Iraq war deal 'signed in blood' by Blair in 2002
Sir Christopher Meyer told the Iraq Inquiry that the two men spent an afternoon meeting in private at the former president’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, in April 2002, which appeared to lead to a shift in the then Prime Minister’s stance on Iraq.
Sir Christopher said: “I took no part in any of the discussions and there was a large chunk of that time when no adviser was there.
“The two men were alone in the ranch so I’m not entirely clear to this day what degree of convergence (on Iraq policy) was signed in blood, if you like, at the Crawford ranch.
“But there are clues in the speech Tony Blair gave the next day, which was the first time he had said in public ‘regime change’. He was trying to draw the lessons of 9/11 and apply them to the situation in Iraq which led - I think not inadvertently but deliberately - to a conflation of the threat posed by Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
“When I read that I thought ‘this represents a tightening of the UK/US alliance and a degree of convergence on the danger Saddam Hussein presented’.”
Sir Christopher, who was Britain's ambassador to the US between 1997 and 2003, was called to give evidence about the changing nature of British and American policy towards Iraq in the two years before the invasion of March 2003.
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Sir Christopher said: “I took no part in any of the discussions and there was a large chunk of that time when no adviser was there.
“The two men were alone in the ranch so I’m not entirely clear to this day what degree of convergence (on Iraq policy) was signed in blood, if you like, at the Crawford ranch.
“But there are clues in the speech Tony Blair gave the next day, which was the first time he had said in public ‘regime change’. He was trying to draw the lessons of 9/11 and apply them to the situation in Iraq which led - I think not inadvertently but deliberately - to a conflation of the threat posed by Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
“When I read that I thought ‘this represents a tightening of the UK/US alliance and a degree of convergence on the danger Saddam Hussein presented’.”
Sir Christopher, who was Britain's ambassador to the US between 1997 and 2003, was called to give evidence about the changing nature of British and American policy towards Iraq in the two years before the invasion of March 2003.