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This programme contains some strong language and some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting. | 0:00:02 | 0:00:06 | |
'When people look back on this conflict, I honestly believe they will see this | 0:00:06 | 0:00:09 | |
'as one of the defining moments of our century. | 0:00:09 | 0:00:11 | |
'In a week, we'll hear the final verdict on the Iraq War, | 0:00:11 | 0:00:15 | |
'which cost countless lives and left a country in chaos.' | 0:00:15 | 0:00:19 | |
It's incredibly eerie here on the streets of Basra tonight. | 0:00:19 | 0:00:23 | |
'I was with British troops when they invaded, | 0:00:23 | 0:00:26 | |
'as they fought a losing battle, | 0:00:26 | 0:00:29 | |
'and when they pulled out after six long years of war. | 0:00:29 | 0:00:32 | |
'Now, I'm going back | 0:00:34 | 0:00:36 | |
'with parents who lost their son, a soldier, here.' | 0:00:36 | 0:00:39 | |
Matthew would have thought, "You've done it now, Mum. You've done it." | 0:00:40 | 0:00:47 | |
'The British general who led the Desert Rats into battle | 0:00:48 | 0:00:51 | |
'looks back on what went wrong.' | 0:00:51 | 0:00:53 | |
We were inadequately prepared, both physically and mentally, | 0:00:53 | 0:00:57 | |
for the aftermath of the war fighting. | 0:00:57 | 0:01:01 | |
'Now the Iraq Inquiry will have to decide why we went to war | 0:01:01 | 0:01:05 | |
'and who was responsible for what happened.' | 0:01:05 | 0:01:07 | |
'We want justice.' | 0:01:08 | 0:01:09 | |
We want justice, you know, for the sake of our family, | 0:01:10 | 0:01:14 | |
for British soldiers who lost their lives there. | 0:01:14 | 0:01:17 | |
'Basra Airport in southern Iraq. | 0:01:29 | 0:01:32 | |
'There's little to show this was once the base | 0:01:32 | 0:01:34 | |
'for thousands of British troops. | 0:01:34 | 0:01:36 | |
'Today, it's a civilian airport | 0:01:42 | 0:01:44 | |
'and I'm here to meet Maureen and Roger Bacon from London.' | 0:01:44 | 0:01:48 | |
Morning. How are you? | 0:01:48 | 0:01:50 | |
-Nice to see you. -You, too. -How was your trip? Hello, Maureen. | 0:01:50 | 0:01:53 | |
Nice to see you. | 0:01:53 | 0:01:54 | |
'For 11 years, they've wanted to come to Basra, where their son, | 0:01:54 | 0:01:58 | |
'Matthew, a British officer, was killed.' | 0:01:58 | 0:02:01 | |
So that's where Matthew would have been based. | 0:02:01 | 0:02:04 | |
To actually find that still, the actual building | 0:02:06 | 0:02:09 | |
that he worked in is here, that's... | 0:02:09 | 0:02:11 | |
that's something else, again. | 0:02:11 | 0:02:13 | |
'For the Bacons, this is an alien and dangerous place. | 0:02:15 | 0:02:19 | |
On the roadside, there's a lot of waste and a lot of rubbish. | 0:02:19 | 0:02:24 | |
Barren and pretty bleak, really. | 0:02:25 | 0:02:28 | |
Always smiling. | 0:02:33 | 0:02:34 | |
'Matthew's parents hope this trip can help them | 0:02:36 | 0:02:38 | |
'understand why Matthew died here.' | 0:02:38 | 0:02:41 | |
When he left, he was shoulders back, head held high | 0:02:42 | 0:02:45 | |
and he was coming out here to make a better place for the Iraqis, | 0:02:45 | 0:02:51 | |
so I wanted to, just to see where Matthew spoke his last words | 0:02:51 | 0:02:56 | |
and took his last breath, just to try and make sense of it all. | 0:02:56 | 0:03:01 | |
-TONY BLAIR: -'On Tuesday night, I gave the order | 0:03:09 | 0:03:11 | |
'for British forces to take part in military action in Iraq. | 0:03:11 | 0:03:14 | |
'Their mission - to remove Saddam Hussein from power | 0:03:16 | 0:03:19 | |
'and disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction.' | 0:03:19 | 0:03:22 | |
'When the British forces invaded, | 0:03:25 | 0:03:27 | |
'they thought Saddam's huge army would put up a fight. | 0:03:27 | 0:03:30 | |
'I was with the Desert Rats. | 0:03:31 | 0:03:33 | |
'Their aim - to secure strategic bridges into Basra.' | 0:03:33 | 0:03:36 | |
So this is it, Al-Fayha'a Bridge. | 0:03:39 | 0:03:41 | |
Yep, well, it brings back a lot of memories. | 0:03:41 | 0:03:43 | |
It's almost 13 years ago to the day that we were here. | 0:03:43 | 0:03:47 | |
'I first met Graham Binns when he commanded British forces here.' | 0:03:48 | 0:03:53 | |
This was fighting by almost a sort of militia-style. | 0:03:53 | 0:03:56 | |
'Only a small hard-core of Saddam's loyalists | 0:03:58 | 0:04:01 | |
'took a stand on the bridge. | 0:04:01 | 0:04:03 | |
'They used the population as cover. | 0:04:03 | 0:04:05 | |
'We sat on these bridges for longer than I was expecting, really,' | 0:04:06 | 0:04:11 | |
and then we started conducting raids into the city centre. | 0:04:11 | 0:04:16 | |
CHEERING | 0:04:16 | 0:04:17 | |
'Saddam's militia quickly melted away | 0:04:17 | 0:04:20 | |
'and the British took control of southern Iraq. | 0:04:20 | 0:04:22 | |
'Just days later, I drove through Basra. | 0:04:26 | 0:04:28 | |
'I found the home of Saddam's notorious cousin, | 0:04:29 | 0:04:32 | |
'once the governor here. | 0:04:32 | 0:04:34 | |
'Nicknamed "Chemical Ali", | 0:04:34 | 0:04:36 | |
'he'd ordered the killing of thousands of Iraqis with poison gas. | 0:04:36 | 0:04:40 | |
'Families who suffered under the regime | 0:04:40 | 0:04:42 | |
'had now taken over his mansion.' | 0:04:42 | 0:04:44 | |
Thank you, Mr Blair. | 0:04:46 | 0:04:48 | |
You want to thank Mr Blair for bringing the army here? | 0:04:48 | 0:04:50 | |
-Yes, yes, good. Very good. -And many people feel that in Basra? | 0:04:50 | 0:04:53 | |
-ALL REPEAT: -Yes! | 0:04:53 | 0:04:55 | |
SHE SPEAKS OWN LANGUAGE | 0:04:55 | 0:04:57 | |
'I've come back now to Basra, back to that very same house.' | 0:05:04 | 0:05:08 | |
You know, that sense of gratitude to Tony Blair, | 0:05:10 | 0:05:13 | |
that sense of optimism that the British Army was here | 0:05:13 | 0:05:16 | |
and, you know, Basra could have a better future, | 0:05:16 | 0:05:18 | |
that was really, really strong when I was here just after the invasion. | 0:05:18 | 0:05:22 | |
But, sadly for the British, it didn't last long. | 0:05:22 | 0:05:24 | |
DOGS BARK | 0:05:24 | 0:05:27 | |
'Within a week of taking Basra, on night patrol, | 0:05:27 | 0:05:30 | |
'it was clear the British were in for a long haul.' | 0:05:30 | 0:05:33 | |
It's incredibly eerie here on the streets of Basra tonight. | 0:05:35 | 0:05:39 | |
In recent days, several state-owned banks have been looted. | 0:05:39 | 0:05:43 | |
'There was a power vacuum in Basra. | 0:05:43 | 0:05:45 | |
'Saddam's brutal Sunni regime had suppressed the Shia Muslim south. | 0:05:45 | 0:05:50 | |
'Now it was gone.' | 0:05:50 | 0:05:51 | |
Basically, what we've got is guys coming in from the slums area | 0:05:53 | 0:05:57 | |
into the town centre, where we are now, | 0:05:57 | 0:05:59 | |
and they're armed with AK-47s and basically harassing | 0:05:59 | 0:06:03 | |
the locals, you know, kicking front doors in. | 0:06:03 | 0:06:05 | |
'Five million people live in southern Iraq. | 0:06:08 | 0:06:11 | |
'There were never enough British troops on the ground to stop | 0:06:11 | 0:06:14 | |
'a breakdown of law and order.' | 0:06:14 | 0:06:16 | |
Everybody's stealing it from the national stores, | 0:06:18 | 0:06:21 | |
so we're a bit helpless to stop them at the moment. | 0:06:21 | 0:06:24 | |
You ask them, "Is it stolen?" They're like, "Yes, Ali Baba's." | 0:06:24 | 0:06:28 | |
It's natural, now that the Iraqi government have gone. | 0:06:28 | 0:06:31 | |
'The British Army set up their headquarters | 0:06:36 | 0:06:39 | |
'in Saddam's summer palace. | 0:06:39 | 0:06:41 | |
'Brigadier Binns was running an area almost the size of England | 0:06:41 | 0:06:45 | |
'with no strategic plan.' | 0:06:45 | 0:06:47 | |
'We really didn't understand how much risk we were taking. | 0:06:49 | 0:06:53 | |
'I think we'd lulled ourselves into this false sense that the war' | 0:06:53 | 0:06:57 | |
was over, the fighting had finished and we would | 0:06:57 | 0:07:01 | |
set about reconstruction with the support of the population. | 0:07:01 | 0:07:04 | |
That fire's still burning over on the front. | 0:07:07 | 0:07:10 | |
-I'm surprised they've not put that out yet. -Yes. | 0:07:10 | 0:07:13 | |
'British troops had to supply basic needs, like water, in a city | 0:07:13 | 0:07:17 | |
'whose infrastructure had been deliberately run down by Saddam. | 0:07:17 | 0:07:22 | |
'The soldiers wanted to win hearts and minds, | 0:07:22 | 0:07:24 | |
'but the population was getting restive.' | 0:07:24 | 0:07:27 | |
Yes. OK. | 0:07:29 | 0:07:30 | |
-Let me explain. The situation is very difficult. -Yes. | 0:07:32 | 0:07:34 | |
Firstly, with the water, you are correct. | 0:07:34 | 0:07:37 | |
The water engineering works aren't working. OK? | 0:07:37 | 0:07:41 | |
Mark Etherington was one of just a handful of British civilian | 0:07:41 | 0:07:44 | |
administrators sent to Iraq. | 0:07:44 | 0:07:47 | |
First meeting I attended, a local tribal chief said to me, | 0:07:47 | 0:07:51 | |
"Nothing works, everything is broken and it needs to be fixed." | 0:07:51 | 0:07:55 | |
And then I think, after a while, he added, "Now"! | 0:07:55 | 0:07:58 | |
And there were two of us at the time, I remember. | 0:07:58 | 0:08:02 | |
I didn't think we had a coherent plan in the longer term. | 0:08:02 | 0:08:06 | |
We hadn't really, as a coalition, | 0:08:06 | 0:08:08 | |
thought through how we were going to operate. | 0:08:08 | 0:08:12 | |
We were inadequately prepared both physically | 0:08:12 | 0:08:15 | |
and mentally for the aftermath of the war fighting. | 0:08:15 | 0:08:18 | |
The aftermath would keep the British bogged down for six long years. | 0:08:21 | 0:08:25 | |
Maureen and Roger Bacon have come to Basra to try | 0:08:29 | 0:08:32 | |
and understand what their son gave his life for here. | 0:08:32 | 0:08:35 | |
From the start, his parents knew | 0:08:39 | 0:08:41 | |
Matthew would be involved in the war. | 0:08:41 | 0:08:44 | |
His life had always been military service. | 0:08:44 | 0:08:47 | |
I think from age six, he decided that he was going in the Army | 0:08:47 | 0:08:52 | |
and it was going to be his career. | 0:08:52 | 0:08:55 | |
The idea of soldiering came into his head, really, and he joined the | 0:08:55 | 0:08:59 | |
local Army Cadet Force and it was immediately the right thing for him. | 0:08:59 | 0:09:05 | |
Matthew progressed through the ranks to become | 0:09:06 | 0:09:09 | |
a major in the Intelligence Corps. | 0:09:09 | 0:09:12 | |
While the Army prepared for war, | 0:09:12 | 0:09:14 | |
his mother joined a million people demonstrating in London. | 0:09:14 | 0:09:19 | |
I marched and it was something that I felt passionate about. | 0:09:19 | 0:09:23 | |
I wondered, "Why are we going into Iraq?" | 0:09:24 | 0:09:28 | |
It was just something that I couldn't work out | 0:09:28 | 0:09:31 | |
and didn't agree with at all. | 0:09:31 | 0:09:33 | |
I felt very uncomfortable about it. | 0:09:33 | 0:09:35 | |
I felt, "This is not right, this is not right." | 0:09:35 | 0:09:37 | |
Matthew just said, "Well, you must do what you want to do, Mum." | 0:09:37 | 0:09:42 | |
He didn't give any opinion at all, | 0:09:42 | 0:09:44 | |
because Matthew was a professional soldier. | 0:09:44 | 0:09:47 | |
Two years later, Matthew would be posted to Iraq. | 0:09:47 | 0:09:51 | |
He only served there for a month. | 0:09:51 | 0:09:53 | |
-NEWS REPORTER: -'A British soldier is killed in southern Iraq. | 0:09:53 | 0:09:56 | |
'Three others are injured.' | 0:09:56 | 0:09:58 | |
There was this terrific knock on the door like no other knock that | 0:09:59 | 0:10:05 | |
I've ever heard or would ever wish to hear again. | 0:10:05 | 0:10:08 | |
Disbelieving that, you know... | 0:10:08 | 0:10:10 | |
-In shock, really. That's what it was. Complete shock. -Yes. | 0:10:10 | 0:10:13 | |
And we couldn't think. Couldn't think. | 0:10:13 | 0:10:17 | |
MILITARY TAPS | 0:10:17 | 0:10:20 | |
The families who lost loved ones want to know | 0:10:20 | 0:10:23 | |
if they were told the truth about why Britain went to war in Iraq. | 0:10:23 | 0:10:27 | |
A year before the invasion, | 0:10:33 | 0:10:35 | |
Tony Blair flew in to meet President George Bush. | 0:10:35 | 0:10:38 | |
Only months after 9/11, Iraq was now on the agenda. | 0:10:38 | 0:10:42 | |
This was part of the Blair hug-'em-close philosophy. | 0:10:44 | 0:10:47 | |
"We're with you on this. | 0:10:47 | 0:10:49 | |
"We're with you from the beginning and we'll be with you till the end." | 0:10:49 | 0:10:52 | |
Sir Christopher Meyer was at the Bush ranch in Texas | 0:10:54 | 0:10:56 | |
when the two leaders met in private. | 0:10:56 | 0:10:59 | |
Did Tony Blair make a secret deal with George Bush to remove | 0:10:59 | 0:11:03 | |
Saddam by military force? | 0:11:03 | 0:11:05 | |
Those two men are alone. | 0:11:05 | 0:11:07 | |
I suspect what Blair actually said to Bush was, | 0:11:07 | 0:11:12 | |
"Whatever you decide to do, George, I'm with you." | 0:11:12 | 0:11:16 | |
The next day, Mr Blair backed the American desire to | 0:11:16 | 0:11:19 | |
get rid of Saddam, their next target in the war on terror. | 0:11:19 | 0:11:23 | |
If necessary, the action should be military and, again, | 0:11:24 | 0:11:29 | |
if necessary and justified, it should involve regime change. | 0:11:29 | 0:11:33 | |
'It was the first occasion when I had heard Tony Blair...' | 0:11:34 | 0:11:40 | |
mention in public regime change in an approving way. | 0:11:40 | 0:11:45 | |
Removing Saddam by force without a UN resolution would be illegal. | 0:11:47 | 0:11:52 | |
Tony Blair said he wanted to go the UN route, but Clare Short, | 0:11:53 | 0:11:58 | |
who had responsibility for humanitarian relief, | 0:11:58 | 0:12:01 | |
didn't believe him. | 0:12:01 | 0:12:03 | |
I think he'd made up his mind to be with Bush, | 0:12:03 | 0:12:07 | |
knowing we were massaged and deceived to get us there, | 0:12:07 | 0:12:13 | |
when it was a manipulation of us, that is us, | 0:12:13 | 0:12:16 | |
the Parliament, the Cabinet, | 0:12:16 | 0:12:18 | |
British public opinion, American public opinion, | 0:12:18 | 0:12:21 | |
by people who were determined | 0:12:21 | 0:12:23 | |
to take military action from the beginning. | 0:12:23 | 0:12:26 | |
It was only as troops began to build up on Iraq's border, | 0:12:26 | 0:12:30 | |
two months before the war, that serious planning got underway. | 0:12:30 | 0:12:34 | |
But Sir Christopher had warned London the year before | 0:12:34 | 0:12:38 | |
the US had no plan for the aftermath. | 0:12:38 | 0:12:40 | |
We said, "It's a black hole. It's a black hole, and it is something that | 0:12:42 | 0:12:46 | |
"you, Prime Minister, need to say, | 0:12:46 | 0:12:48 | |
"the President needs to get moving." | 0:12:48 | 0:12:50 | |
And we said this at regular intervals through the year. | 0:12:50 | 0:12:54 | |
"It's not working on planning." | 0:12:54 | 0:12:57 | |
The British Government's attempts to get UN approval to tackle Saddam | 0:12:57 | 0:13:01 | |
meant they couldn't be seen to be gearing up for military action. | 0:13:01 | 0:13:06 | |
The plans for afterwards were not properly made because all | 0:13:06 | 0:13:09 | |
the players that should be involved weren't allowed to be involved. | 0:13:09 | 0:13:14 | |
Terrible. | 0:13:15 | 0:13:16 | |
But in London, the head of Britain's forces claims Clare Short was | 0:13:18 | 0:13:22 | |
preventing her crucial department from getting fully involved. | 0:13:22 | 0:13:26 | |
It's been said that you didn't engage with the planning | 0:13:26 | 0:13:29 | |
-because of your personal stance on the war. -Yeah, but that is a lie. | 0:13:29 | 0:13:33 | |
I mean, you know... There was a sort of tension between us | 0:13:33 | 0:13:37 | |
and the Ministry of Defence very late in the day, | 0:13:37 | 0:13:41 | |
when I think they started to realise the dangers that were coming. | 0:13:41 | 0:13:45 | |
-REPORTER: -'The fall of Baghdad - | 0:13:48 | 0:13:49 | |
'Saddam's grip on the capital collapses. | 0:13:49 | 0:13:52 | |
'After three weeks of war, | 0:13:52 | 0:13:53 | |
'scenes of jubilation have replaced fighting and bombing.' | 0:13:53 | 0:13:57 | |
Days after Saddam was toppled, his ministries were burnt | 0:13:59 | 0:14:02 | |
and looted, while American troops stood by. | 0:14:02 | 0:14:05 | |
-What's been going on here? -The fuckin' war's going on. | 0:14:06 | 0:14:09 | |
They weren't prepared for this. | 0:14:12 | 0:14:14 | |
For America, it was already mission accomplished - the war was over. | 0:14:14 | 0:14:19 | |
-GEORGE BUSH: -'In the battle of Iraq, the United States | 0:14:19 | 0:14:22 | |
'and our allies have prevailed. | 0:14:22 | 0:14:25 | |
'The tyrant has fallen and Iraq is free.' | 0:14:25 | 0:14:29 | |
Where's the Americans? Is this how Iraq wants to be? | 0:14:31 | 0:14:35 | |
Everybody stealing and looting from everybody? | 0:14:35 | 0:14:38 | |
We want security! We want peace for our country! | 0:14:38 | 0:14:40 | |
Britain, the junior partner in the coalition, | 0:14:43 | 0:14:46 | |
was tied to the only policy the Americans had - | 0:14:46 | 0:14:50 | |
to dismantle the whole state. | 0:14:50 | 0:14:51 | |
In Basra during the invasion, the coalition had bombed | 0:14:54 | 0:14:58 | |
the headquarters of Saddam's all-powerful Ba'ath Party. | 0:14:58 | 0:15:01 | |
But now they disbanded the entire Ba'ath structure | 0:15:03 | 0:15:06 | |
which had held the country together - | 0:15:06 | 0:15:08 | |
the police, the army, the civil service. | 0:15:08 | 0:15:11 | |
We stripped the framework of the nation by removing a regime | 0:15:11 | 0:15:16 | |
and we didn't replace it with anything that was... | 0:15:16 | 0:15:19 | |
..that promoted stability. | 0:15:21 | 0:15:23 | |
Another British civilian coordinator, Emma Sky, | 0:15:23 | 0:15:26 | |
had to deal with the breakdown of the Iraqi state. | 0:15:26 | 0:15:30 | |
We ended up with hospitals without any doctors, | 0:15:30 | 0:15:33 | |
schools without any teachers, because it didn't just | 0:15:33 | 0:15:37 | |
remove the top-level people, it went right the way down. | 0:15:37 | 0:15:40 | |
This was a centralist economy, so the factories, the dams, | 0:15:40 | 0:15:43 | |
the irrigation schemes, the police, the police's uniform, | 0:15:43 | 0:15:46 | |
their cars, you name it - we were responsible for it. | 0:15:46 | 0:15:51 | |
It removed the sinews of the state that held the country together. | 0:15:51 | 0:15:55 | |
And so without any security forces, people were fearful | 0:15:55 | 0:15:59 | |
and they started to form gangs, militias could flourish, | 0:15:59 | 0:16:02 | |
insurgent groups started up. | 0:16:02 | 0:16:03 | |
Tony Blair's response was to draw down British forces | 0:16:06 | 0:16:10 | |
within weeks of the invasion, | 0:16:10 | 0:16:12 | |
from 46,000 to just over a third of that. | 0:16:12 | 0:16:16 | |
There are people here who in years to come will look back | 0:16:16 | 0:16:20 | |
and will remember what you did and recognise that as the start | 0:16:20 | 0:16:23 | |
of their future and a life of hope and the possibility of prosperity. | 0:16:23 | 0:16:26 | |
Regime change didn't usher in a rosy future, | 0:16:28 | 0:16:31 | |
it unleashed powerful sectarian forces. | 0:16:31 | 0:16:34 | |
Soon the overstretched, underequipped British forces would | 0:16:36 | 0:16:39 | |
be caught in a disaster that would change public perception of the war. | 0:16:39 | 0:16:44 | |
-It says on the stone "Iraq 2003". -Yes. | 0:16:48 | 0:16:52 | |
"Remember." | 0:16:54 | 0:16:56 | |
And people do. | 0:16:57 | 0:16:59 | |
John Hyde's son Ben was a Red Cap, | 0:17:01 | 0:17:04 | |
one of six Royal Military Police | 0:17:04 | 0:17:06 | |
killed the month after the war was declared over. | 0:17:06 | 0:17:09 | |
Ben and the lads, I think, had six police stations to administer. | 0:17:09 | 0:17:13 | |
They were there trying to help the people. | 0:17:13 | 0:17:15 | |
I first met John ten years ago when he read me a bluey - | 0:17:17 | 0:17:21 | |
Ben's letter to be opened if he died. | 0:17:21 | 0:17:24 | |
"Mum and Dad... | 0:17:25 | 0:17:26 | |
.."if you're reading this then you'll know that I won't be coming home. | 0:17:28 | 0:17:31 | |
"I'm up in the stars now, looking down on you, | 0:17:33 | 0:17:37 | |
"making sure that you're safe." | 0:17:37 | 0:17:38 | |
The Red Caps died in Maysan, a Shia tribal area on the border | 0:17:43 | 0:17:48 | |
with Iran, the biggest Shia power in the region. | 0:17:48 | 0:17:51 | |
The British were now responsible for this province, | 0:17:52 | 0:17:54 | |
but Iran was determined to extend its influence here. | 0:17:54 | 0:17:58 | |
Chris Kemp commanded a company of British Paras in the area. | 0:18:02 | 0:18:06 | |
He is now head of the BBC's security. | 0:18:06 | 0:18:09 | |
He hasn't spoken publicly before about the day the Red Caps died. | 0:18:09 | 0:18:13 | |
I had 90 soldiers and a huge patch of land, which is | 0:18:15 | 0:18:18 | |
clearly not enough to bring any sort of military sense to it. | 0:18:18 | 0:18:23 | |
We could see things happening around us | 0:18:23 | 0:18:25 | |
but hadn't been able to interpret that information, | 0:18:25 | 0:18:27 | |
but you could sense that there was malign influence. | 0:18:27 | 0:18:31 | |
Iran was stirring up trouble as the British tried to disarm | 0:18:31 | 0:18:35 | |
the tribes, though Major Kemp didn't know it. | 0:18:35 | 0:18:38 | |
He called a meeting with local elders | 0:18:38 | 0:18:40 | |
in the town of Majar al-Kabir. | 0:18:40 | 0:18:43 | |
There were people in that room that had never been there before. | 0:18:43 | 0:18:46 | |
They were the people right at the bottom of the room | 0:18:46 | 0:18:48 | |
that were actually really calling the shots. | 0:18:48 | 0:18:51 | |
Chris Kemp says he agreed to stop searching houses | 0:18:51 | 0:18:54 | |
but made it clear his troops would continue to patrol the town. | 0:18:54 | 0:18:58 | |
So I said, "We're not having a no-go area, | 0:18:58 | 0:19:01 | |
"no further weapons searches, but we would be coming back." | 0:19:01 | 0:19:04 | |
A few days later, the Paras were confronted | 0:19:06 | 0:19:09 | |
by an armed crowd in the town. | 0:19:09 | 0:19:12 | |
They had to fight their way out. | 0:19:12 | 0:19:14 | |
Meanwhile, six Red Caps were at the police station, | 0:19:14 | 0:19:17 | |
trapped now by the mob. | 0:19:17 | 0:19:19 | |
They had no satellite phone to call for help. | 0:19:19 | 0:19:23 | |
There was no thought to take them prisoner, | 0:19:23 | 0:19:26 | |
disarm them or anything else - they went in there to kill them. | 0:19:26 | 0:19:30 | |
Ben was hit six times and fell to the ground | 0:19:30 | 0:19:34 | |
and the Iraqis then went into the room | 0:19:34 | 0:19:37 | |
and continued firing until they were dead. | 0:19:37 | 0:19:40 | |
What tends to get forgotten is the courage | 0:19:42 | 0:19:45 | |
that the lads showed that day. | 0:19:45 | 0:19:47 | |
They could have slaughtered a lot of people, | 0:19:47 | 0:19:50 | |
but that's not what the Royal Military Police do. | 0:19:50 | 0:19:52 | |
They're peacekeepers, they're trained negotiators. | 0:19:52 | 0:19:56 | |
Chris Kemp led the force sent to rescue the Paras | 0:19:57 | 0:20:00 | |
and discovered the Red Caps had been killed at the station. | 0:20:00 | 0:20:04 | |
I remember the ambulances with the legs of the soldiers. | 0:20:05 | 0:20:08 | |
It's a strong memory that won't ever leave me, | 0:20:09 | 0:20:13 | |
that loss of life on a single day. | 0:20:13 | 0:20:15 | |
Some of the families believe that you abandoned those men, | 0:20:15 | 0:20:19 | |
those young soldiers, that the Paras effectively left them to their fate. | 0:20:19 | 0:20:23 | |
What do you say to that? | 0:20:23 | 0:20:25 | |
It would be completely untrue. We wouldn't do that. | 0:20:25 | 0:20:28 | |
No British soldier would have done that. | 0:20:28 | 0:20:31 | |
But we just didn't know they were there and, in the confusion, | 0:20:31 | 0:20:34 | |
you would not have known they were there | 0:20:34 | 0:20:36 | |
unless somebody had told you they were there. | 0:20:36 | 0:20:39 | |
The battalion headquarters didn't know exactly where | 0:20:39 | 0:20:42 | |
the Red Caps were. | 0:20:42 | 0:20:44 | |
The inquest questioned the failure of intelligence | 0:20:44 | 0:20:47 | |
and lack of crucial equipment, like satellite phones. | 0:20:47 | 0:20:50 | |
You know, I don't know what closure means. | 0:20:52 | 0:20:54 | |
-And you think about Ben. -All the time. | 0:20:57 | 0:21:00 | |
Probably more now than I did when he was alive. | 0:21:02 | 0:21:05 | |
But what happened at Majar al-Kabir really shocked the British public. | 0:21:07 | 0:21:12 | |
They realised for the first time that far from mission accomplished, | 0:21:12 | 0:21:16 | |
some Iraqis, with meddling from Iran, were never | 0:21:16 | 0:21:19 | |
going to accept the British Army occupying their country. | 0:21:19 | 0:21:23 | |
THEY CHANT | 0:21:23 | 0:21:25 | |
With Iran's backing, the Shia militias were becoming all-powerful. | 0:21:27 | 0:21:32 | |
The British underestimated the growing influence | 0:21:32 | 0:21:35 | |
of Muqtada al-Sadr, the firebrand cleric, and his Mahdi Army. | 0:21:35 | 0:21:39 | |
They thought they could negotiate with him | 0:21:39 | 0:21:42 | |
but his militia was gearing up for a fight. | 0:21:42 | 0:21:44 | |
-TRANSLATION: -The British forces came to Iraq as invaders. | 0:21:48 | 0:21:51 | |
We considered them an army of occupation, | 0:21:51 | 0:21:54 | |
so we had a duty to resist. | 0:21:54 | 0:21:57 | |
And we were able to fight them despite our scarce resources. | 0:21:57 | 0:22:00 | |
Under the militias, Basra, once famous for its culture | 0:22:05 | 0:22:08 | |
and its tolerance, became a place of fear. | 0:22:08 | 0:22:11 | |
Alcohol sellers were hounded out, people disappeared, | 0:22:12 | 0:22:16 | |
were tortured and killed. | 0:22:16 | 0:22:17 | |
Middle-class educated Iraqis began to leave. | 0:22:18 | 0:22:21 | |
Back then I met Taroub al-Ainache and heard about her family tragedy. | 0:22:22 | 0:22:27 | |
Her husband, Hasan, was working for the British as they tried | 0:22:28 | 0:22:32 | |
to put local government in the hands of Iraqis. | 0:22:32 | 0:22:34 | |
He always told me, | 0:22:35 | 0:22:36 | |
"Basra is going to be the Venice of the Middle East." | 0:22:36 | 0:22:39 | |
He really had high, high hopes for Basra. He loved it. | 0:22:39 | 0:22:43 | |
But Hasan refused to take part in corruption, | 0:22:44 | 0:22:47 | |
which was now flourishing as a result of the insecurity. | 0:22:47 | 0:22:51 | |
I heard the shots in the house because it happened | 0:22:51 | 0:22:53 | |
so near to my house. | 0:22:53 | 0:22:55 | |
They just came at very, very short range and blew his head off. | 0:22:55 | 0:22:59 | |
I've come back to visit Taroub, who now lives in Jordan. | 0:23:02 | 0:23:06 | |
-Shall I make tea for you? -That would be lovely. | 0:23:06 | 0:23:08 | |
Taroub's sons and grandchildren live in England and Canada. | 0:23:08 | 0:23:11 | |
I go visit them every now and then. | 0:23:13 | 0:23:15 | |
-So your sons, your family, are all over the world now. -Yes, yes. | 0:23:15 | 0:23:18 | |
We'd taken some pictures of Taroub's house | 0:23:19 | 0:23:22 | |
and neighbourhood in Basra today. | 0:23:22 | 0:23:24 | |
She has never been back there - it's too dangerous | 0:23:24 | 0:23:28 | |
and holds too many memories. | 0:23:28 | 0:23:29 | |
Street is so dirty now, refuse to clean. | 0:23:31 | 0:23:33 | |
Ah, this is the house. | 0:23:33 | 0:23:35 | |
It's beautiful. It's a beautiful house. | 0:23:37 | 0:23:40 | |
This is the palm tree I used to water every morning. | 0:23:40 | 0:23:42 | |
How do you feel looking at the pictures? | 0:23:42 | 0:23:45 | |
Sad. | 0:23:45 | 0:23:47 | |
Sad, sad. | 0:23:47 | 0:23:48 | |
Do you think you will ever go back? | 0:23:48 | 0:23:50 | |
-Hopefully, yeah. -One day. | 0:23:50 | 0:23:52 | |
One day. But when? I don't know. | 0:23:52 | 0:23:55 | |
Nobody knows. | 0:23:55 | 0:23:58 | |
More than a million Iraqis have fled abroad as a result of the war. | 0:23:58 | 0:24:02 | |
Of course there is bitterness. | 0:24:02 | 0:24:04 | |
All Iraqis are scattered all over the world now. | 0:24:04 | 0:24:07 | |
And what did the British bring to Basra? | 0:24:07 | 0:24:09 | |
Nothing. | 0:24:11 | 0:24:13 | |
They came and they went and what changed? | 0:24:13 | 0:24:16 | |
Nothing changed. | 0:24:18 | 0:24:19 | |
Just Saddam Hussein was out, that's it. | 0:24:20 | 0:24:22 | |
'Nine months after the invasion, US forces finally caught Saddam. | 0:24:28 | 0:24:33 | |
'He was hiding out by the River Tigris.' | 0:24:33 | 0:24:35 | |
So, this is it. | 0:24:35 | 0:24:37 | |
This is it. This is where the... This is the Presidential suite. | 0:24:37 | 0:24:41 | |
-The Presidential suite? -Yeah, right there. -Was here? -Yeah. | 0:24:41 | 0:24:45 | |
But running Saddam to ground in his foxhole didn't stabilise Iraq. | 0:24:45 | 0:24:50 | |
His loyalists joined Sunni extremist groups like Al-Qaeda, | 0:24:50 | 0:24:53 | |
fast gaining a foothold here. | 0:24:53 | 0:24:55 | |
They launched brutal sectarian attacks against Shia Muslims. | 0:24:57 | 0:25:01 | |
The country descended into violence and anarchy. | 0:25:01 | 0:25:05 | |
First explosions went off amongst pilgrims gathered at... | 0:25:05 | 0:25:08 | |
Iraq suffers its bloodiest day since the official end of the war. | 0:25:08 | 0:25:12 | |
Before the war, the Prime Minister had disregarded experts | 0:25:16 | 0:25:19 | |
who warned of the risks of removing a dictator. | 0:25:19 | 0:25:23 | |
Tony Blair told the nation the real threat was Saddam's | 0:25:23 | 0:25:26 | |
weapons of mass destruction. | 0:25:26 | 0:25:29 | |
He has existing and active military plans for the use of chemical | 0:25:29 | 0:25:32 | |
and biological weapons which could be activated within 45 minutes. | 0:25:32 | 0:25:37 | |
Before the war, UN inspectors searched Iraq for the weapons. | 0:25:38 | 0:25:42 | |
Finding them would have justified a military invasion. | 0:25:42 | 0:25:46 | |
I was with them, checking out some of the locations in Tony Blair's | 0:25:46 | 0:25:50 | |
infamous intelligence dossier. | 0:25:50 | 0:25:53 | |
I'm on my way to Al Doura. | 0:25:53 | 0:25:55 | |
It's a vaccine laboratory which British intelligence, | 0:25:55 | 0:25:58 | |
in their dossier, have called a facility of concern. | 0:25:58 | 0:26:02 | |
'There was nothing left anywhere. The UN never found the weapons. | 0:26:02 | 0:26:06 | |
'They had destroyed them all a decade before, | 0:26:10 | 0:26:13 | |
'according to the Iraqi officials I met.' | 0:26:13 | 0:26:15 | |
The West still doesn't seem to believe Iraq, | 0:26:16 | 0:26:18 | |
there's still this feeling you're hiding something. | 0:26:18 | 0:26:21 | |
If we had something we would produce it. | 0:26:21 | 0:26:23 | |
We would be happy to produce it, to get rid of it and get done. | 0:26:23 | 0:26:27 | |
But if we don't - we don't - what do we do? | 0:26:27 | 0:26:29 | |
Back then, in New York, I met the chief UN inspector. | 0:26:33 | 0:26:36 | |
Hans Blix was never sure the Iraqis were telling the truth | 0:26:38 | 0:26:41 | |
but he was sceptical of the intelligence | 0:26:41 | 0:26:44 | |
provided by the British. | 0:26:44 | 0:26:46 | |
Frequently they simply state that "intelligence tells us this" | 0:26:46 | 0:26:48 | |
or "intelligence shows that". Fine, it may all be true. | 0:26:48 | 0:26:52 | |
But simply saying that "intelligence shows" is not evidence. | 0:26:52 | 0:26:55 | |
Today, Dr Blix is back home in Sweden. | 0:26:56 | 0:27:00 | |
He told me he warned Mr Blair a month before the war that hundreds | 0:27:00 | 0:27:04 | |
of inspections had failed to yield any substantial evidence of WMDs. | 0:27:04 | 0:27:08 | |
I shared with him then our doubts about the existence of weapons. | 0:27:09 | 0:27:14 | |
I said "Maybe." | 0:27:14 | 0:27:16 | |
But I said at the same time that, "It would be paradoxical, | 0:27:16 | 0:27:19 | |
"wouldn't it, if you were to invade Iraq | 0:27:19 | 0:27:22 | |
"with 250,000 men and find very little?" | 0:27:22 | 0:27:25 | |
And what was Tony Blair's response when you warned him? | 0:27:25 | 0:27:28 | |
Did he take it on board? | 0:27:28 | 0:27:29 | |
No, he sort of waved it away and said that, | 0:27:29 | 0:27:32 | |
"No, our intelligence and our indications are so clear." | 0:27:32 | 0:27:36 | |
I think this was a basic mistake. | 0:27:36 | 0:27:38 | |
So did the Prime Minister put a gloss on flimsy evidence | 0:27:38 | 0:27:42 | |
to make a false case for war? | 0:27:42 | 0:27:44 | |
A far-reaching VX nerve agent programme, | 0:27:44 | 0:27:47 | |
up to 6,500 chemical munitions, | 0:27:47 | 0:27:49 | |
at least 80 tonnes of mustard gas, | 0:27:49 | 0:27:52 | |
possibly more than ten times that amount, unquantifiable amounts... | 0:27:52 | 0:27:55 | |
In the crucial Commons debate on the eve of war, Mr Blair said | 0:27:55 | 0:27:59 | |
anything unaccounted for from a decade before must still exist. | 0:27:59 | 0:28:04 | |
Do you think he misrepresented the facts? | 0:28:06 | 0:28:08 | |
What he said did not represent the reality. | 0:28:08 | 0:28:11 | |
Was he lying, therefore? | 0:28:11 | 0:28:13 | |
I never claimed that it was in bad faith. | 0:28:13 | 0:28:16 | |
Many people can bring themselves to believe something | 0:28:16 | 0:28:19 | |
that they want to believe. | 0:28:19 | 0:28:20 | |
-But you think he misrepresented the facts? -Yes. | 0:28:20 | 0:28:23 | |
Even after they'd destroyed Saddam's military machine, | 0:28:26 | 0:28:29 | |
the coalition never found the elusive weapons of mass destruction, | 0:28:29 | 0:28:34 | |
only facilities abandoned long ago. | 0:28:34 | 0:28:36 | |
A year before the war, | 0:28:36 | 0:28:38 | |
British intelligence had told the government their knowledge | 0:28:38 | 0:28:41 | |
of the WMDs was sporadic and patchy, | 0:28:41 | 0:28:45 | |
but six months later, intelligence chiefs helped Mr Blair | 0:28:45 | 0:28:48 | |
compile the dossier that made the case for war. | 0:28:48 | 0:28:51 | |
I apologise for the fact that the intelligence we'd received | 0:28:52 | 0:28:57 | |
was wrong because, even though he had used chemical weapons | 0:28:57 | 0:29:01 | |
extensively against his own people, against others, | 0:29:01 | 0:29:04 | |
the programme in the form that we thought it was did not exist | 0:29:04 | 0:29:09 | |
in the way that we thought, so I can apologise for that. | 0:29:09 | 0:29:13 | |
Apologising for the intelligence being wrong is blaming | 0:29:13 | 0:29:17 | |
the intelligence agencies, and is a falsity | 0:29:17 | 0:29:20 | |
because what was known, which was very little indeed, | 0:29:20 | 0:29:24 | |
was then exaggerated way beyond | 0:29:24 | 0:29:27 | |
to give this imminent threat - | 0:29:27 | 0:29:30 | |
imminent threat to Britain. | 0:29:30 | 0:29:33 | |
I mean, that's just dishonest. There's no question about it. | 0:29:33 | 0:29:36 | |
The British were under mounting pressure from the Shia militias | 0:29:41 | 0:29:45 | |
two years on. They faced a devastating new weapon, | 0:29:45 | 0:29:48 | |
a roadside bomb that could penetrate British armour. | 0:29:48 | 0:29:51 | |
EXPLOSION | 0:29:53 | 0:29:54 | |
We were too thin to really take on an enemy that was becoming more | 0:29:54 | 0:30:00 | |
technically sophisticated. | 0:30:00 | 0:30:03 | |
-And where were they getting that technical expertise from? -Iran. | 0:30:03 | 0:30:06 | |
There was a determined campaign to embarrass the coalition. | 0:30:06 | 0:30:10 | |
Roger and Maureen's son, Matthew, was killed by a roadside bomb | 0:30:15 | 0:30:19 | |
when he was sent to Basra in 2005. | 0:30:19 | 0:30:22 | |
They've waited 11 years to visit the spot where he died. | 0:30:23 | 0:30:27 | |
More of a track. | 0:30:29 | 0:30:31 | |
A dirt track. | 0:30:31 | 0:30:34 | |
Matthew's patrol had left Basra Palace, | 0:30:34 | 0:30:37 | |
heading for the airbase through the notorious Shia Flats, | 0:30:37 | 0:30:41 | |
controlled by the militias. | 0:30:41 | 0:30:43 | |
I was trying to imagine the patrol travelling there, | 0:30:46 | 0:30:50 | |
through that traffic. | 0:30:50 | 0:30:54 | |
I was thinking about Matthew and the banter, you know, that the | 0:30:54 | 0:30:58 | |
boys were having. | 0:30:58 | 0:31:00 | |
People following them, watching them. | 0:31:00 | 0:31:03 | |
This is still a threatening and dangerous place. We can't stay long. | 0:31:12 | 0:31:16 | |
Just to think that it would happen in an area like this. | 0:31:23 | 0:31:26 | |
Just desolation. It's unbelievable. | 0:31:26 | 0:31:29 | |
Matthew's parents want to lay some mementos. | 0:31:31 | 0:31:34 | |
And next. | 0:31:44 | 0:31:46 | |
To lay the pebbles, one from Roger and myself, and the cross, | 0:31:48 | 0:31:53 | |
and the pebble from Matthew's brother, | 0:31:53 | 0:31:56 | |
that was really emotional. | 0:31:59 | 0:32:02 | |
-And to scatter the poppies. -Just put them around. | 0:32:02 | 0:32:05 | |
Yes. | 0:32:05 | 0:32:07 | |
-Just... -OK. | 0:32:07 | 0:32:08 | |
Very difficult to put into words. | 0:32:09 | 0:32:11 | |
-I just felt Matthew there. I've got one for... -79. | 0:32:12 | 0:32:16 | |
They've brought poppies for each of those killed in action in Iraq. | 0:32:16 | 0:32:22 | |
-Men and women. -Men and women. | 0:32:23 | 0:32:25 | |
Soldiers put their lives on the line. You know that. | 0:32:36 | 0:32:39 | |
But it doesn't lessen anything. | 0:32:39 | 0:32:41 | |
The grief is the same. | 0:32:46 | 0:32:48 | |
So coming here was part of that... | 0:32:52 | 0:32:56 | |
Um... | 0:32:58 | 0:33:00 | |
Rite of passage, I suppose, in a way. | 0:33:00 | 0:33:02 | |
I have a sense of relief. | 0:33:07 | 0:33:09 | |
A relief at actually seeing the place where Matthew died. | 0:33:09 | 0:33:14 | |
And also... | 0:33:14 | 0:33:16 | |
Matthew... | 0:33:16 | 0:33:19 | |
..would have thought, "You've done it now, Mum. You've done it." | 0:33:21 | 0:33:26 | |
And it's what he would have expected me to do. | 0:33:29 | 0:33:32 | |
Definitely. | 0:33:32 | 0:33:34 | |
Matthew should never have been on that road. | 0:33:37 | 0:33:39 | |
He should have been in a helicopter, but it had broken down. | 0:33:39 | 0:33:43 | |
He had to go in a Snatch Land Rover, a lightly armoured vehicle. | 0:33:43 | 0:33:48 | |
He died two years after the first soldier was killed in this | 0:33:48 | 0:33:51 | |
type of Land Rover. | 0:33:51 | 0:33:52 | |
We actually saw the Land Rover on the television news. | 0:33:55 | 0:33:59 | |
And it was horrific. Absolutely horrific. | 0:33:59 | 0:34:04 | |
I mean, the Snatch Land Rovers, it's like a knife going through butter. | 0:34:04 | 0:34:09 | |
The year after Matthew Bacon died, | 0:34:15 | 0:34:17 | |
British soldiers were still being killed by roadside bombs. | 0:34:17 | 0:34:21 | |
As Iraq teetered on the brink of civil war, I joined the small | 0:34:24 | 0:34:28 | |
British detachment in Maysan, where the Red Caps had been killed. | 0:34:28 | 0:34:32 | |
Everyone was on high alert. | 0:34:34 | 0:34:35 | |
The Shia militia leader, Muqtada al-Sadr, | 0:34:36 | 0:34:39 | |
had just warned the British to leave. | 0:34:39 | 0:34:41 | |
In Amarah, the capital of the province, | 0:34:45 | 0:34:47 | |
I went on patrol with Captain Richard Holmes. | 0:34:47 | 0:34:50 | |
Seems calm enough. | 0:34:55 | 0:34:56 | |
Yeah. I mean, as I say, we've been here for four months | 0:34:56 | 0:35:00 | |
and this area especially, people have always been very welcoming. | 0:35:00 | 0:35:05 | |
They're very friendly. | 0:35:05 | 0:35:07 | |
But within minutes, everything would change. | 0:35:07 | 0:35:10 | |
We've just walked about 150 yards through town | 0:35:12 | 0:35:15 | |
and clearly our military escort is worried. | 0:35:15 | 0:35:17 | |
We're not able to stay here much longer. | 0:35:17 | 0:35:20 | |
Heading out of town, I realise something was wrong. | 0:35:24 | 0:35:27 | |
Tanks roared past us. | 0:35:27 | 0:35:29 | |
A roadside bomb had destroyed the Snatch Land Rover carrying | 0:35:30 | 0:35:33 | |
Captain Holmes and another soldier, Private Lee Ellis, | 0:35:33 | 0:35:37 | |
as they drove back to base. | 0:35:37 | 0:35:38 | |
They had both been killed. | 0:35:39 | 0:35:42 | |
27 British soldiers died in bomb attacks on their Land Rovers | 0:35:43 | 0:35:47 | |
in Iraq, raising serious questions about British Army equipment. | 0:35:47 | 0:35:52 | |
Some of the relatives say that the equipment just wasn't good enough. | 0:35:52 | 0:35:56 | |
It was the best that was available at the time, but the vehicles | 0:35:56 | 0:36:00 | |
we were using, the Snatch, were not up to the job. | 0:36:00 | 0:36:04 | |
They didn't have adequate levels of protection | 0:36:04 | 0:36:09 | |
and we were slow to replace them | 0:36:09 | 0:36:12 | |
and provide adequate protection to our people. | 0:36:12 | 0:36:15 | |
By now, dwindling British forces had retreated to a few bases in Basra. | 0:36:18 | 0:36:22 | |
Three years on, | 0:36:22 | 0:36:24 | |
reconstruction was grinding to a halt for lack of security. | 0:36:24 | 0:36:28 | |
The only way in from the airport was by helicopter. | 0:36:30 | 0:36:33 | |
We weren't driving anywhere any more. | 0:36:33 | 0:36:36 | |
You began to get a sense that things were not going our way. | 0:36:36 | 0:36:40 | |
Mark Etherington was trying to coordinate British aid. | 0:36:40 | 0:36:44 | |
There was still no plan. | 0:36:44 | 0:36:46 | |
There were countless scattered islands of effort where | 0:36:46 | 0:36:49 | |
people were working very hard and often bravely, | 0:36:49 | 0:36:54 | |
but they didn't seem knitted together in any way. | 0:36:54 | 0:36:57 | |
One didn't sense that all of this amounted to a strategy. | 0:36:57 | 0:37:01 | |
In the Shia Flats, just a few hundred yards from where Matthew | 0:37:03 | 0:37:06 | |
Bacon died, there's a sad reminder of what the British tried | 0:37:06 | 0:37:10 | |
and failed to achieve in Basra. | 0:37:10 | 0:37:12 | |
They built three huge water towers and spent £10 million trying | 0:37:14 | 0:37:19 | |
to provide clean water for half a million people. | 0:37:19 | 0:37:23 | |
-TRANSLATION: -A British company came to work on the project here. | 0:37:24 | 0:37:28 | |
It was meant to supply water for this area. | 0:37:28 | 0:37:31 | |
We didn't have drinking water. | 0:37:31 | 0:37:33 | |
It was salty, full of dirt and bacteria. | 0:37:33 | 0:37:36 | |
But then later, the project was abandoned. | 0:37:36 | 0:37:38 | |
Eventually, the towers were handed over to the Iraqis | 0:37:39 | 0:37:43 | |
but, to this day, the project hasn't been connected | 0:37:43 | 0:37:46 | |
and people still don't have clean water. | 0:37:46 | 0:37:50 | |
Well, this was meant to be a showpiece, | 0:37:50 | 0:37:53 | |
to show that the British could actually improve | 0:37:53 | 0:37:56 | |
the infrastructure of Basra. | 0:37:56 | 0:37:58 | |
But the failure to secure the city | 0:37:58 | 0:38:00 | |
meant that this place just couldn't be maintained. | 0:38:00 | 0:38:03 | |
It never actually worked and, in the end, | 0:38:03 | 0:38:06 | |
it turned out to just be a white elephant. | 0:38:06 | 0:38:08 | |
Four years after the invasion, | 0:38:16 | 0:38:18 | |
the British were hunkered down in their main base at the airport. | 0:38:18 | 0:38:22 | |
I've come back with Graham Binns to what's left of the airbase today. | 0:38:25 | 0:38:29 | |
Well, I mean, it's a trip down memory lane. | 0:38:31 | 0:38:34 | |
This was the main British garrison before we left. | 0:38:34 | 0:38:38 | |
It's changed an awful lot. | 0:38:38 | 0:38:40 | |
Most of the infrastructure's been stripped out. | 0:38:40 | 0:38:44 | |
The commander who had easily taken Basra came back four | 0:38:44 | 0:38:47 | |
years on to a very different challenge. | 0:38:47 | 0:38:50 | |
So the whole place was just covered in these things, which are just | 0:38:50 | 0:38:54 | |
tea walls, made out of concrete, that protect buildings and people. | 0:38:54 | 0:38:58 | |
GUNFIRE | 0:38:58 | 0:39:00 | |
I was on the airbase then, as the British battled a constant | 0:39:03 | 0:39:07 | |
barrage of mortars from the militias. | 0:39:07 | 0:39:10 | |
At its height, there were up to 30 different attacks a day. | 0:39:13 | 0:39:19 | |
Each one could have been up to a dozen rockets coming in. | 0:39:19 | 0:39:23 | |
I lived at the bottom of that tower | 0:39:23 | 0:39:26 | |
and I always believed that that tower was an aiming mark. | 0:39:26 | 0:39:30 | |
It was now that Tony Blair made his farewell visit to Basra, | 0:39:30 | 0:39:35 | |
still justifying the Iraq War. | 0:39:35 | 0:39:37 | |
There's been terrorist acts in Morocco, in Algeria, | 0:39:39 | 0:39:42 | |
in Pakistan, in Saudi Arabia. Essentially, everywhere. | 0:39:42 | 0:39:46 | |
This threat is on the march and we are here on the frontline | 0:39:46 | 0:39:51 | |
trying to defend ourselves and our way of life against it. | 0:39:51 | 0:39:55 | |
Mr Blair insisted Iraqi forces would soon be | 0:39:55 | 0:39:58 | |
capable of taking control, but he couldn't actually leave the airbase. | 0:39:58 | 0:40:03 | |
EXPLOSION | 0:40:05 | 0:40:07 | |
-TRANSLATION: -We showed Basra Airport, | 0:40:07 | 0:40:10 | |
the location where the British Prime Minister was visiting. | 0:40:10 | 0:40:14 | |
We struck with more than 300 Grad missiles. | 0:40:14 | 0:40:18 | |
We hoped we could kill Tony Blair. | 0:40:18 | 0:40:20 | |
The Prime Minister, who had taken us to war in Iraq, now stepped down. | 0:40:25 | 0:40:30 | |
Mr Blair declined our request for an interview. | 0:40:30 | 0:40:33 | |
He told us he would make a full statement | 0:40:33 | 0:40:36 | |
when the Iraq Inquiry reports. | 0:40:36 | 0:40:38 | |
But he had this to say recently on American television. | 0:40:38 | 0:40:41 | |
I can also apologise, by the way, | 0:40:44 | 0:40:46 | |
for some of the mistakes in planning and certainly our mistake | 0:40:46 | 0:40:51 | |
in our understanding of what would happen once you removed the regime. | 0:40:51 | 0:40:55 | |
But I find it hard to apologise for removing Saddam. | 0:40:57 | 0:41:00 | |
Mr Blair claimed removing Saddam | 0:41:00 | 0:41:03 | |
would make the world a safer place post-9/11. | 0:41:03 | 0:41:07 | |
I need you to help me, Mr Blair, because... | 0:41:09 | 0:41:12 | |
Instead, there's been hostage taking, beheadings, | 0:41:12 | 0:41:15 | |
suicide attacks in London. | 0:41:15 | 0:41:18 | |
We are at war and I'm a soldier. | 0:41:18 | 0:41:20 | |
Now you too will taste the reality of this situation. | 0:41:20 | 0:41:23 | |
The Iraq War has fuelled extremism and instability across the region. | 0:41:25 | 0:41:29 | |
This British man has to pay the price. | 0:41:31 | 0:41:34 | |
The so-called Islamic State emerged from the chaos of Iraq. | 0:41:34 | 0:41:38 | |
A magnet for jihadis, they're now attacking Europe. | 0:41:38 | 0:41:42 | |
Yet intelligence chiefs had secretly warned before the Iraq invasion | 0:41:42 | 0:41:46 | |
the threat from terrorism would be heightened by military action. | 0:41:46 | 0:41:50 | |
There is so much tinder in the region, the slightest spark sets | 0:41:53 | 0:41:59 | |
off a conflagration, so we don't know where this is going to end. | 0:41:59 | 0:42:03 | |
But look at Iraq today, it's a failed state. | 0:42:03 | 0:42:07 | |
Look at Syria, it's a failed state. | 0:42:07 | 0:42:11 | |
A lot of this derives from the fact that, on the basis of faulty | 0:42:11 | 0:42:15 | |
intelligence, the US and the UK went to war in 2003. | 0:42:15 | 0:42:20 | |
Roger and Maureen Bacon are visiting an Iraqi family whose lives | 0:42:24 | 0:42:28 | |
have also been devastated by the war here. | 0:42:28 | 0:42:31 | |
-I'm very sorry. -It is a real tragedy. | 0:42:33 | 0:42:37 | |
Our sons are victims of an unjust war. | 0:42:37 | 0:42:41 | |
Nibras was just 22. | 0:42:51 | 0:42:54 | |
One of five policemen killed on a checkpoint by Islamist | 0:42:54 | 0:42:58 | |
militants after the British left Iraq. | 0:42:58 | 0:43:00 | |
From one mother to another mother, I'm very sorry. | 0:43:15 | 0:43:20 | |
I understand how you feel and I see your picture of your son | 0:43:20 | 0:43:24 | |
and that's the picture of my son, too. | 0:43:24 | 0:43:26 | |
So I understand your pain. | 0:43:26 | 0:43:29 | |
-Cos we live it every day... Yes. Every day. -Yes. | 0:43:31 | 0:43:37 | |
We're very sorry that we left Basra in the state that we did. | 0:43:37 | 0:43:43 | |
We wish that it was a better place. | 0:43:43 | 0:43:45 | |
GUNFIRE | 0:43:49 | 0:43:52 | |
OK, the scenario is that you have stopped a vehicle... | 0:43:53 | 0:43:58 | |
In the last years the British spent in Basra, I saw their big | 0:43:58 | 0:44:01 | |
push to train up local police and security forces. | 0:44:01 | 0:44:05 | |
They wanted to hand over | 0:44:05 | 0:44:06 | |
responsibility for security to the Iraqis as soon as possible. | 0:44:06 | 0:44:10 | |
Today, Basra's police chief, Abdel Karim Al-Ameri, | 0:44:13 | 0:44:17 | |
is not short of manpower but that is part of the problem. | 0:44:17 | 0:44:20 | |
-TRANSLATION: -If you look at the police in Basra, | 0:44:23 | 0:44:26 | |
we have around 29,000. This is an insane number. | 0:44:26 | 0:44:30 | |
I am sure this doesn't happen in Britain, right? | 0:44:30 | 0:44:33 | |
Though the British spent millions training the police, | 0:44:35 | 0:44:39 | |
the emphasis was on quantity, not quality. | 0:44:39 | 0:44:42 | |
-TRANSLATION: -People applied who weren't fit to work in the police. | 0:44:44 | 0:44:50 | |
Some were thieves, murderers, wanted men. | 0:44:50 | 0:44:53 | |
But they gave them ID cards and weapons, | 0:44:53 | 0:44:55 | |
a government licence to start looting. | 0:44:55 | 0:44:59 | |
And now, in most of the gangs we catch, we find policemen. | 0:44:59 | 0:45:03 | |
This road outside Basra, near the Iranian border, | 0:45:08 | 0:45:12 | |
became kidnap central after the invasion. | 0:45:12 | 0:45:16 | |
It is only now the police chief's set up a ring of checkpoints, | 0:45:16 | 0:45:19 | |
manned by more professional forces, that kidnaps dropped substantially. | 0:45:19 | 0:45:24 | |
The British spent a lot of money and time here, training the police. | 0:45:25 | 0:45:29 | |
-Did it do any good? -No, just the opposite. | 0:45:29 | 0:45:33 | |
If the British had built a police force using a more scientific | 0:45:33 | 0:45:36 | |
approach, we wouldn't have had these problems. | 0:45:36 | 0:45:38 | |
Building up Iraqi security forces meant Britain could | 0:45:40 | 0:45:44 | |
move troops and equipment to fight in Afghanistan, | 0:45:44 | 0:45:48 | |
now seen as the priority. | 0:45:48 | 0:45:49 | |
Meanwhile, America was reinforcing Iraq with a massive | 0:45:50 | 0:45:54 | |
surge of soldiers. | 0:45:54 | 0:45:55 | |
Emma Sky was now political adviser to the head of US forces. | 0:45:57 | 0:46:02 | |
With the Americans like, "We're coming back | 0:46:02 | 0:46:04 | |
"and we are going to make this work." | 0:46:04 | 0:46:06 | |
With Basra, there became a sense that the Brits calculated that | 0:46:06 | 0:46:10 | |
Iraq was lost, that Afghanistan was still saveable, | 0:46:10 | 0:46:14 | |
that they would get out of Iraq and go to Afghanistan. | 0:46:14 | 0:46:17 | |
We had lost the strategic will to endure. | 0:46:17 | 0:46:20 | |
We were measuring success by the rate at which | 0:46:20 | 0:46:23 | |
we could draw down and move people to Afghanistan. | 0:46:23 | 0:46:28 | |
Actually, what happened is that we resourced | 0:46:28 | 0:46:32 | |
neither particularly well. | 0:46:32 | 0:46:33 | |
We went into Afghanistan with too little | 0:46:33 | 0:46:36 | |
and we drew too much away from here too quickly. | 0:46:36 | 0:46:40 | |
EXPLOSIONS | 0:46:40 | 0:46:42 | |
By now, the Shia militias were determined to push the small | 0:46:45 | 0:46:49 | |
British force out of the city. | 0:46:49 | 0:46:51 | |
Here it goes again. | 0:46:52 | 0:46:55 | |
EXPLOSIONS | 0:46:55 | 0:46:56 | |
SOLDIERS EXCLAIM | 0:46:56 | 0:46:59 | |
Welcome to Basra Palace. | 0:47:00 | 0:47:02 | |
Soldiers filmed themselves under siege at the Palace, | 0:47:02 | 0:47:05 | |
the British headquarters inside the city. | 0:47:05 | 0:47:08 | |
British troops were dying in firefights to keep supply | 0:47:11 | 0:47:14 | |
lines open between the airbase and the Palace. | 0:47:14 | 0:47:17 | |
THEY SHOUT | 0:47:17 | 0:47:19 | |
Iranian mortar crews reinforced the militias. | 0:47:24 | 0:47:27 | |
Mate, that was close, wasn't it? I'm shaking. | 0:47:31 | 0:47:34 | |
Incoming! | 0:47:35 | 0:47:37 | |
EXPLOSIONS SOLDIERS SHOUT | 0:47:38 | 0:47:40 | |
The Army was about to do a secret deal with the very people | 0:47:40 | 0:47:44 | |
killing our soldiers. | 0:47:44 | 0:47:45 | |
GUNSHOTS | 0:47:45 | 0:47:47 | |
I was there and saw the celebratory shooting | 0:47:49 | 0:47:52 | |
as militia prisoners were released from British custody. | 0:47:52 | 0:47:55 | |
You did do a deal with them. | 0:47:58 | 0:48:00 | |
Well, I am not going to discuss the nature of those talks. | 0:48:00 | 0:48:03 | |
'At the time, the man doing the deal, Graham Binns, | 0:48:03 | 0:48:06 | |
'wasn't keen to talk about it. | 0:48:06 | 0:48:08 | |
'But now it is clear what happened.' | 0:48:08 | 0:48:11 | |
We started talking to the leadership | 0:48:11 | 0:48:14 | |
and we reached a deal for the release of prisoners, | 0:48:14 | 0:48:18 | |
providing the attacks against us stopped. | 0:48:18 | 0:48:21 | |
Although, they were part of an organisation | 0:48:21 | 0:48:23 | |
that had killed British soldiers. | 0:48:23 | 0:48:25 | |
That, I think, is just one of the awkward facts of conflict, | 0:48:25 | 0:48:28 | |
that we sometimes just brush under the table. | 0:48:28 | 0:48:31 | |
You have to talk... Normally to resolve a conflict, | 0:48:31 | 0:48:33 | |
you have to talk to the opposition. | 0:48:33 | 0:48:35 | |
And so the British Army withdrew from Basra, to the | 0:48:37 | 0:48:41 | |
airbase outside the city. | 0:48:41 | 0:48:43 | |
They would finally leave southern Iraq six years after the invasion. | 0:48:43 | 0:48:48 | |
So was it all worth it? | 0:48:54 | 0:48:56 | |
What does the man who led the troops into Basra think of the city today? | 0:48:56 | 0:49:00 | |
Well, it is still dirty, dusty and hot. So some things don't change. | 0:49:02 | 0:49:07 | |
But what strikes me is that markets are busy | 0:49:07 | 0:49:10 | |
and there are a lot of new cars on the street. | 0:49:10 | 0:49:13 | |
What I see here now makes me more optimistic. | 0:49:14 | 0:49:19 | |
I don't think we did too much harm. | 0:49:19 | 0:49:22 | |
We ourselves didn't cause overwhelming damage | 0:49:22 | 0:49:27 | |
when we took the city. | 0:49:27 | 0:49:28 | |
But did the British achieve anything after that? | 0:49:30 | 0:49:33 | |
We were simply not prepared | 0:49:34 | 0:49:36 | |
for supporting the reconstruction of a city this size. | 0:49:36 | 0:49:40 | |
Do you think it was foolish to think we could? | 0:49:40 | 0:49:43 | |
I think we probably over-promised | 0:49:43 | 0:49:44 | |
and under-delivered in that regard, yes. | 0:49:44 | 0:49:47 | |
On the surface, things in Basra are improving, but underneath, | 0:49:49 | 0:49:54 | |
democracy is still fragile, corruption is rife. | 0:49:54 | 0:49:57 | |
The famous canals are choked with rubbish | 0:49:57 | 0:50:00 | |
and there are frequent power cuts. | 0:50:00 | 0:50:02 | |
I wondered how things were now in the mansion of Saddam's cousin, | 0:50:04 | 0:50:08 | |
Chemical Ali, 13 years after I first came here. | 0:50:08 | 0:50:11 | |
Assalamu alaikum. | 0:50:13 | 0:50:15 | |
Families are still squatting here. 20 people living in two rooms. | 0:50:16 | 0:50:20 | |
Security remains the key to everything here. | 0:50:38 | 0:50:41 | |
Today, Basra Palace is still home to military forces | 0:50:42 | 0:50:46 | |
but now it is Shia militias who are based here. | 0:50:46 | 0:50:50 | |
Ironically, the very people who forced the British out are an | 0:50:50 | 0:50:53 | |
essential part of the Iraqi army, | 0:50:53 | 0:50:55 | |
fighting the so-called Islamic State. | 0:50:55 | 0:50:58 | |
It looks a bit neglected now, doesn't it? | 0:50:59 | 0:51:02 | |
Well, it, it does, actually. | 0:51:02 | 0:51:05 | |
It is rundown, it is | 0:51:05 | 0:51:06 | |
occupied by various elements of the Iraqi military and security forces. | 0:51:06 | 0:51:11 | |
Yes. And, erm, a few sheep here. | 0:51:11 | 0:51:14 | |
-Well, somebody's making good use of the land. -Yes! | 0:51:14 | 0:51:17 | |
So what is the General's final verdict on Britain's | 0:51:19 | 0:51:22 | |
war in Iraq? | 0:51:22 | 0:51:23 | |
I think it was entirely the right thing to | 0:51:24 | 0:51:26 | |
do at the time, to remove the regime. | 0:51:26 | 0:51:30 | |
I just don't think we resourced it and had a plan that was... | 0:51:31 | 0:51:34 | |
to replace it with something else. | 0:51:34 | 0:51:36 | |
No-one can deny the tragedy of this war, which cost Iraq at least | 0:51:41 | 0:51:46 | |
a quarter of a million dead, | 0:51:46 | 0:51:48 | |
two million displaced and homeless. | 0:51:48 | 0:51:50 | |
During the invasion, | 0:51:53 | 0:51:54 | |
I first came face to face with the human cost of this war | 0:51:54 | 0:51:58 | |
at the house of Abed Hassan Hamoodi. | 0:51:58 | 0:52:00 | |
It was hit by a coalition bomb targeting the building behind. | 0:52:02 | 0:52:05 | |
Before I leave Iraq, I really want to see this place again. | 0:52:08 | 0:52:13 | |
The coalition mistakenly thought Chemical Ali | 0:52:13 | 0:52:16 | |
was at the neighbouring house. | 0:52:16 | 0:52:17 | |
Well, it is really strange being back in this bedroom. | 0:52:27 | 0:52:29 | |
It looks tidy now and 13 years ago, when I was here, | 0:52:29 | 0:52:32 | |
it was knee-deep in debris. | 0:52:32 | 0:52:34 | |
This is where everybody was sleeping that night and the | 0:52:34 | 0:52:37 | |
blast was right next door and this is the room that took the hit. | 0:52:37 | 0:52:41 | |
It feels... It is abandoned now and it is really sad. | 0:52:41 | 0:52:45 | |
Three generations of the Hamoodi family were sheltering | 0:52:47 | 0:52:51 | |
here from the war. Ten people were killed. | 0:52:51 | 0:52:54 | |
I managed, luckily, to save the life of my daughter with her two | 0:52:56 | 0:53:00 | |
sons, four years and six months. | 0:53:00 | 0:53:04 | |
The third one was killed with his grandmum. | 0:53:04 | 0:53:07 | |
Dina Hamoodi lost her young son. | 0:53:08 | 0:53:11 | |
What will your family do now? | 0:53:11 | 0:53:13 | |
What will the women do? | 0:53:13 | 0:53:16 | |
Nothing. Just crying. We don't have anything to do. | 0:53:16 | 0:53:21 | |
Just crying. | 0:53:21 | 0:53:22 | |
Just crying. Just nothing. | 0:53:23 | 0:53:26 | |
Abed Hassan, Dina and the family now live in England. | 0:53:30 | 0:53:34 | |
They still gather every year, on the anniversary of the bombing. | 0:53:34 | 0:53:38 | |
Every morning I look at the picture and I cry for a while. | 0:53:38 | 0:53:43 | |
The tragedy is never forgotten. It is with me day and night. | 0:53:43 | 0:53:47 | |
Something I will never forget. Honest to God. | 0:53:47 | 0:53:52 | |
Do you think your family will ever recover from what happened? | 0:53:52 | 0:53:55 | |
I don't think so. I don't think so. | 0:53:55 | 0:53:59 | |
It is difficult. | 0:53:59 | 0:54:01 | |
And it is getting more difficult with time. | 0:54:01 | 0:54:04 | |
They say sometimes time is a solution. | 0:54:04 | 0:54:06 | |
But myself, I think with time it is getting more complicated. | 0:54:06 | 0:54:12 | |
When the Hamoodis left Iraq, they shut up the house in Basra. | 0:54:14 | 0:54:19 | |
They were once pillars of their community. | 0:54:19 | 0:54:22 | |
Dr Akram goes back to help in the hospital when he can. | 0:54:22 | 0:54:26 | |
The people have now started to say that they are better | 0:54:26 | 0:54:29 | |
lived in Saddam's days rather than these days. | 0:54:29 | 0:54:32 | |
-Better off under Saddam? -Yes, that is what they feel. | 0:54:32 | 0:54:36 | |
-Who do you blame for what happened in Iraq? -Blair and Bush. | 0:54:36 | 0:54:40 | |
Those two people that are responsible for everything | 0:54:41 | 0:54:46 | |
that happened to the British people and to Iraqi people, | 0:54:46 | 0:54:49 | |
and those people, | 0:54:49 | 0:54:50 | |
they should be taken to court, court of law and they should be judged. | 0:54:50 | 0:54:55 | |
What do you feel about Tony Blair | 0:54:55 | 0:54:58 | |
-and his responsibility for what happened in Iraq? -We want justice. | 0:54:58 | 0:55:03 | |
We want justice, you know, for the sake of our family, | 0:55:03 | 0:55:07 | |
for British soldiers who lost their lives there. | 0:55:07 | 0:55:11 | |
He is responsible for what happened. He and Mr Bush. | 0:55:11 | 0:55:15 | |
When I first came here, | 0:55:17 | 0:55:19 | |
Saddam's yacht was still moored on the Shatt al-Arab waterway. | 0:55:19 | 0:55:23 | |
Now it is barely visible. | 0:55:25 | 0:55:27 | |
Well, there isn't any trace of Saddam Hussein left here | 0:55:32 | 0:55:35 | |
in Basra, except this rusting hulk of his old yacht in the water. | 0:55:35 | 0:55:38 | |
But, you know, the British have hardly left any trace here either. | 0:55:40 | 0:55:43 | |
It could well be that their only lasting legacy is that they | 0:55:43 | 0:55:46 | |
did remove Saddam. | 0:55:46 | 0:55:48 | |
The Iraq Inquiry has promised to tell us | 0:55:50 | 0:55:52 | |
the lessons that should be learned. | 0:55:52 | 0:55:55 | |
But for some of those involved, they are already plain to see. | 0:55:55 | 0:55:58 | |
The lessons are these - | 0:55:58 | 0:56:01 | |
don't interfere in other people's civil wars, don't try | 0:56:01 | 0:56:06 | |
and nation-build, it is a fool's errand, | 0:56:06 | 0:56:11 | |
and don't do regime change | 0:56:11 | 0:56:14 | |
unless you are utterly clear what the consequences are likely to be. | 0:56:14 | 0:56:19 | |
I think Blair had the feeling that this was an evil regime | 0:56:21 | 0:56:27 | |
and that it was the moral thing to do away with it. | 0:56:27 | 0:56:29 | |
I don't think that is an evil thought | 0:56:29 | 0:56:31 | |
but I think it was a presumptuous | 0:56:31 | 0:56:33 | |
thought that the UK and the US alone should do that. | 0:56:33 | 0:56:37 | |
They were all his decisions. | 0:56:37 | 0:56:38 | |
He thought it was the right thing to do. | 0:56:38 | 0:56:41 | |
He has got it on his conscience for as long as he is alive | 0:56:42 | 0:56:46 | |
and it will remain his legacy in the history books, I'm afraid. | 0:56:46 | 0:56:51 | |
Clare Short resigned from Tony Blair's government, | 0:56:53 | 0:56:56 | |
her political career cut short by Iraq. | 0:56:56 | 0:56:59 | |
I did try but I still feel terrible about it. | 0:57:01 | 0:57:04 | |
Terrible. | 0:57:04 | 0:57:06 | |
It sort of ruined the culmination of my life in politics, really. | 0:57:07 | 0:57:11 | |
Because it is politics at its worst. | 0:57:11 | 0:57:14 | |
And it has caused untold destruction for the people of Iraq | 0:57:14 | 0:57:18 | |
and the wider region. | 0:57:18 | 0:57:19 | |
Has coming to Basra helped Roger | 0:57:26 | 0:57:28 | |
and Maureen come to terms with Matthew's death? | 0:57:28 | 0:57:31 | |
I would like to think that he lost his life in a worthwhile cause. | 0:57:32 | 0:57:36 | |
But I can't. I can't do that. | 0:57:38 | 0:57:40 | |
As a country, as a people, we would have no wish to have invaded Iraq. | 0:57:40 | 0:57:46 | |
We were carried into it and I can't emphasise enough how much that | 0:57:46 | 0:57:51 | |
I feel this was entirely wrong, that it was a complete deception. | 0:57:51 | 0:57:56 | |
He did lose his life for Queen and country. | 0:57:56 | 0:57:59 | |
And that is what we have to live with for the rest of our lives, | 0:57:59 | 0:58:02 | |
every day. | 0:58:02 | 0:58:04 | |
Should never, ever have invaded Iraq. Never. | 0:58:04 | 0:58:07 | |
Never. No life lost was worth it. At all. None. | 0:58:10 | 0:58:14 | |
Whatever the verdict of the Iraq Inquiry, | 0:58:18 | 0:58:20 | |
the true scale of the damage done to this country, the region | 0:58:20 | 0:58:24 | |
and Britain's reputation, only history can judge. | 0:58:24 | 0:58:29 |