Tony Blair was urged to delay ‘impatient’ George W. Bush’s Iraq invasion, archives reveal

Newly released government files show British prime minister was repeatedly warned about George W. Bush’s ‘Manichean’ mindset and his impatience for military intervention

US president George W. Bush and British prime minister Tony Blair in April 2003.

Tony Blair was advised to delay the invasion of Iraq, which George W. Bush saw as his “mission” to rid the world of “evildoers”, according to newly released government files.

The UK prime minister flew to Camp David in January 2003, two months before the invasion, to urge the US president to wait until at least March to allow potential diplomatic solutions to work.

Recently released documents from the UK National Archives have revealed how government officials told Mr Blair to slow down Mr Bush, who was described as “implacable”, “impatient” and “Manichean” in his preparations.

Files from government officials between December 2002 and January 2003 recommended that Mr Blair convince Mr Bush to wait for either a “smoking gun”, indicating weapons of mass destruction were definitely in Iraq, or for the UN Security Council to agree on a resolution specifically authorising the use of military force.

Tanks and soldiers of Britain’s 7th Armoured brigade gather in the Kuwaiti desert on March 14, 2003, ahead of the invasion of Iraq.

The correspondence demonstrated the “clear divergence between the UK and US” over the “timetable for military action” described in the Chilcot inquiry in 2016.

On December 18, 2002, British ambassador to the US Christopher Meyer sent an annual review to the prime minister’s office from Washington. He wrote: “Much of the impulse for deposing Saddam Hussein comes from Bush himself. More than anything else, he fears another catastrophic terrorist attack on the homeland, especially one with an Iraqi connection. His view of the world is Manichean. He sees his mission as ridding it of evildoers. He believes American values should be universal values. He finds the Europeans’ differentiation between Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein self-serving. He is strongly allergic to Europeans collectively.”

Meyer added that although some groups such as “conservative ideologues, Likud fellow-travellers” were pressing for war, this did not include “the American people at large”.

On January 29, 2003, two days before Mr Blair’s visit to Camp David and a day after Mr Bush’s State of the Union address, Meyer wrote again. “The prime minister will find on Friday a pretty implacable Bush: impatient, deeply disillusioned with France and Germany, convinced that his – and Mr Blair’s – critics will be routed by an early and easy military victory,” he said.

Saddam Hussein yells during his trial in a Baghdad court in 2006. Picture: AFP

Meyer then referenced the Blair administration’s desire for a second UN resolution from Hans Blix, executive chairman of the UN monitoring, verification and inspection commission.

“If the notorious smoking gun can be found, this will make things much easier. Otherwise, a sequence of fortnightly reports from Blix saying that the Iraqis are still not co-operating will be the next best thing,” he wrote.

Foreign policy adviser David Manning wrote to Mr Blair the next day recapping his meeting with US national security adviser Condoleezza Rice. “Bush still wants to rush his fences,” Sir David wrote. “You need to stick very strongly to the arguments in your Note and spell them out in a way that leaves no scope for Bush ‘interpretation’.”

Other notes from these months reveal how Mr Blair was encouraged to turn down an invitation to give the commencement address at Harvard University in the summer of 2003. Matthew Rycroft, Mr Blair’s private secretary on foreign affairs, wrote: “You are seen as travelling abroad too much already.”

The Times