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Should Tony Blair be indicted as a war criminal?

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  • Shia and Sunni Muslims had been living in peaceful co-existence for the last 500 years until Blair came along and Saddam never murdered 3,000 of his own Kurdish population using WMDs. Unfortunately neither of those statements is true.

    The number of Blair haters who think they are experts on the history of the Middle East, Iraq and and the Shia Sunni conflict down the years based on reading childish anti-Blair/anti-USA leaflets handed out at anti-war demos never ceases to amaze me. The fact is they all know jack shit about the subject and will never allow themselves to accept any facts unless it supports their 'Blair is a war criminal' narrative.
  • Saddam was never a threat to us but he was to Israel. Would Blair be prepared to do what he did to protect Israel? Possibly imo.

    Iraq had been under severe sanctions since the first gulf war - it was no threat whatsoever to the most militarised nation in the Middle East. Saddam Hussein was only a threat to Iraqis and to the nations next door - Iran, Kuwait, Bahrain
  • Atrocities in the middle east are either attributed to Isis or glossed over. We need to be told which murders are being committed by Sunnis or Shias before we can continue to meddle into historical divisions. Cameron's 70k freedom fighters. What? Yet he commited £100's Millions of taxpayers money on a more flaky premise than0 the dodgy dossier.
  • I don't know how he sleeps at night

    For me the devil walking amongst us is either him, or Jeremy Kyle
  • Blair reckons that the Middle East will be stable for the next Generation following his actions!!

    We've been saying that for centuries though, the Middle East has been a problem ever since the Crusades so which Generation is he talking about!!

    Oh my goodness.

    What is the definition of War Criminal?

    War crimes fall into three groups - or four if you include genocide.

    Crimes against peace

    planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances
    participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the above
    War crimes

    Violations of the laws or customs of war, including:

    Atrocities or offences against persons or property, constituting violations of the laws or customs of war
    murder, ill treatment or deportation to slave labour or for any other purpose of the civilian population in occupied territory
    murder or ill treatment of prisoners of war or persons on the seas
    killing of hostages
    torture or inhuman treatment, including biological experiments
    plunder of public or private property
    wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages
    devastation not justified by military necessity
    Crimes against humanity

    Atrocities and offences committed against any civilian population, before or during the war, including:

    murder
    extermination
    enslavement
    deportation
    mass systematic rape and sexual enslavement in a time of war
    other inhumane acts
    persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated
    Genocide, crimes against peace, crimes of aggression and crimes against humanity are different to war crimes. Some can obviously occur outside of war, and some are not fully codified. A war crime can only be prosecuted by the International Court if it was part of a wider policy. So it's definite he couldn't be tried as a War Criminal, possibly for crimes against peace or agression but necon crazy zebinterpretation of intelligence is unlikely to prove willfull intent.
  • edited July 2016

    Shia and Sunni Muslims had been living in peaceful co-existence for the last 500 years until Blair came along and Saddam never murdered 3,000 of his own Kurdish population using WMDs. Unfortunately neither of those statements is true.

    The number of Blair haters who think they are experts on the history of the Middle East, Iraq and and the Shia Sunni conflict down the years based on reading childish anti-Blair/anti-USA leaflets handed out at anti-war demos never ceases to amaze me. The fact is they all know jack shit about the subject and will never allow themselves to accept any facts unless it supports their 'Blair is a war criminal' narrative.

    I would certainly hold my hands up and say that I know very little about the politics and internal machinations of the Middle East.
    I would also add that I was speaking to a friend the other night who knew one of the personnel who had been part of the team looking for evidence of chemical weapons in Iraq. He claimed there were traces of these everywhere they looked, but nothing substantial enough to present as evidence.
    Saddam was undoubtedly someone who would use what weapons he had on anyone he perceived as an enemy to Saddam.
    All that said, for me, the issue with Tony Blair is that he committed this country to a war before he got anywhere near Parliament. There is a good article about him by James Naughtie on the BBC website this morning.
    I believe Tony Blair made a huge error of judgement in his leadership of the country at that time, and that will ultimately be what he will be remembered for, and not the peace process in NI, for which he does deserve some credit, I believe.



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  • The analysis after question time was damning, he looked like a 'haunted' man. He will now be limited to doing after dinner speaking with Khazak working men's clubs...
  • Saddam was never a threat to us but he was to Israel. Would Blair be prepared to do what he did to protect Israel? Possibly imo.

    Iraq had been under severe sanctions since the first gulf war - it was no threat whatsoever to the most militarised nation in the Middle East. Saddam Hussein was only a threat to Iraqis and to the nations next door - Iran, Kuwait, Bahrain
    And the 38 Scud missiles that landed in Israel?
    Maybe fired in desperation but showed he had the capability.
  • 3blokes said:

    Shia and Sunni Muslims had been living in peaceful co-existence for the last 500 years until Blair came along and Saddam never murdered 3,000 of his own Kurdish population using WMDs. Unfortunately neither of those statements is true.

    The number of Blair haters who think they are experts on the history of the Middle East, Iraq and and the Shia Sunni conflict down the years based on reading childish anti-Blair/anti-USA leaflets handed out at anti-war demos never ceases to amaze me. The fact is they all know jack shit about the subject and will never allow themselves to accept any facts unless it supports their 'Blair is a war criminal' narrative.

    I believe Tony Blair made a huge error of judgement in his leadership of the country at that time, and that will ultimately be what he will be remembered for, and not the peace process in NI, for which he does deserve some credit, I believe.



    I agree 100% with that statement. But the idea that he is a war criminal is fanciful.
  • Saddam was never a threat to us but he was to Israel. Would Blair be prepared to do what he did to protect Israel? Possibly imo.

    Iraq had been under severe sanctions since the first gulf war - it was no threat whatsoever to the most militarised nation in the Middle East. Saddam Hussein was only a threat to Iraqis and to the nations next door - Iran, Kuwait, Bahrain
    And the 38 Scud missiles that landed in Israel?
    Maybe fired in desperation but showed he had the capability.
    Not to Britain though
  • Can't argue with that good piece.

    The overiding factor is that Blairs stubbornness caused 179 British troops to die in Iraq ...for nothing. There really was no greater good. No bigger picture that their personal sacrifices were worth doing.
    Life is precious. Blair seemed to think that our troops were simply already dead men/women walking...and completely at his disposal for whatever.
    His property as PM.

    He didn't think it through. It's his job to think things through more then anyone. It's complicated....but it's also that simple.

    The chilcot report obviously exposes it further by suggesting we were not even fully prepared and ill equipped for the war going into it. It's sickening.

    There is no way out of this one for Blair. Every arguement he may give.... there is a much stronger counter arguement for it.
    He does have a case on some matters though, I believe.

    He was wrong. 179 of our people died for nothing. America would have inevitably achieved the same outcome of capturing Saddam.

    I don't think Blair is as evil as I perhaps thought straight after this report came out.
    I just think he didn't even consider the fact that there was no "bigger picture". It was more like just walking into a brick wall which has ruined innocent peoples lives.
    I don't think he cares enough about the victims families.
    We should never have been connected to the invasion of Iraq.
    Let America do what they've gotta do. Which was also sadly killing a lot of Iraqi civillians.

  • Don't care what people think about my own views on this so don't bother trying to 'correct' me, but I personally believe Blair was persuaded by Bush that the US had intelligence on WMD, to the point where it compelled his actions, including that dreadful 'with you whatever' note.

    Where I believe he's misled people is as to whether he should have been so persuaded, perhaps more an issue of personal pride. Under no circumstances should Bush have been placed as an authority above our own intelligence, what the UN were doing, and - more importantly - our own Parliament. That said, the decision was made by Parliament, even if on inadequate evidence.

    Regime change was always necessary - Hussein was an evil dictator who had murdered countless of his own people using chemical weapons (WMDs by the way), and would do so again - but the vacuum the lack of planning of the US/UK left has created the huge problems we have today. If we'd have gone in aligned with the UN (and even the Arab League), there was more chance of a successful post-Hussein transition. We didn't learn many lessons from the Gulf War.

    All that said, the military leaders seem to have been criticised way more strongly than Blair.

    War crimes - not remotely relevant I'm afraid.
  • There are of course a number of wars of aggression where those attacking Blair never accuse those responsible of committing war crimes e.g.

    Saddam Hussein against Iran and Kuwait
    Hezbollah against Syria and Israel
    Iran against Syria
    Syria against Lebanon
    Serbia against Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia
    Sudan against Darfur
    Hamas against Israel
    The Taleban against Afghanistan and Pakistan
    ISIS against Syria. Iraq, France etc.etc.
    Russia against Chechenya and Syria
    Chana aginst Tibet
    Soviet Union against Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia and Hungary

    Why is this?

    Rather than indulging in their hatefest aginst Tony Blair for the past 13 years past perhaps a little thought might be given to how the UN needs to be reformed so that it can as an effective tool against the tyrants who abuse their own people and their neighbours which was its intended purpose, and in which it has failed for many years well before Tony Blair came along.
  • And yes Saddam did have WMDs which he used against the Kurds, which he admitted to holding after the Kuwait war, and which he did not account for to the UN Weapons Inspectors (Blix made this very clear - and just asked for more time so that they could be accounted for). My guess is they went to Saddam's fellow Baathist gasser in Syria - I'm afraid things like that do not just diasappear into thin air.
  • But Blair said that the wmd could be used against the west. Total bollocks
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  • Well if they had existed they could have been used against the west of Iraq. And against suadi arabia, Jordan and Syria which form the western border of Iraq. Maybe that's what he meant ;)
  • sm said:

    There are of course a number of wars of aggression where those attacking Blair never accuse those responsible of committing war crimes e.g.

    Saddam Hussein against Iran and Kuwait
    Hezbollah against Syria and Israel
    Iran against Syria
    Syria against Lebanon
    Serbia against Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia
    Sudan against Darfur
    Hamas against Israel
    The Taleban against Afghanistan and Pakistan
    ISIS against Syria. Iraq, France etc.etc.
    Russia against Chechenya and Syria
    Chana aginst Tibet
    Soviet Union against Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia and Hungary

    Why is this?

    Rather than indulging in their hatefest aginst Tony Blair for the past 13 years past perhaps a little thought might be given to how the UN needs to be reformed so that it can as an effective tool against the tyrants who abuse their own people and their neighbours which was its intended purpose, and in which it has failed for many years well before Tony Blair came along.

    Not sure it's entirely true that people aren't accusing those responsible of war crimes for at least some of those conflicts. Radovan Karadzic was recently jailed for his role in Srebrenica for example.

    You're absolutely right re the UN's role. The US had run out of patience with Hussein taking the piss out of the UN time and time again. With the sheer amount of conflict out there today, not sure it's something the UN could adequately address now. But where regime change is achievable, I think the UN has a responsibility to attempt to do so by ensuring those responsible are indicted for the war crimes they commit.
  • edited July 2016
    sm said:

    There are of course a number of wars of aggression where those attacking Blair never accuse those responsible of committing war crimes e.g.

    Saddam Hussein against Iran and Kuwait
    Hezbollah against Syria and Israel
    Iran against Syria
    Syria against Lebanon
    Serbia against Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia
    Sudan against Darfur
    Hamas against Israel
    The Taleban against Afghanistan and Pakistan
    ISIS against Syria. Iraq, France etc.etc.
    Russia against Chechenya and Syria
    Chana aginst Tibet
    Soviet Union against Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia and Hungary

    Why is this?

    Rather than indulging in their hatefest aginst Tony Blair for the past 13 years past perhaps a little thought might be given to how the UN needs to be reformed so that it can as an effective tool against the tyrants who abuse their own people and their neighbours which was its intended purpose, and in which it has failed for many years well before Tony Blair came along.

    You seem to have ignored countless attacks by US financed Israel against their poorer neighbours and indeed Palestinians who are under their jurisdiction, having stolen much of their land. We invaded Iraq on more flimsy UN resolution than the ones that Israel have ignored for decades.

    As of 2013, Israel had been condemned in 45 resolutions by United Nations Human Rights Council since its creation in 2006—the Council had resolved almost more resolutions condemning Israel than on the rest of the world combined.

    Also you seem to have forgotten our own great nation from your list, at least some of the above are bolshy neighbours but we specialise in attacking 3rd world countries miles from home.
  • Gah. Israel v Palestine is Goliath v David. The philistines.
  • Philistines? You need the Labour change thread.


  • You seem to have ignored countless attacks by US financed Israel against their poorer neighbours and indeed Palestinians who are under their jurisdiction, having stolen much of their land. We invaded Iraq on more flimsy UN resolution than the ones that Israel have ignored for decades.

    No I haven't - I said those attacking Blair = thanks for supporting my point about people's selectivity when it comes to war crimes

  • sm said:

    There are of course a number of wars of aggression where those attacking Blair never accuse those responsible of committing war crimes e.g.

    Saddam Hussein against Iran and Kuwait
    Hezbollah against Syria and Israel
    Iran against Syria
    Syria against Lebanon
    Serbia against Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia
    Sudan against Darfur
    Hamas against Israel
    The Taleban against Afghanistan and Pakistan
    ISIS against Syria. Iraq, France etc.etc.
    Russia against Chechenya and Syria
    Chana aginst Tibet
    Soviet Union against Afghanistan, Czechoslovakia and Hungary

    Why is this?

    Rather than indulging in their hatefest aginst Tony Blair for the past 13 years past perhaps a little thought might be given to how the UN needs to be reformed so that it can as an effective tool against the tyrants who abuse their own people and their neighbours which was its intended purpose, and in which it has failed for many years well before Tony Blair came along.

    1. Because people are more aware of the facts of this case
    2. Because Blair lied to our Parliament, not anyone else's
    3. Because people are more likely to have loved ones who were sent to fight in Iraq than any of the other conflicts
    4. Because people are more likely to know, or at least know of, people who were killed in this conflict
    5. Because Blair was elected to represent us, his crimes were therefore committed in our name. Seeing him punished would help in some small way to clear our nation's shame

    Nothing sinister, just logical really.
  • All very parochial and unlikely to achieve anything whatsoever. Perhaps more of focus on why the UN exists, why it is failing in its objectives and what needs to be done to correct this would be rather more productive than going on about a matter where everyone's views are pretty much set and there really is nothing in the way of new evidence waiting to come out.

    The other thing that should stop is the practice among some of blaming western democracies for every terrorist incident that occurs while there is a next to stony silence about the perpetrators who have the primary guilt.

  • edited July 2016

    Shia and Sunni Muslims had been living in peaceful co-existence for the last 500 years until Blair came along and Saddam never murdered 3,000 of his own Kurdish population using WMDs. Unfortunately neither of those statements is true.

    The number of Blair haters who think they are experts on the history of the Middle East, Iraq and and the Shia Sunni conflict down the years based on reading childish anti-Blair/anti-USA leaflets handed out at anti-war demos never ceases to amaze me. The fact is they all know jack shit about the subject and will never allow themselves to accept any facts unless it supports their 'Blair is a war criminal' narrative.

    would've helped if blair himself educated himself about sunni and shia conflict before starting a war and a creating a power vaccum that would kill millions.

    Ah well, he was only our head of government so it doesn't really matter does it.
  • Tory Blair was a Career Politician.
    John Smith was the main man with Gordon Brown next and Blair 3rd in the Pecking order.
    The gifted Smith who was liked by the city, plus most of labour other than the far left; what could go wrong !.
    Smith died after being told to climb mountains by his doctors in his spare time, to keep himself fit after having a mild heart attack.
    After another heart attack killed him when only 55, Blair usurped Brown and by being in the Right place and Time after black Wednesday and John Majors battles within his own party he won a landslide.
    Blair was on a crest of a Wave, what could go wrong for this lifelong Tory Labour man ?

    1. no such thing as true or false, just how his mate Campbell would spin it.
    2. He knew that he would make a sackful of money if he kept in with uncle Sam. (holy cow, how true was that)
    3. Blair took advice from Bob Monkhouse ?
    "The public love sincerity: If you can fake that you're got it made"

    Tony Blair should be banished to Iraq
    to spend the rest of his life looking for WMD.
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