Bush & Blair Should Be In Shackles Before War Crimes Tribunal-Robert Parry

[kpete]

By Robert Parry
March 28, 2006


In a world where might did not make right, George W. Bush, Tony Blair and their key enablers would be in shackles before a war crimes tribunal at the Hague, rather than sitting in the White House, 10 Downing Street or some other comfortable environs in Washington and London.

The latest evidence of their war crimes was revealed in secret British minutes of an Oval Office meeting on Jan. 31, 2003, when Bush, Blair and their top aides chillingly discussed their determination to invade Iraq, though still hoping to provoke the Iraqis into some violent act that would serve as political cover.

Bush, who has publicly told Americans that it was Saddam Hussein who “chose war” by refusing to disarm, was, in reality, set on invading Iraq regardless of Hussein’s cooperation with United Nations weapons inspectors, according to the five-page memo described in detail by the New York Times.

At the same Oval Office meeting, Bush cavalierly dismissed concerns that the U.S. conquest might not go as smoothly as he expected.

The President predicted that it was “unlikely there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups,” according to the British minutes written by David Manning, then Blair’s chief foreign policy adviser.

But Bush’s judgment would prove tragically wrong, as more than 2,300 U.S. troops have died along with tens of thousands of Iraqis – possibly more than 100,000 – in three years of invasion, occupation and now sectarian violence.

more at:
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/032706.html