Richard Perle: "Invasion Was Illegal"

[weldon_berger]

According to Richard Perle, Tony Blair and George Bush went to war illegally. Coming from Perle, one of the primary architects of the administration's Iraq policy, it's quite the admission. Not that he's saying the two countries did anything wrong; just that international law sucks.

International lawyers and anti-war campaigners reacted with astonishment yesterday after the influential Pentagon hawk Richard Perle conceded that the invasion of Iraq had been illegal.

In a startling break with the official White House and Downing Street lines, Mr Perle told an audience in London: "I think in this case international law stood in the way of doing the right thing."

President George Bush has consistently argued that the war was legal either because of existing UN security council resolutions on Iraq - also the British government's publicly stated view - or as an act of self-defence permitted by international law.

But Mr Perle, a key member of the defence policy board, which advises the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that "international law ... would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone", and this would have been morally unacceptable.

I'm sure the principals in the affair will be absolutely delighted with Mr. Perle's refreshing honesty. And I'm sure lexicographers will be scrambling to fit Perle's definition of "moral" into their frame of reference.

[MrSoundAndVision]

1. link

always provide it. And if it's on television, note it's broadcast details for proof.

[RC]

3. weldon_berger did

In the opening sentence.

[weldon_berger]

5. I am a veritable

linking fiend. :)

[MrSoundAndVision]

2. oh I see

another thread has it. My bad.

[bluestateguy]

4. Is he nuts?

He just confessed to committing an international crime. He will be unable to travel to many countries once the Bush Administration is over lest he be indicted and hauled off to the Hague.

[weldon_berger]

6. Oh, he'll be fine.

He wasn't actually in the administration. I suppose he might fall into the same category as those Rwandan radio announcers who helped incite the genocide, but that's probably it.

I'm eager to see tomorrow's press availability in London, though. That should be a fine little circus.