I am not a natural hawk. Like many of my friends and colleagues on the left I marched against the Vietnam war. I am proud to have done so. I was critical of much of American policy in the cold war era in Latin America, in Africa and in other parts of the world. I have despaired as the present leadership in Washington fails to engage in poor country debt reduction; refuses to sign the Kyoto protocol, pulls out of the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty and refuses to recognise the International Criminal Court.
Yet I am convinced that Britain is now right to stand with the United States over Iraq. I was Middle East minister at the Foreign Office for two years from 1999. Iraq was part of my brief. I have seen the intelligence reports proving the existence of Saddams weapons of mass destruction. I have seen the brutality he inflicts daily on his own people and the evidence of the million deaths he has caused through war with Iran, Kuwait and in Iraq itself. I am convinced that we cannot simply sit back and turn a blind eye we have to act.
Force should only ever be used as a last resort. And since we drove Saddam out of Kuwait in 1991, the international community has done everything in its power to resolve this situation peacefully.
We did not march on to Baghdad in April 1991 at the end of the first Gulf war, as we would have been entitled to do. We spared the regime that had inflicted so much pain and suffering on the people of Kuwait because we wanted to avoid further bloodshed. In exchange, as the non-negotiable terms for letting Saddam continue in power, we agreed on UN Resolution 687. This required Saddam to eliminate Iraqs weapons of mass destruction within fifteen days.
Twelve years on, Saddam has still failed to do so. We went back to the United Nations in the autumn of 2002 and secured unanimous support for Resolution 1441 which gave Iraq a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament obligations and warned of the serious consequences if it did not.
With the threat from thousands of American and British soldiers camped on his borders, Saddam then allowed UN weapons inspectors back into Iraq to search for his hidden weapons in a twisted game of hide and seek. Yet that was not the purpose or role of the inspectors. They were there, not to find his weapons but to take receipt of them from the regime and oversee their destruction. He has handed over some weapons as token gestures to win over world opinion.
We know from intelligence reports that his most dangerous weapons remain hidden, including 550 mustard gas shells; 6,500 chemical weapons munitions; and 10,000 litres of anthrax just one litre of which, effectively delivered, could kill millions.
Britain, and our US allies, believe that we have the legal authority to act under the terms of the UN resolutions already past. We would have liked to achieve one final resolution, but the decision of France to veto that resolution regardless of what it said prevented that. I firmly believe that the greatest threat to the future authority of the UN would be to refuse to enforce one of its most critical resolutions. This would not only damage the UNs future strength, but confirm it as an instrument of diplomacy but not of action, forcing nations down the very unilateralist path we wish to avoid.
After this conflict is over, we are committed to protecting the territorial integrity of Iraq; and to ensuring that the countrys oil revenues will be put in a trust fund for the Iraqi people administered by the UN.
I respect those who do not agree with the course of action we are taking. Many of my friends, family and colleagues marched for peace and still remain unconvinced of the path we have chosen. They reflect the concern felt throughout the country.
But I genuinely believe that we are now faced with no choice but to rid this world of these weapons of mass destruction. And that now means, having tried all other options at our disposal over twelve years, that we have to rid the world of Saddam Hussein.
