Had Bush and Blair been punished for Iraq war crimes, Iran might have been spared

Had Bush and Blair been punished for Iraq war crimes, Iran might have been spared Submitted by Peter Oborne on Thu, 04/09/2026 - 16:32 It has been 23 years since the fall of Baghdad - and the parallels with the latest US-Israeli madness are chilling Protesters near the White House in Washington DC denounce US military action in Iran, on 7 April 2026 (Mandel Ngan/AFP) Off Twenty-three years ago, I sat beside Hamid Karzai in his presidential office in Kabul, watching US bombers pound Saddam Hussein’s Iraq live on Al Jazeera.  It was clear the Afghan leader hated what he saw, concluding that the American-led war was mad and bad. We both grimaced – and we were right. By invading Iraq, former US President George W Bush and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair incited a catastrophe. It led to civil war, hundreds of thousands of deaths, the trashing of international law, and trillions of dollars down the drain. Today marks the 23rd anniversary of the fall of Baghdad, and the world is witnessing the same madness, bloodshed and horror – this time courtesy of another US president, Donald Trump. In his Iran adventure, Trump naturally enjoys the support of Blair, who has criticised Prime Minister Keir Starmer for not showing stronger support for Britain’s allies in Washington. But warmonger Blair has now retired from active politics. Trump’s primary ally in the Iran debacle is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Twenty-three years ago, Netanyahu (then an opposition politician) was one of the strongest advocates for the assault on Iraq. On Wednesday, in what feels like a blatant attempt to sabotage the Pakistan-brokered Iran ceasefire deal, Netanyahu unleashed hell with a devastating bombardment of Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, killing more than 250 people and injuring many more. The French diplomat Talleyrand noted, when the Bourbon dynasty returned to power after the revolutionary wars, that the French royal family had “learned nothing and forgotten nothing”. Exactly the same can be said of the US and its allies, though with much less excuse.  Endless interventions The Iraq War was meant to bring peace to the Middle East. It can now be understood as the start of an endless series of bloodstained western or western-backed interventions: from Lebanon, to Afghanistan’s Helmand province, to Libya, Yemen and Gaza – and now Iran.  In my view, the war in Sudan, where the West refuses to call out its cherished UAE allies for supporting the bloodstained Rapid Support Forces, could also fall into this category. All catastrophic. Some genocidal. All shaped by a fundamentally racist analysis, where the deaths of brown people count far less than western lives.  The wars across the region can be seen as a collective war waged by the US and its clients against anyone who refuses to accept their dominion Each of these wars has its own special characteristics, but viewed in a broad context, they can be seen as a collective war waged by the US and its clients against anyone who refuses to accept their dominion. The Trump/Netanyahu attack on Iran, like the Bush/Blair invasion of Iraq, counts as a war of aggression. Since the assault on Iran was not authorised by the United Nations, and Iran did not pose anything resembling an immediate threat, the US and Israel have jointly committed what is regarded under international law as an act of aggression. This was defined at the Nuremberg trials as the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole”. Further comparisons between Iraq and Iran are striking. On Iran, the Daily Mail used the same kind of fake justification for war employed by Blair and his team (“45 minutes from doom”) ahead of the Iraq invasion 23 years ago. “Tehran’s mad mullahs COULD launch Shahed drone attacks on British cities,” screamed one Mail headline. Unsurprisingly, Richard Dearlove, the former MI6 chief who provided the false information about weapons of mass destruction that gave Blair the excuse to commit British forces to the illegal Iraq invasion, called for Starmer to give full-blooded support to the Iran war. Complicit media Both wars have been amplified by a complicit mainstream media. The Sunday Times, supposedly a serious newspaper in the UK, declared that the bombing campaign “must succeed” and cheered on the war. Many papers have suppressed or simply ignored US/Israeli atrocities.  They are following the example of British politicians. Nigel Farage, leader of the far-right Reform Party and tipped as potentially the next British prime minister, embraces Trump with the same fervour that Blair once backed Bush. Kemi Badenoch’s Conservatives have also backed the bombing, assailing Labour for not joining the war with greater enthusiasm. Trump has called Middle East wars 'crazy', but the US-Israel war on Iran may be the craziest yet Read More » Starmer, meanwhile, has allowed US bombers to use British airbases to attack Iran, while failing to condemn US and Israeli criminality.  Criticisms from the right have made Starmer appear more moderate and restrained than he deserves. But he has at least not made the same terrible error that he made in supporting Israel’s campaign of collective punishment in Gaza, ongoing for more than two years now.  If there is one British hero of the mad assault on Iran, it might be Attorney General Richard Hermer. Twenty-three years ago, one of Hermer’s predecessors, Peter Goldsmith, gave the green light for an illegal war. Hermer has avoided the same error. History will thank him. Today, Hamid Karzai lives under Taliban restraint in Kabul. Unfortunately, Trump – a convicted felon, racist bigot and habitual liar who is mentioned tens of thousands of times in the Epstein Files – remains at large.  So does Netanyahu. Both leaders belong in the Hague, facing war crimes charges. Blair should be there too – and if the world had punished him and Bush for their illegal war on Iraq 23 years ago, we might not be where we are today. The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye. War on Iran Opinion Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:29 Update Date Override 0