The Public Transcripts 35 Tim Foy

 The Iraq Inquiry then moved on to the view from Baghdad and Basra from 2004 to 2006 interviewing Consul Generals, deputy heads of mission in Baghdad and Basra and minor functionaries Lindy Cameron, Simon Collis, Tim Foy and James Tansley.  It is quite hard to comprehend their evidence as the inquriy interviewed them collectively rather than as individuals - to quote Sir John Chilcot  "This is, in rugby terms, a sort of rolling maul, I think."

As the participants at these hearings were not all civil servants the sessions were in private and though transcripts were made available large sections are redacted on the grounds of National Security, International Security and to protect diplomatic relations.

Although hidden away in the waffle and technical FO-speak is this rather blunt exchange

Woodrow Wilson's 14 Points...

 David Miliband professes not to be an expert in International law. As do many of those commenting on this page. Which raises the question... ...where does International Law come from anyway....? The answer is that it is, ironically for neo-Conservatives, largely an American invention and the UN was invented to arbitrate it. The UN replaced the League of Nations which was slightly discredited by World War II. The League of Nations was born of the 1919 peace conference at Versailles at the end of World War I and its founding principles were based on President Woodrow Wilson's 14 points. The Fourteen Points were based on the research of "the Inquiry", a team of about 150 advisors led by foreign-policy advisor Edward M. House into the topics likely to arise in the anticipated peace conference. So rather than any more analysis of what is legal or illegal under international law... ...let's go back to the start. Here are the 14 points again ,,, as read by Sarah Palin: 

The Public Transcripts 34 David Miliband

Douglas Alexander and David Miliband (the ministers responsible for trying to sort out the post Iraq invasion situation) also gave evidence but as they hadn't been involved much in the build up to war no one was really interested in what they had to say.  David Miliband was closely questioned on the legal case for war....

...he went on to say he thought the war had actually been good for Britain's international reputation in the middle east .....by linking himself so closely and uncritically with the Blair government's position on the Iraq war he gave his younger brother Ed a political stick to beat him with in the later battle for the Labour Party leadership so this testimony is actually quite interesting historically.

The Public Transcripts 33 ...More from Gordon Brown

Asked about the legal advice he commented that if he had known the uncertainty pertaining to Lord Goldsmith's legal advice then that he did now ... it would not have changed his view unless Lord Goldsmith was prepared to say that his unequivocal advice was that this was not lawful.  A cunning argument that no one else seemed to have thought of. He always has an alibi, or one or two to spare. He also attempted to put some distance between himself and President Bush's antics commenting that "I never subscribed to what you might call the neo-Conservative position that somehow, at the barrel of a gun, overnight, liberty and democracy could be conjured up."

He went onto say that if you look the question of expenditure in Iraq, you have got to start from this one fundamental truth -- that every request that the military commanders made to us for equipment was answered. No request was ever turned down. Unfortunately there is a difference, of course, between being turned down and being ignored. So clearly no one requested any UAVs and if they did they were not turned down ... the requests simply proceeded very slowly. Of course it could be that some things were turned down but if they were then they were turned down for good reason by someone lower down the command chain than Gordon himself who was, as he puts it, purely incharge of the finance of the war (not conducting it). He was forced to later retract his claims that defence spending had always risen.

The Public Transcripts 32 Gordon Brown ...

Gordon Brown's testimony reveals exactly why he later rose to the top of the tree.  Like the late Jim Hacker he relentlessly uses the technique of answering one question with the answer to a different question usually involving his catchphrase "It was the right decision and it was for the right reasons.".  Despite actually living in Number 10 (Tony Blair lived in the flat above Number 11) Mr Brown insisted that he didn't know much about the diplomatic and military preparations for the war because he was as chancellor of the exchequer engrossed in doing complicated long division sums.  If a war crime was committed Gordon was not there.

The Public Transcripts 31 - Lord Goldsmith's Actual Legal Advice

 

Jaques Chirac's speech about not joining in the Iraq War