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| April 2005 ... British troop puts a smile on the face of Iraqi kids |
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Political Editor
IT has been a long time coming, but anti-war campaigners are finally admitting something good has come out of the liberation of Iraq two years ago.
The turning point came in January as eight million courageous civilians risked life and limb to vote for a regime that might not slaughter them.
It was accompanied by Libya’s decision to end its hostilities to the West.
And it gathered pace as first the Palestinians, then the Egyptians and finally — astonishingly — the Saudis began to nod in the direction of democracy.
As the thirst for democracy gathered pace, Syria risked being driven out of Lebanon and ex-Soviet tyrannies began to topple in Eastern Europe.
Now the mood of the world has changed towards the allied invasion which ousted evil Saddam Hussein.
For all the mistakes made in the immediate aftermath of the near-bloodless victory, there is now more than a glimmer of hope for Iraq’s future.
Most of the credit, grudgingly, has gone to American President George Bush.
Virtually none, until now, has been attached to Tony Blair, who risked all to support Britain’s greatest ally.
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| April 2003 ... troops and Iraqis pull down Saddam statue |
It is Mr Blair’s own Labour supporters who remain hardest to convince the war was worth the candle. Muslim-dominated constituencies vowed to give the PM a “bloody nose” in the election.
Leftwing organs like the BBC, The Guardian, The Mirror, the New Statesman and The Independent led a vicious campaign of personal denigration against Mr Blair.
They revelled in embarrassing the intelligence services and gloated when the Prime Minister was hauled before the Hutton Inquiry.
Now many have been forced to eat their words.
To its credit, The Independent led the way yesterday with a page one picture of a British trooper laughing with young Iraqi girls.
Its headline read: “Iraq: is the tide turning?”
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| Dec 2003 ... US troops find Saddam Hussein hidden in pit |
The anonymous story — not by its anti-American, anti-Israeli Robert Fisk — says the “nightmare may be coming to an end”. “Attacks on US forces are down from 140 a day to 30 a day,” it says.
“Casualty figures are down. So are assassination attempts.
“US forces believe they can reduce forces by up to 40,000. In Baghdad and Washington, the feeling is growing that the worst might just be over.”
The scale of this momentous conversion is impossible to exaggerate.
It compares only with the extraordinary admission by Lebanon’s Muslim leader
Wallid Jumblatt that the Iraqi invasion was “the start of a new Arab world”.
Tony Blair is blamed by doubters for misleading the public, toying with intelligence and ignoring the corrupt UN.
He was isolated by French, German and Russian leaders — their fingers deep in Iraq’s corrupt coffers. Had he waited for approval, millions of Iraqi people would still be risking death and torture under Saddam Hussein and his murderous sons, Uday and Qusai.
Sometimes, it is clear, the ends justify the means.
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| Sep 2004 ... an Iraqi weeps for son killed by rebel bomb |
Defence Editor Tom Newton Dunn writes:
Two things have broken the back of the insurgents in Iraq over the last 12 months, British and US chiefs believe.
The first is a series of crushing military defeats.
But the second is far more powerful — it is the will of the ordinary Iraqi people.
In the last six months of 2004, the gruelling cat and mouse game against the rebels climaxed in a handful of major battles.
For the Americans, that meant Najaf in August and Fallujah in November. And for the Brits, it came about in a series of ever more bitter confrontations in the long hot summer at Basra and Al Amarah. At the end of every one, Saddam’s die-hards in the north and the Shiite Muslim fanatics of the Mehdi Army in the south were left with many thousands dead.
A lot of those victories were down to the grit and determination of the average squaddie on the street who proved courageous time and again.
One of those was 23-year-old Private Johnson Beharry, who was rightly awarded the first Victoria Cross in 23 years for his extraordinary valour in rescuing more than 30 comrades and then going back out for more the next day.
But as well as decimating their numbers, the mental effect on the rebels was just as devastating.
Many potential recruits began to question whether certain death was really worth it. But more important than any bullets and bombs thrown at the enemy was the psychological effect of one single day — January 30, Election Day.
In an amazing crescendo of public anger, eight million Iraqi people came out to defy terror to choose their own future for the first time.
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| Jan 2005 ... woman shows mark after casting her vote |
It was a truly humbling experience for all of us journalists and soldiers alike to see the courage on their faces that day and to hear how voters spat on the charred corpses of suicide bombers.
It was an overwhelming national message to the insurgents — they had had enough.
The only way any terrorist insurgency is beaten is when the ordinary people withdraw their support.
Terrorists can’t hide in a hostile crowd. As British forces chief in Iraq, Lt Gen Sir John Kiszely said in his farewell interview last week after six tough months in Baghdad: “I see a changing mood in the Iraqi people, with a greater degree of optimism and self confidence.”
The utterly-wrong Vietnam comparison was all the rage among the chattering classes six months ago.
Now, you won’t even hear the MP for Baghdad South George Galloway saying that any more.
Instead, top brass behind the scenes are seriously talking about fixing a date for when to begin the long withdrawal.
It is likely to start by the end of this year.
Why will it be time to bring Our Boys home then?
Because it looks more and more like their job really will be well and truly done.
