I assumed that Blair, at least, was genuine in seeking to present Saddam with an ultimatum

I was surprised at this argument at the time.

Successive senior officials in both US administrations of the preceding decade had stated the view that—weapons inspections or not—there could be no lifting of sanctions until Saddam had been toppled. This included Clinton, Albright, Bush, and Powell—but also UK officials like David Hannay, the UK’s permanent representative to the UN in 1991.

This position was quite contrary to UN resolutions 661 (and later 1284) and for years effectively had removed any incentive to comply with UN weapons inspections. It also ensured that any “ultimatum” through further UN resolutions in 2002 would be largely meaningless.

Very astute and (unforunately) all too accurate.

Ken Clarke (formerly senior in UK Conservative government) gave an excellent and very prescient speech when Blair proposed going to war.
(Perhaps the only praise TB deserves is that he did actually have parliamentary debate and a vote on the war. But that is very faint praise)

What is more, not only did he predict the cause, he also warned of the repercussions with increased terrorism.

Any war will be won easily. I am glad that if we go to war, it will not take long.

However, we should consider alternatives because of the consequences of war.

We will win. But what then? How many terrorists will we recruit in the greater, long-standing battle against international terrorism? It will be far harder to win. What will we do to the stability of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan or Egypt? What sort of leadership will replace that which might be deposed?

The Government never address those questions satisfactorily, as my right hon. Friend the shadow Foreign Secretary said. However, they will have to live with the answers.

The next time a large bomb explodes in a western city, or an Arab or Muslim regime topples and is replaced by extremists, or the the Government must consider the extent to which the policy contributed to it. That is why hon. Members should pause and why, unless evidence is produced for a breach and a material threat, my judgment today is that we should not go to war.

I think we are all aware of the mechanisms by which rich countries get their way in the UN. But the problem is the difference between this ‘business as usual’ bribery, and the open contempt for the ‘non-decent’ (i.e.not US/UK) viewpoint that has been increasingly shown since Kosova.

The problem with Kosova was not that UNSC was not obtained. The point is that this was then ‘spun’ retrospectively, as a principle: i.e. ‘well we have now shown we don’t need UNSC approval: what’s wrong, don’t you remember Kosova?’. That was the crucial break betwen diplomacy as it had been carried out since 1945, and the (even less pleasant) version of it we have to deal with nowadays. One that principle had been established, it didn’t make Iraq inevitable, but it did make Iraq (or something like it) far more likely.

If you remember at the time when they were trying to get that SC resolution they were caught trying a number of dirty tricks, from bugging phone lines of diplomats to intimidation:

…increasingly threatening noises from the US towards undecided countries on the Security Council who have been warned of the unpleasant economic consequences of standing up to the US.

This is the basis for the collective security we are talking about here. To get 8 SC votes out of 15 by a combination of bribing and bullying is not that difficult; the fact that they couldn’t get even that for the Iraq war really does say something.

For what it’s worth I think this is exactly right. Had this been done, this would have had the side effect of STRENGTHENING the UN instead of weakening it, and demonstrating the, as it were, ‘unbreakability’ of international law.

Unfortunately, because of the way the war was fought, and (not unimportant) the way the war was ‘spun’ afterwards, people began to infer that UNSC approval ‘wasn’t really that important’ (as long as your heart was in the right place, presumably) and that certain powers (guess who) could, if they wished, ‘suspend’ or ‘get round’ international law whenever it suited them.

I am, though they don’t lead me to change my position all that much. My view at the time was that the failure to get UNSC approval wasn’t that important, since there was a clear consensus in favour of intervention and the only problem was that the Russians didn’t want to be forced to state a public position.

Now I think that was wrong and the effort should have been made to secure a UNSC resolution, making whatever concessions were needed to get Russia not to veto it.

I also think (and thought at the time) that the bombing of Belgrade crossed the line from striking military targets to terrorisation, most obviously with the bombing of the TV station. This precedent was used recently in Lebanon.

But, contrary to Martin at #25, the falsehood of the WMD claims was evident, to those who cared to look, before the invasion of Iraq, while the evidence in support of Clinton’s claims on Kosovo was strong.

Well exactly. And is anyone having second thoughts about it now we see where it leads to?

[http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm199900/cmselect/cmfaff/28/2813.htm#a34]. The Parliamentary committee of course came up with the completely meaningless and empty judgement that Kosova was ‘illegal’ but not ‘moral’ (!!) [‘we conclude that NATO’s military action, if of dubious legality in the current state of international law, was justified on moral grounds.’]

Most of the ‘decents’ get round this by conflating the Kosova war (which was to do with the desire for independence by ethnic albanians) with the Bosnian war (which was to do with Serbian aggression against Bosnian Muslims and others), and then argue backwards that if Bosnia was ‘justified’ then, obviously, the war for the KLA was also ‘justified’, as though the Kosovan war set a precedent, even though the Bosnian war happened first.