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Iraq and the wider Middle East

Yes, there were differences, and I guess that any inquiry later on will deal with them. Some of those differences relate to the governing party’s need to get its own people through the Lobby and the narrowing of the argument. We have discussed that. If I have one regret, it is that we did not press harder and harder for a much wider stretching of the terms of that debate. However, there were specific and direct concerns about weapons of mass destruction—I do not resile from that—and it was right for us to ensure that they were debated. I wish to tell the House in the second phase of my speech that the issue is not that there was a lack of plans for what would happen in Iraq after the invasion. In fact, there was a surfeit of plans. That was the problem. In America—this is where I condemn what went on—there was an almost childish argument between the State Department and the Pentagon about what they should do afterwards. The Pentagon had made up its mind that Chalabi would go into power and that, very quickly, it would draw down troops and get out of there, leaving the Iraqis with their police and armed forces in place to get on and sort it out. The State Department was for nation building, and it pushed that case very strongly. The truth is that the planning should have been finished and finalised before we went anywhere near there. When my hon. Friend the Member for North Essex (Mr. Jenkin) and I came back from Kuwait, it was clear to us then that there was still a real lack of planning here and in the United States and a sense that the United States would come up with something almost at the last moment. The real nightmare occurred seven or eight months after the invasion, because into that vacuum—we know that power abhors a vacuum—came the insurgents and terrorist organisations that were allowed to galvanise and organise others in Iraq. I wish that that had not been the case, but we are where we are now. I have to tell the Liberal Democrats and the right hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) that we are all for troop withdrawal. There is no wonderful idea that only the Liberal Democrats are for troop withdrawal. We are all for troop withdrawal—the only question is when and how. [Interruption.] They laugh, because they do almost anything: they see a wagon rolling and they will jump on it. [Interruption.] I wish that they would shut up for a second and listen. The Liberal Democrats have come up with the arbitrary date of October solely because they sense and smell that the Government are heading towards a general withdrawal of troops in that time and they want to be first to give some idea that they have put a date on it. One can almost read the circulars going out on to the doorsteps saying, ““Liberals call for October withdrawal—Government did what they called for.”” It is so shallow as almost to be unworthy of any debate or discussion.