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Ministry of Defence

I am grateful to the House for allowing me to participate in this important debate. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) has said, this is one of our first opportunities to assess some of the spending commitments that have taken place not only this year, but in the past few years. I take issue with some of the concerns that have been raised by Government Members that, somehow, we are involved in a process of simply ticking off the accounts. We must go further than simply looking at the financial aspects—the numbers—to the decisions that lie behind them. Were those decisions correct? Could the objectives have been achieved quicker or cheaper if other decisions had been made instead? Today, as I am sure all hon. Members are aware, is the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. This is an appropriate time to take stock of what has happened in that country—a moment to consider what has been achieved or not achieved—and to measure the social and political progress that has been made. There are more than 200 UK dead. More than 2,300 American soldiers have been killed. More than 4,000 British soldiers have been injured. We now know that there were no weapons of mass destruction, no missiles with 45-minute readiness and certainly no links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. In my view, it was a mistake to ignore the calls for a broader coalition to deal with Saddam Hussein. It was a mistake to disband the Iraqi military. Certainly, it was a mistake to try to link 9/11 with what was going on in Iraq. In my view, the invasion of Iraq, with the objective of helping to defeat terrorism, has only encouraged more terrorism and made the world a more unsafe place. Today’s debate is about the sums involved, but those poor decisions have driven up the cost of our operations. I do not argue about whether Saddam Hussein had to be dealt with, but as someone who has spent many years in the military—serving not only in Kuwait, but in Bosnia and other places—I have questions about the manner in which we went about getting rid of him. The inadequate assessment of the initial threat, the poor justification for an attack and the appalling management of peacekeeping have all led to the rising costs that we are debating today. We heard only last week that 800 troops will be removed from the British forces in Iraq. The suggestion is that we are doing well and achieving our objective, but Iraq is in a very poor condition. Three months after the elections, there is still no proper Government. On average, electricity is available in Baghdad for only four hours every day, and there is no adequate water supply or sewage system—after the Americans have spent about $20 billion on the infrastructure.