Little Sir Echo: U.S. lies & Tony Blair's dilemma

From the start, it has been hard to understand British Prime Minister Tony Blair's conduct concerning the war on Iraq. Clearly, he believed deeply in the moral case for unseating Saddam Hussein. Blair had nothing to gain politically from supporting George W. Bush, since the British public initially was against the war. But Blair backed the president so obsequiously that he forfeited the influence he might have had in Washington, Bush's pally treatment notwithstanding. Blair simultaneously reinforced Britain's reputation in Europe as incorrigibly Atlanticist and divisive.

Rodric Braithwaite, former chairman of Britain's joint intelligence committee, said of the prime minister's performance that "a junior partner who is taken for granted is a junior partner with no influence." To have influence, you must express opinions and national interests of your own, and indicate that on some issues you might break with the partner. It is no use playing Little Sir Echo.

This conduct was particularly odd from a prime minister said to be obsessed with winning a place in history. Blair remained faithful even after Donald Rumsfeld told him the United States didn't really need British troops, and after the Bush administration subverted his independent effort to work with the Palestinians and cut him (and everyone else) out of Middle Eastern road map implementation.

Now the prime minister is in trouble. It's charged that the decision to go to war was taken in Washington last fall and everything that followed was an expedient charade. London and Washington are accused of lying to get public support for the war and of faking evidence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz has given a candid and convincing explanation of how it began to the magazine Vanity Fair. Implicit in his account is that last year the Bush administration wanted to go to war but had no excuse for doing so. The bureaucracies were called together and told to find an excuse. The core causus belli they could agree on was Iraqi possession of weapons of mass destruction. That settled, it became the government's virtual reality that the weapons existed--even if the CIA and the UN had not found them.

The mighty Wurlitzer of American policy, persuasion, and the press was put to work to persuade the public and the world of the reality of this threat, so that America could go to war. Britain's modest harmonium joined in. The prime minister proudly furnished Washington with two dossiers of evidence on Iraqi weapons that subsequently proved very dodgy.

When the war was over, the coalition's failure to find the weapons had to be explained. First it was said that the weapons had been smuggled to Syria. Then Secretary Rumsfeld suggested that none exist, that they were destroyed before the war and all evidence buried. Then he reversed himself and said they do exist, still are there, and will be found. The U.S. military command in Iraq said the search may take several years because it is a big country. President Bush went back into virtual-reality mode and told Polish television: "We found the weapons of mass destruction." He was followed by Secretary of State Colin Powell who expressed confidence that the weapons will eventually be found, and Prime Minister Blair who said that the coalition had simply been too busy to look for the weapons.

In the United States, few seemed to care at first, thinking that the war had been a splendid little affair. Congress has now interested itself in what the Senate and public had been told, however, and there is growing support for hearings to be held by the Senate's Armed Services Committee, as well as the Intelligence Committees in both the House and the Senate.

Actually, there is not much pretense about what happened. Speaking by way of retired officers, the intelligence community says that Donald Rumsfeld's Defense Department cut the CIA out of the planning loop and substituted tendentious material coming from exile groups and prowar Washington think tanks.

Britain used to have higher standards, and has a much more aggressive press corps and television. Prime Minister Blair's government has a reputation for "spinning" its public relations, but not for the barefaced lie. The prime minister himself has the reputation of a decent man.

His former foreign secretary, Robin Cook, has now demanded an independent inquiry. The House of Commons Foreign Relations Committee has announced that it will hold an inquiry into Britain's decision and will likely investigate whether Downing Street's own flacks and handlers clumsily "improved" the material they had been given by MI6 before furnishing it to Washington. A final report will likely be made to the prime minister's office rather than to Parliament. Such discretion, however, may not be possible if the American hearings stir trouble in Washington (and on television). Prime Minister Blair may come to regret having been so reliable an American partner.

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