all its ballistic missiles and missile-related infrastructure.
Concern about Iraq’s WMD potential was not only soundly based in fact, but was reinforced by Saddam’s duplicitous behaviour surrounding compliance with UN resolutions. With the exception of limited access to one declared nuclear material storage facility, UN inspectors were denied access to Iraq between December 1998 and November 2002.
There was intense debate about access to the presidential palaces of Saddam’s regime, as the Iraqi dictator had declared them off-limits to weapons inspectors. One of them was much larger than Buckingham Palace, a point I made in a speech to the American Chamber of Commerce in Sydney on 2 October 2002. Just 24 hours earlier Saddam had reached agreement with the UN weapons inspectors for a resumption of inspections — but the eight or nine so-called presidential sites were to be excluded from the inspections! Such was the ineffectual character of the existing SC resolutions on Iraq’s WMDs.
The combination of the even closer relations we had established with the Bush Administration and the quality of Michael Thawley’s representation in Washington meant that we had a direct pipeline to Administration thinking all through the first half of 2002. By mid-2002 I had formed the view that if Iraq did not satisfactorily respond to international pressure about her WMD capacity, the Americans would almost certainly take military action against her, and that Australia would need to decide whether or not to join that action.
The desire to remove Saddam was not confined to Republicans. It is widely forgotten now that in 1998 the American Congress enacted the Iraq Liberation Act, which declared that regime change in Iraq was an objective of US foreign policy. President Clinton was in the White House, and the legislation drew powerful backing from both sides of the aisle. That act reflected a bipartisan view that Iraq, with its past rogue behaviour, and WMDs — which most Americans believed she possessed — was a threat not only to her neighbours but potentially other countries, including the United States.
After ‘Operation Desert Fox’, when American and British forces launched air strikes against Iraq late in 1998 to enforce UN sanctions, Clinton declared, ‘So long as Saddam remains in power he will remain a threat to his people, the region and the world.’4 According to Clinton, the best way to end that threat was for Iraq to have another government.
In February of that year Clinton insisted that the world had to face facts about Saddam. He said that the world had to deal with the ‘kind of threat Iraq poses … a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists … who travel the world among us unnoticed’.5 Those words could just as easily have been spoken by George Bush or Donald Rumsfeld.
If that was America’s attitude in 1998, how much more apprehensive about Saddam must the people of the United States have been in the months following September 2001? Whereas, prior to the terrorist attacks, America’s appetite for regime change in Iraq fell short of supporting a military invasion, the mood was different afterwards — and not just amongst the neo-conservatives.
In his book The Threatening Storm, Kenneth Pollack, national security man in the Clinton White House responsible for Iraq, records a comment from his boss, Sandy Berger, Clinton’s national security advisor, that they ‘had a responsibility to leave the next Administration with a viable Iraq policy, not a mess. It would be up to that Administration to decide what to do’.6 The Clinton Administration did not regard military action against Iraq as an unthinkable option, and that was long before 9/11.
‘Operation Desert Thunder’, in February 1998, contemplated air strikes by the Americans and British against Saddam’s WMD capacity as well as other strategic assets of the regime, because of another round of defiance of UN resolutions by Iraq. The aim of the strikes was to disrupt Saddam’s ability to maintain his grip on power.
After a personal request from Bill Clinton, I had agreed to the prepositioning, in the Middle East, of units of the SAS to support the US/UK operation. In the end the forces were not needed, as a compromise was agreed between the Iraqi leader and the United Nations. But in December 1998, ‘Operation Desert Fox’, involving precision air strikes, was executed due to Iraq not heeding its obligations regarding UN inspections.
The Labor Party, under Kim Beazley, endorsed my action in sending the SAS. It was common ground between the Government and the opposition that the action contemplated by the Coalition against Iraq was fully sanctioned by existing UN resolutions.
Yet now it is hard to see the qualitative difference between what was sought to be enforced in 1998 and what was sought to be enforced in 2003. That was apparently the opinion of such a well-credentialled Democrat as Richard Holbrooke. Addressing the American Enterprise Institute on 13 June 2003, the late Jeane Kirkpatrick told of a conversation she had had with Richard Holbrooke, appointed by President Obama as special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan. According to Kirkpatrick, Holbrooke said, ‘Three times Clinton did what many Democrats are now saying Bush can’t do. He did it in Bosnia in ’95, in Iraq with Desert Fox in December of ’98, and in Kosovo in ’99. In the Balkans case he had no Security Council authority.’7
Certainly there was a vast difference between the scales of the respective military operations, yet the principle at stake, namely the failure of Iraq to fully comply with the United Nations’ requirements regarding WMDs, was the same. In 1998 Kim Beazley was no reluctant conscript. I invited him to attend the private farewell of the SAS at Campbell Barracks in Perth. He backed what I had to say about the mission. It was a genuine bipartisan display.
The public record in the United States in 2001 and 2002 is replete with statements calling for regime change in Iraq, and not only from neo-conservatives. On 10 October 2002, the House of Representatives in Washington voted by 296 to 133 to authorise the use of military force against Iraq. The Senate resolved likewise, by 77 to 23. Many leading Democrats, including Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, voted for the use of force. Hillary Clinton’s speech was remarkable for its tone of quite strong support for the Bush approach. She showed no reluctance to put the boot into the first Bush Administration for ‘leaving the Kurds and the Shi’ites, who had risen against Saddam Hussein at our urging, to Saddam’s revenge’.8 Senator Joe Biden, now Vice-president, described the resolution he would vote for as ‘a march to peace and security’.9
Through 2002, it became apparent that if action were taken by the Americans, Tony Blair would commit British forces to fight alongside the United States. Blair, himself, became an articulate and frequent critic of Iraq. His reaction to the attacks of 11 September had been similar to mine.
The American military commenced contingency planning for an invasion of Iraq in the early part of 2002. Although they and others, including Britain and Australia, knew that the lion’s share of the forces involved, if an invasion took place, would be American, they did not want to be entirely alone. They were keen to see the involvement of a limited number of other countries, of which Britain and Australia were at the top of the list. Australian officers went to Central Command at Tampa in Florida to participate in the contingency planning, although it was understood that no Australian commitment to participate had been made.
From the very beginning we knew what was in the minds of the American military. We also knew how we might contribute in the most effective manner possible and in a way that safeguarded, as best one could, the position of any Australian troops which might ultimately be committed.
In his public and private utterances, Bush always kept his options open on Iraq. That having been said, I am sure that from soon after the attacks of September 2001, his instincts would have favoured taking out Saddam’s regime. This w
as not because he thought that Saddam had been involved in the attacks on the World Trade Center or the Pentagon, but because he believed that given Iraq’s history there was far too great a risk that Iraq, under Saddam, would be involved in some way in a future assault on America. If that was his disposition, he would not have been alone. Millions of Americans would have shared his instincts; who could have blamed them?
As 2002 progressed, considerable support emerged in the United States for action against Saddam. By contrast, as time wore on, Blair’s domestic political challenge on Iraq became increasingly difficult. He was, and would remain, ahead of his party on Iraq.
Tony Blair led a British Labour Government which included many with an almost childlike faith in the processes of the United Nations. To them the sine qua non of good foreign policy was always adhering to the dictates of multilateral organisations, especially the United Nations. Also there remained that lingering jealousy, on both sides of British politics, towards US foreign policy leadership.
By contrast, Blair was instinctively more pro-American than many other European leaders. He correctly believed that many Europeans took the mistaken view that America would always be there, and that no matter how many insults might be delivered and no matter how indifferent Europeans were to the United States, the friendship and support of the past could always be drawn upon.
He frequently said to me that many Europeans failed to understand that there was a latent isolationist sentiment within the United States and, if push came to shove, plenty of Americans would be perfectly happy to turn their backs on Europe.
Like me, Blair believed that there was a long struggle ahead of liberal democracies and that they had to oppose Islamic extremism, with military action where necessary and also through winning the battle of ideas between Islamic fascism and moderate, progressive Islam. As the months passed I found that, despite our formal political differences, Tony Blair’s world-view in relation to issues such as terrorism was similar to my own.
I went to Washington again in July 2002. The highlight of that visit was my postponed address to a joint sitting of congress, a real honour for any visitor. It was a chance to identify the common values between Australia and the United States. I saw the invitation very much as a compliment from the United States to Australia.
In our discussions during that visit, President Bush and I were careful to avoid specifics about Australian troop commitments to a possible invasion of Iraq. He knew that close discussions were under way between the US military and their Australian counterparts. He was entitled to assume on the basis of that, and also the tenor of our discussions, that if the military option was chosen by the United States then, in all likelihood, Australia would join.
But he knew that I had not made any commitment to this effect and that for understandable political and other reasons I would keep my options open until the time when a final decision was needed. This was, in fact, his position. He and Colin Powell both made the point that no final decision had been taken and that they were continuing to pursue a diplomatic approach. The President was not optimistic that it would succeed. He cited a recent speech at West Point in which he asserted that the Cold War doctrine of containment did not work in the world of terrorist movements and failed states.
I left my discussion with the President believing that he would follow the diplomatic route and seek another UN resolution, without any real faith that it would work and that, in the end, he would take military action against Iraq. There was no way he would allow the issue of Iraq to slip onto the back burner.
Divisions were emerging between Colin Powell, Vice-president Cheney and the Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. The latter two had little patience for pursuing another UN resolution, believing it was not only postponing the inevitable but wasting valuable time. A build-up of US forces in the Middle East would not be sustainable indefinitely — particularly with the onset of the hottest part of summer.
For Australia and the United States, the push for a further resolution was not derived from legal concerns, but driven by the belief of Powell and others that the moral authority of the Coalition would be reinforced if it had been seen to have tried to obtain another SC resolution.
There was also the particular predicament of Tony Blair. He was likely to commit substantial British forces to any operation. His legal advice, at that time, was reported to be more equivocal than that given to the Australian Government. Ultimately his legal advice was similar to ours. More importantly, the growing revolt within his own Labour Party increased the political necessity for Blair to go back to the Security Council and seek a new resolution on Iraq, in the hope of placating the internationalists and the doubters.
Early in September Bush rang seeking my advice about the next steps on Iraq. I was in Brisbane to give an address to the convention of the Queensland Liberal Party. Bush told me that Colin Powell was keen that the United States return to the United Nations for a further resolution, that he, Bush, was scheduled to address the General Assembly the following week, and he would then need to outline the future path of American policy on Iraq. Bush expressed concern that any further resolution he might obtain would not be of much use. I told Bush that I agreed with Powell’s line about seeking another UN resolution and that it would provide valuable domestic political help to Blair. That was the path he followed. On 12 September Bush addressed the General Assembly, foreshadowed a further resolution and laid out in plain terms previous UN failures on Iraq and was frank about US concerns regarding Saddam Hussein.
Although this new resolution was, eventually, carried unanimously, it only added incrementally to the pressure on Iraq, because it lacked a final trigger mechanism. It would remain the case that if, after the processes of this new resolution had been exhausted, Iraq was still non-compliant, there would be furious debate as to whether the existing resolutions contained enough authority for military action. It was precisely because countries such as Russia and France wanted to withhold explicit authority for an invasion that the resolution had ended up in the terms that it did.
It is easy to understand why Cheney and Rumsfeld chafed at the decision of their President to go back to the Security Council. Their prediction that not a lot more would be obtained by doing so proved correct. Yet their arguments did not allow for the political imperative of accommodating Tony Blair. Some 45,000 British troops would be committed to Iraq; an unmistakable earnest of Britain’s determination to join the Americans. Bush was absolutely right to accommodate Blair’s domestic political realities. He owed it to an old and close ally.
Some hope was entertained that, in the light of further evidence of Saddam’s lack of compliance, it might be possible to obtain, via yet another resolution, explicit authority from the SC for military action. The dilemma for Bush was that once he had sought and obtained a fresh resolution, he had, to some extent, become a hostage to the world body. Good faith had led him into the dilemma.
The optimum time for an invasion of Iraq would be February/March 2003. The American troop build-up began in October. They and their British allies faced the twin challenges of time and weather. Iraq is impossibly hot for most of the year. It is prohibitively so from April onwards for a period of three or four months. I knew that if an invasion were to take place then it could not be later than March 2003. This had implications for Australia as well as the United States and Britain.
Our ground force commitment was likely to be limited to Special Forces for the intensive phase of any military action against Iraq. I foreshadowed this in a speech in November 2002. I also knew that if our forces were to be given every opportunity to prepare in theatre, thus minimising the likelihood of casualties, then they should be pre-positioned by early February at the latest.
An important prelude to attempts to obtain a specific invasion mandate from the Security Council was Colin Powell’s special address to that body on 5 February 2003. Months later it was claimed that Powell felt he had been badly misled in relation to his speech. Th
at always puzzled me. I could not imagine that a man in Powell’s position would have delivered a speech of that kind without being fully satisfied that the claims being made in it were as carefully verified as possible. In fact Powell told me, when I saw him in Washington on 10 February, that he had sat with the CIA director, George Tenet, for three days sorting through the intelligence used in the presentation and made it clear he would not use anything that was not corroborated from multiple sources.
This speech contained the allegations regarding dual-use mobile laboratories for the production of biological weapons. It would be months before the widely held belief of Allied intelligence agencies regarding these mobile vans proved to be unfounded. Powell also used explicit intelligence, based on telephone intercepts, to demonstrate the steps taken by the Iraqi regime to hide material from weapons inspectors.
It was only at the beginning of 2003 that many Australians began focusing on the arguments for and against invading Iraq. Powell’s speech therefore had a big impact on people. He was a strong, convincing figure and his presentation, so widely covered, shifted numbers of people towards the belief that Iraq did have WMDs.
Prior to Christmas 2002, the fresh inspections required under the new resolution, 1441, had commenced and, once again, the old cat and mouse game was played by the Iraqis. The chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, a consummate Swedish diplomat and international bureaucrat, much enjoyed the pivotal role he occupied.
Almost like clockwork he produced a report which, on balance, chided the Iraqis for their lack of cooperation. This was to be followed by another report which provided a glimmer of hope and something approaching a pass mark for Saddam Hussein. This maintained the stake of the United Nations in the whole affair.