At PMQs today, answering a question from David Cameron, Blair said:

It has always been my view that it was in the British interest to remove Saddam Hussein.

It's not the first time he's said this sort of thing. We know that even the ever so flexible Lord Goldsmith was unequivocal in saying that a policy based on regime change would be illegal. As the Downing Street memo recorded "the Attorney-General said that the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action". So, how do we get him prosecuted? Seriously?

Also, in answer to a puff question on Iraq from Ann Clywd, no longer the chairman of the parliamentary party, he said:

It's is important, as she rightly implies, to emphasise that the people that we are fighting are al-Qaeda linked up with Sunni extremists, Iranian backed elements linking up with Shiite militias. Those are the self-same forces that we are fighting in Agfhanistan...

Iranian elements fighting for the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan? That is just utterly ridiculous. Does he not understand this or does he not care what fatuous drivel he speaks in defence of his failing policies? I'm not sure which would be worse and it may well be that both are true. He said many other equally ridiculous things; this just happened to be one which stood out.

Anyway, he's off to get his new orders now from a man who, impossible though this may appear, is even more clueless as to the realities of the situation. The idea that these two men are capable of turning things around, even supposing that the situation was not already irretrievable, flies in the face of all the evidence of the last four years. Blair has been a key advocate for the introduction of performance targets in the public sector. The Head of a failing school doesn't have long to sort things out before they're out on their ear. If Blair had applied that principle to his own position... but of course he never would.

Tags: News, Politics, Iraq, Tony Blair