The Burden of Power: Countdown to Iraq - The Alastair Campbell Diaries (86 page)

Blix was now causing us significant problems. He was talking now about Saddam’s line on [potential decommissioning of] al-Samoud missiles being a significant piece of disarmament. TB was raging again, said the man was supposed to be a civil servant, but had decided to behave like a politician. He is just desperate not to be seen as the person who allowed a war to start, but his job is to present the facts. He felt Blix was being bullied successfully by the French who, he was now convinced, wanted as their main foreign policy objective to build Europe as a power rival to the US, and determined to shaft TB as the, or a, main player in Europe. He was also worried that Kofi [Annan, UN Secretary General] was getting closer to the Franco-German position from where we thought him to be. At last night’s dinner with Aznar, he told TB that Chirac had said directly to him that there were two possible visions for Europe – in one, close to the US; in the other, as a rival. Chirac knew which he wanted. Aznar knew which he wanted too, he said, and it wasn’t that.

In Spain there was four per cent support for action without a second UNSCR, twenty-three per cent with it. TB said to Aznar that four per cent was roughly the number you could get in a poll for people who believed Elvis was alive, so he had a struggle! Aznar seemed as determined as TB though. TB’s cold had got worse and he had stayed late in bed. The Jackie Ashley interview disaster went on. After all the travel nightmares of yesterday now it transpired the tape hadn’t worked, so TB had pretty much wasted his voice. Godric, Sally and I tried to help her out from notes and memory, but it was another pain we could do without. His cold cannot have been helped by all the nonsense of yesterday, broken planes and buses to get scheduled flights and the rest of it. As Jack Straw said, ‘He is effectively vice president of the free world, and has to travel around like a cost-cutting tourist.’ I had a similar feeling at the Moncloa, which was a beautifully designed and expensively built complex for the PM and his staff and the kind of thing that would provoke an absolute outcry if we went for something like it. Downing Street had a lot of advantages,
but set against this, it had a lot of disadvantages too. The Aznar breakfast was the usual going through the motions on a communiqué which would get very little attention at all, and then focusing on the questions likely to come up, which were all pretty obvious. It helped that generally on Iraq they were in the same place, and able to offer a bit of mutual support. Aznar was determined to reshape Spain’s relations with the US. The press conference was good, and between them they got up the right message.

We set off for the airport, TB now turning his mind to the [Welsh Labour Party conference] speech, in between continuing to vent his spleen at GB. He was convinced that GB and Co. were running the line to the media that the reason TB couldn’t persuade people was because of the general TB-trust issue. ‘It is actually wicked.’ There was another story in
The Times
today about TB planning to overrule GB re foundation hospitals which sparked another little wave of Treasury briefing against Milburn for having stirred it up. Back on to the small plane taking us to Wales where TB wrote out in long hand the Iraq section of the speech for Swansea. Very strong. The nature of the threat plus the lessons of [Neville] Chamberlain as ‘a good man who made the wrong decision’ [appeasing Nazi Germany]. I reordered it and we signed it off on the thirty-minute drive to the conference centre. Fairly big demos. His voice was really bad now but he just about held it together for the speech, which went OK, both in the hall and media-wise. On the plane back we were talking through general positioning. Blix was not making things easy in one direction; the Yanks were making it difficult in the other. This is tough, he said, very tough, about as tough as it gets. He asked what I thought the chances were of it killing him off. Twenty per cent, I said. ‘I’d say nearer thirty the way things are right now.’

I did a twenty-mile run, my longest yet, stopping only once when TB called for a chat re Blix. A combination of Blix and the recent moves by the Iraqis had got us on the back foot again. He felt it was all now about the politics of the UNSC, and would come down to a hard-headed argument for votes. It was all going to ebb and flow but we just had to keep going. He was clear that the consequences of not being with the US now were incalculable. I said I felt there had been various points where we could have done something different vis-à-vis the US. He said no, the only way to have had influence with them was to be clear from the start we would be with them when things got really tough. He was clear our interests were aligned.

Yesterday’s news of the arrest of al-Qaeda’s Number 3 kept the media off our backs for most of the day, but in general I felt things moving away from us again.
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Saddam was definitely outwitting us on al-Samoud missiles and getting us in the wrong place. We didn’t have the armoury to hit back hard. It was partly my fault because I hadn’t been motoring as I had in previous full-on communications situations. We were doing OK on the sustained arguments material, but on the quick tactical stuff I didn’t feel on form, and I think that hit TB’s confidence on some of this too. I had to decide re the FA [chief executive job] because they were starting interviews tomorrow, but I had pretty much reached the conclusion it wasn’t possible. PG said it would be seen as a disaster for TB, just when he didn’t need anything to add to his problems. The latest polling was not as bad as it might have been considering.

TB called me up at 7.45 as he was due to leave for Belfast at 8.15. He was even more worried than he had been on Friday. He felt things just were not where they needed to be. David M and John Scarlett came back from their weekend trip to Mexico and Chile and felt both countries were very firmly on the fence and could see no reason to come off it. TB said it was still possible we could get a majority on the UNSC but if it was in circumstances where people felt we bullied and arm-twisted, the French would be less worried about putting down a veto. The Americans were frankly alienating people by their tactics. David M said the message these smaller countries got was the basic assumption from the Americans that they would come over in the end.

I said to TB that our problem on the communications front was largely caused by US friendly fire. Just when we started to get a message through, they would come up with something different which would pose a real problem for us. They looked the whole time like they were desperate for war. We at least didn’t look like we were desperate for war, but we did look like we were desperate to be with them, so to a lot of people it amounted to the same thing. TB said he would have to tell Bush that it was not possible to get the votes at the moment. It was totally what they didn’t want to hear but they had to hear it from someone. He was very down on the Americans
at the moment. I was feeling much as I had done for some time, compounded by another totally useless conference call which was becoming little more than a telephonic multinational diary meeting. Also I sensed they were becoming irritated with us. I told David I wanted to be frank with them that Bush, not just Rumsfeld, was the main communication problem. With TB away [in Northern Ireland] for the next day or two, I did a series of meetings on the structures we had, and also trying to analyse which of our key messages were actually getting through, both here and in the regions.

I had a meeting with Ed Balls, still going on about Peter M urging Milburn to be a rival to GB, still claiming that we were encouraging columnists to write that GB could be for the chop. He claimed GB wanted to do more on Iraq, and I said the more he did the better. But I always felt he would only do it on his terms. I also suggested he and Milburn do something public together in the run-up to the tax rise. TB called in once or twice re Iraq. Blix had effectively become a commentator as well as a player. Saddam’s games were playing well for him and whether they tried or not, the Americans just weren’t helping us in public opinion terms. Sally felt the party was with us up to the point of the destruction of missiles, which tipped the balance towards giving the inspectors more time. TB was moving to the Canadian position of a bit more time to get the questions finally answered.

I was beginning to fear that if we went to war without a second resolution, TB would fail to get it through the Commons, and he would be dead in the water. ‘I’ve just got to tell Bush clearly that if he does this wrong, he’ll have governments toppling all over the place and cause absolute chaos.’ There was a poll in Spain showing ninety-five per cent opposition. Opposition in Turkey was enormous.

TB still in Northern Ireland. The Iraq meeting was fine though I felt we needed to do more to get up the bigger argument about democracies versus dictatorships. We were in a very odd period where there was a strong sense of momentum towards war come what may, but with the dynamics feeling as though they were totally against us. He was doing OK in Belfast, though [David] Trimble [First Minister of Northern Ireland] walked out at 7 and Sinn Fein kept chiselling away. They kept at it till gone midnight and TB didn’t get back till 3am. I had some good cheques coming in – [Michael] Heseltine [former Conservative Deputy Prime Minister], [Jeremy] Paxman [BBC]. Ed Balls called, clearly having spoken to GB, and said he thought if he
did something with Milburn, the story would be division not unity. Depends how you do it.

TB had just a few hours’ sleep before his meeting with [Igor] Ivanov [Russian foreign minister]. David M had raised with Condi the idea of TB going to Chile and Mexico and trying to get them to co-present on the day of Blix the idea of a final ultimatum and taking the clusters document [a paper setting out where Iraq had not complied with its disarmament obligations] from Blix to get out what needed to be done. She was not dismissive, though they may be sensing that we felt they lacked the subtlety required. TB felt strongly these countries needed to be given a reason for coming on board more than fear of US bullying. The idea would be to say after Blix reported that it was clear Saddam was not co-operating and now we would set a date by which the UNSC would decide it was clear he had not taken the final opportunity to disarm. Ivanov was clear that Putin would like to be more involved. David felt there was a case for going to Chile as early as tomorrow.

TB was pretty good in the House today, considering how little sleep he had had and how difficult the issues were. France, Germany and Russia issued a joint statement, de Villepin driving it mainly. Earlier Jack came over for a meeting with TB and told him ‘If you go next Wednesday with Bush, and without a second resolution, the only regime change that will be taking place is in this room.’ Written down, it sounds more menacing than it was. He was trying to be helpful. TB’s call to Bush was OK, though as I stayed in TB’s room, I only heard his side, saying we had a real problem with world opinion, that these countries needed a reason to come round, that he wanted to go to Chile and set out the outlines of an amended resolution with a deadline so it was clear there would be war if Saddam hadn’t responded. Blix was out again today, as much commentator as civil servant. TB felt the UNSC had to take control of this now, not Blix.

When the call ended, Jonathan walked in and said that was a ‘fuck me’ call, in that they actually seemed far apart. TB said it was not as bad as that. He told Bush we would be with them come what may but these other countries needed help to come over. He also said Bush needed to work more on Putin, not just write him off. TB then did the [Chilean President Ricardo] Lagos call and put the same idea. Lagos didn’t totally go against it but was not exactly wild and we certainly had to put on hold the idea of going tomorrow. By the end of the day, not only did he think he should go to Chile, but also
Moscow and another visit to Bush. So the wanderlust was on. ‘We are in this, and nobody must think we would ever wobble.’ But the Americans were not helping. They claimed they had already slowed down as a result of TB, that Bush had wanted to go as early as yesterday but TB had made sure he didn’t. It was a pretty grim scene, and no matter how grim, TB was still saying constantly it was the right thing to do.

I ran in, slightly different route, almost five miles, then up to see TB in the flat with David and Jonathan. He was looking a bit more worried. He said the frustrating thing is that he felt that if we were in charge of it all, we would have sorted it by now. David said the Americans were much more confident they had the votes for a second resolution. TB was keen the Americans reach out far more, especially to Putin. He was also keen that we ‘rise above Blix’ and a meeting with Lagos might be the way to do that. Jack came over and we discussed pre-Blix positioning. We needed to get out the idea that we wanted the clusters document out there, also the sense that Blix was just inhaling the politics in all this. We agreed we needed to publish a version of the clusters document which would help turn round the argument. I was impressed with Jack at the moment. He could sometimes be very nerdish, and wood-for-trees, but his grasp of the detail was a help, and his political feel was currently good. We discussed with JP the idea of going to Africa to see the three leaders there.
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He was off to New York on Concorde at 9 with the message from TB that we needed to turn the Blix clusters document to our advantage.

Cabinet was scratchy, Robin and Clare both a bit bolder in setting out their concerns, Clare saying that the idea of horse trading and bullying was bad for the authority of the UN. TB hit back quite hard, said it was not just the US who were bullying and intimidating. What about the French telling the Bulgarians they would not be able to get into the EU if they sided with America? Robin was diddling rather more subtly whereas Clare was just doing anti-Americanism. John R hit back hard as well as TB. I walked through with TB to his office at the end. He said ‘God, you wouldn’t go into the jungle with them would you?’ The mood had generally been OK, though there was clearly a lot of concern about our position.