Those who think the establishment a myth should look to the inquiry's membership
By Adrian Hamilton
The Independent
".....while the Chilcot inquiry into the whole circumstances of a war that split the country and led to the loss of hundreds of thousand of civilian lives in Iraq as well as irreparably damaging the international reputation of the country and its Prime Minister will not, according to Gordon Brown in setting it up, aim to "apportion blame."....
If you want to know why this should have been a public inquiry led by lawyers and under oath and not an exercise in driving a difficult issue into the political long grass you have only to look at the two public inquiries which are being undertaken into the Iraq occupation – those into the deaths of Baha Mousa, killed with over 90 injuries inflicted by his guards, and the 20 Iraqis killed in the so-called "battle of Danny Boy" in 2004.
War isn't just a continuum of diplomacy by other means, as the committee's questioning this week seemed to imply. It is the single most important act that a government can undertake, and one with the most terrible of consequences, on the perpetrators as well as the victims. Baha Mousa and his fellow Iraqis deserve a proper investigation of what was done to them. But then so does the country for what was done in our name but not with our assent."
By Adrian Hamilton
The Independent
".....while the Chilcot inquiry into the whole circumstances of a war that split the country and led to the loss of hundreds of thousand of civilian lives in Iraq as well as irreparably damaging the international reputation of the country and its Prime Minister will not, according to Gordon Brown in setting it up, aim to "apportion blame."....
If you want to know why this should have been a public inquiry led by lawyers and under oath and not an exercise in driving a difficult issue into the political long grass you have only to look at the two public inquiries which are being undertaken into the Iraq occupation – those into the deaths of Baha Mousa, killed with over 90 injuries inflicted by his guards, and the 20 Iraqis killed in the so-called "battle of Danny Boy" in 2004.
War isn't just a continuum of diplomacy by other means, as the committee's questioning this week seemed to imply. It is the single most important act that a government can undertake, and one with the most terrible of consequences, on the perpetrators as well as the victims. Baha Mousa and his fellow Iraqis deserve a proper investigation of what was done to them. But then so does the country for what was done in our name but not with our assent."
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