Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 08:09:01 -0800 (PST)
From: Ali Kazmi <thekazmis2001-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Cook's resignation speech.


Cook's resignation speech 
Here is the full text of Robin Cook's resignation
speech in the House of Commons, which won applause
from some backbenchers in unprecedented Commons
scenes. 


This is the first time for 20 years that I have
addressed the House from the back benches. 

I must confess that I had forgotten how much better
the view is from here. 

None of those 20 years were more enjoyable or more
rewarding than the past two, in which I have had the
immense privilege of serving this House as Leader of
the House, which were made all the more enjoyable, Mr
Speaker, by the opportunity of working closely with
you. 

It was frequently the necessity for me as Leader of
the House to talk my way out of accusations that a
statement had been preceded by a press interview. 

On this occasion I can say with complete confidence
that no press interview has been given before this
statement. 

I have chosen to address the House first on why I
cannot support a war without international agreement
or domestic support. 

Backing Blair 

The present Prime Minister is the most successful
leader of the Labour party in my lifetime. 

I hope that he will continue to be the leader of our
party, and I hope that he will continue to be
successful. I have no sympathy with, and I will give
no comfort to, those who want to use this crisis to
displace him. 

I applaud the heroic efforts that the prime minister
has made in trying to secure a second resolution. 

I do not think that anybody could have done better
than the foreign secretary in working to get support
for a second resolution within the Security Council. 

But the very intensity of those attempts underlines
how important it was to succeed. 

Now that those attempts have failed, we cannot pretend
that getting a second resolution was of no importance.


French intransigence? 

France has been at the receiving end of bucket loads
of commentary in recent days. 

It is not France alone that wants more time for
inspections. Germany wants more time for inspections;
Russia wants more time for inspections; indeed, at no
time have we signed up even the minimum necessary to
carry a second resolution. 

We delude ourselves if we think that the degree of
international hostility is all the result of President
Chirac. 

The reality is that Britain is being asked to embark
on a war without agreement in any of the international
bodies of which we are a leading partner - not NATO,
not the European Union and, now, not the Security
Council. 

To end up in such diplomatic weakness is a serious
reverse. 

Only a year ago, we and the United States were part of
a coalition against terrorism that was wider and more
diverse than I would ever have imagined possible. 

'Heavy price' 

History will be astonished at the diplomatic
miscalculations that led so quickly to the
disintegration of that powerful coalition. 

The US can afford to go it alone, but Britain is not a
superpower. 

Our interests are best protected not by unilateral
action but by multilateral agreement and a world order
governed by rules. 

Yet tonight the international partnerships most
important to us are weakened: the European Union is
divided; the Security Council is in stalemate. 

Those are heavy casualties of a war in which a shot
has yet to be fired. 

I have heard some parallels between military action in
these circumstances and the military action that we
took in Kosovo. There was no doubt about the
multilateral support that we had for the action that
we took in Kosovo. 

It was supported by NATO; it was supported by the
European Union; it was supported by every single one
of the seven neighbours in the region. France and
Germany were our active allies. 

It is precisely because we have none of that support
in this case that it was all the more important to get
agreement in the Security Council as the last hope of
demonstrating international agreement. 

Public doubts 

The legal basis for our action in Kosovo was the need
to respond to an urgent and compelling humanitarian
crisis. 

Our difficulty in getting support this time is that
neither the international community nor the British
public is persuaded that there is an urgent and
compelling reason for this military action in Iraq. 

The threshold for war should always be high. 

None of us can predict the death toll of civilians
from the forthcoming bombardment of Iraq, but the US
warning of a bombing campaign that will "shock and
awe" makes it likely that casualties will be numbered
at least in the thousands. 

I am confident that British servicemen and women will
acquit themselves with professionalism and with
courage. I hope that they all come back. 

I hope that Saddam, even now, will quit Baghdad and
avert war, but it is false to argue that only those
who support war support our troops. 

It is entirely legitimate to support our troops while
seeking an alternative to the conflict that will put
those troops at risk. 

Nor is it fair to accuse those of us who want longer
for inspections of not having an alternative strategy.


For four years as foreign secretary I was partly
responsible for the western strategy of containment. 

Over the past decade that strategy destroyed more
weapons than in the Gulf war, dismantled Iraq's
nuclear weapons programme and halted Saddam's medium
and long-range missiles programmes. 

Iraq's military strength is now less than half its
size than at the time of the last Gulf war. 

Threat questioned 

Ironically, it is only because Iraq's military forces
are so weak that we can even contemplate its invasion.
Some advocates of conflict claim that Saddam's forces
are so weak, so demoralised and so badly equipped that
the war will be over in a few days. 

We cannot base our military strategy on the assumption
that Saddam is weak and at the same time justify
pre-emptive action on the claim that he is a threat. 

Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in
the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a
credible device capable of being delivered against a
strategic city target. 

It probably still has biological toxins and
battlefield chemical munitions, but it has had them
since the 1980s when US companies sold Saddam anthrax
agents and the then British Government approved
chemical and munitions factories. 

Why is it now so urgent that we should take military
action to disarm a military capacity that has been
there for 20 years, and which we helped to create? 

Why is it necessary to resort to war this week, while
Saddam's ambition to complete his weapons programme is
blocked by the presence of UN inspectors? 

Israeli breaches 

Only a couple of weeks ago, Hans Blix told the
Security Council that the key remaining disarmament
tasks could be completed within months. 

I have heard it said that Iraq has had not months but
12 years in which to complete disarmament, and that
our patience is exhausted. 

Yet it is more than 30 years since resolution 242
called on Israel to withdraw from the occupied
territories. 

We do not express the same impatience with the
persistent refusal of Israel to comply. 

I welcome the strong personal commitment that the
prime minister has given to middle east peace, but
Britain's positive role in the middle east does not
redress the strong sense of injustice throughout the
Muslim world at what it sees as one rule for the
allies of the US and another rule for the rest. 

Nor is our credibility helped by the appearance that
our partners in Washington are less interested in
disarmament than they are in regime change in Iraq. 

That explains why any evidence that inspections may be
showing progress is greeted in Washington not with
satisfaction but with consternation: it reduces the
case for war. 

Presidential differences 

What has come to trouble me most over past weeks is
the suspicion that if the hanging chads in Florida had
gone the other way and Al Gore had been elected, we
would not now be about to commit British troops. 

The longer that I have served in this place, the
greater the respect I have for the good sense and
collective wisdom of the British people. 

On Iraq, I believe that the prevailing mood of the
British people is sound. They do not doubt that Saddam
is a brutal dictator, but they are not persuaded that
he is a clear and present danger to Britain. 

They want inspections to be given a chance, and they
suspect that they are being pushed too quickly into
conflict by a US Administration with an agenda of its
own. 

Above all, they are uneasy at Britain going out on a
limb on a military adventure without a broader
international coalition and against the hostility of
many of our traditional allies. 

>From the start of the present crisis, I have insisted,
as Leader of the House, on the right of this place to
vote on whether Britain should go to war. 

It has been a favourite theme of commentators that
this House no longer occupies a central role in
British politics. 

Nothing could better demonstrate that they are wrong
than for this House to stop the commitment of troops
in a war that has neither international agreement nor
domestic support. 

I intend to join those tomorrow night who will vote
against military action now. It is for that reason,
and for that reason alone, and with a heavy heart,
that I resign from the government. 




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