Britain's Blair steadfast on decision to support Iraq war in new memoir

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair spends more than 100 pages of his newly released memoir defending the war in Iraq.

Blair, who was criticized for his decision to stand by President George W. Bush and send British troops to the region, covers the topic throughout three chapters of his book, A Journey: My Political Life.

The tome went on sale in the United States on Thursday, two days after President Obama announced the United States had “turned a page” in Iraq and officially ended the U.S. combat mission there.

Blair writes about the Iraq war as a politician, noting he can see both sides of the argument over the conflict, but said his task is “not to persuade the reader of the rightness of the cause, but merely to persuade that such a cause can be made out.”

The former British prime minister writes that he doesn’t regret his decision to support the war, but concedes he never guessed at the “nightmare that unfolded” after the invasion.  

In discussing the buildup to the war, Blair reminds the reader of the fear felt throughout the world after the Sept. 11 attacks.

He says he doesn’t know why the intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction was wrong, but maintains Saddam may have been able to develop such weapons in the future if action had not been taken against him.

“I still believe that leaving Saddam in power was a bigger risk to our security than removing him, and that terrible though the aftermath was, the reality of Saddam and his sons in charge of Iraq would at least arguably be much worse,” he writes.

Blair dismisses speculation that Iraq’s oil had a role in the decision to go to war, stating that “if oil had been our concern, we would have cut a deal with Saddam in a heartbeat.”

He defends Bush at several points in the memoir and gives the former president credit for the 2007 troop surge in Iraq — something Obama didn’t do in his Oval Office address.

In discussing the backroom decisionmaking over the war, Blair hints at then-Vice President Dick Cheney’s stubbornness without making any direct charges against him.

“Dick is the object of so much conspiracy theory that it’s virtually impossible to have a rational discussion on him,” Blair writes. "My take on him was different from that of most people. I thought he had one central insight which was at least worth taking seriously. He believed, in essence, that the U.S. was genuinely at war; that the war was one with terrorists and rogue states that supported them. … In other words, he thought the world had to be made anew. … He was for hard, hard power. No ifs, no buts, no maybes.”

The memoir came out in the United Kingdom on Wednesday. Early reports about the book in the British press focused on the Iraq decision, Blair’s criticism of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, his thoughts on Princess Diana and her death, and his relationship with the queen.

While a great deal of the book focuses on British issues, Blair has kind words for every American president he worked with.

He called Bill Clinton a “formidable politician,” noted Bush had “great intuition” and said Obama is “a man with steel in every part of him.”

Blair noted that the three men, though different, had one key thing in common: They were “prepared to put what you perceive to be the common good of the nation before your own political self.”

He only discusses the Monica Lewinsky scandal for a few pages, but credits Clinton with being “preternaturally cool under fire” during the controversy.

Blair offers some armchair psychology on Clinton, speculating that his behavior with Lewinsky “arose in part from his inordinate interest in and curiosity about people. In respect of men, it was expressed in friendship; in respect of women, there was potentially a sexual element. And in that, I doubt he is much different from most of the male population.”

Blair was at the White House in February 1998 when tapes from the grand jury investigation into the Lewinsky scandal leaked. He and Clinton were scheduled to speak to the press, and both knew what most of the questions would be about.

Before they went out to talk to the press corps, Blair says the two leaders were subject to Rahm Emanuel’s famous foul language.

Emanuel, who was then a White House adviser, told the two of them: “Don’t f--k it up.”

Blair also offers his insight into Bill and Hillary Clinton’s relationship: “I think they loved each other. That’s the real revelation. Yes, it’s a political partnership; yes it’s buttressed by mutual ambition, but when all is said is done, the ambition is the awning under which true love shelters, not love which gives shelter to the ambition.”

Blair left office in June 2007, after serving for 10 years as the British leader. He is now a Middle East envoy. He was in Washington on Wednesday to discuss the Middle East peace process and have dinner at the White House.