World | UK
Blair and Bush obsessed with Saddam, Blix says
Leaders conducted witch-hunt which led to Iraq war
- by Tim Shipman and David Jones
- Published: 00:00 December 6, 2009
London : Tony Blair and George Bush were orchestrating a witch-hunt against Saddam Hussain that ended with the Iraq War, according to a former UN weapons inspector.
Hans Blix said the two leaders behaved like 17th century witchfinders in their willingness to oust the dictator.
In an interview with the Mail he revealed that Blair tried to force him to change his mind about the absence of WMDs in Iraq to placate the Americans.
The former Swedish diplomat, who headed the UN weapons inspection team in the run-up to war, concluded Blair and Bush "misled themselves and then they misled the public."
"They were convinced they had their witch in front of them and they searched for the evidence and believed it without critical examination.
"I'm not saying they acted in bad faith [but] they exercised very bad judgment. A modicum of critical thinking would have made them sceptical. When you start a war which cost thousands of lives you should be more certain than they were."
Blix dismissed the ‘dodgy' Downing Street dossier on Saddam's weapons which made the case for war as "a politician's twist."
The claim Iraq could fire chemical weapons in 45 minutes was "hyperbole". Blix's inspectors viewed 700 supposed WMD sites in the months before the war but found nothing more than a handful of empty chemical munitions.
Five weeks before the invasion he revealed these findings to the UN and six days later Blair told him his report had undermined American support for the UN process.
But Blix stuck to his guns and warned the former prime minister not to invade.
— Daily Mail
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