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Elizabeth Wilmshurst
As for the pitiable Lord Goldsmith, the reason his hair often appears so disheveled is that he can no longer look in the mirror. You see, Goldsmith let himself be persuaded to change his mind on the legality of an attack on Iraq. And so did all the lawyers in the Foreign Office—all, that is, but one Elizabeth Wilmshurst, the deputy legal counsel. Wilmshurst had been deeply involved in negotiations with the International Criminal Court regarding crimes of aggression. She knew a war of aggression when she saw one.
Wilmshurst would not go with the flow like the proverbial dead fish. When her boss Michael Wood and her colleagues did a 180-degree collective change of mind on the legality of attacking Iraq, she resigned on March 18, 2003, one day before the war began.
In her letter of resignation, Elizabeth Wilmshurst wrote that she was leaving "with very great sadness" after almost 30 years in the legal department of the foreign office:
"I cannot in conscience go along with advice—within the Office or to the public or Parliament—which asserts the legitimacy of military action without a [new Security Council] resolution, particularly since an unlawful use of force on such a scale amounts to the crime of aggression; nor can I agree with such action in circumstances which are so detrimental to the international order and the rule of law."
Her boss, Michael Wood, who went with the flow, was rewarded with knighthood the following year. So was Christopher Greenwood, the outside jurist from whom Lord Goldsmith sought cover, when he dutifully changed his opinion on the legality of the war. O Tempora, O Mores!
Katharine Gun
The bravery of Katharine Gun is well depicted in the book published last year, The Spy Who Tried to Stop a War. Working on Chinese affairs in the British equivalent of the U.S. eavesdropping agency (NSA), Katharine had little access to sensitive information regarding the Middle East. Yet at the turn of 2002-2003 it became clear to her that the U.S. and U.K. had decided to attack Iraq, whether or not it had threatening weapons, and whether or not the UN Security Council approved.
Still, Katharine was startled to see, set down in black and white in an office email of late January 2003, a blanket instruction to her colleagues to help the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) "surge" the monitoring of conversations of Security Council members in New York. The aim was to give American and British diplomats the wherewithal to pre-empt any initiative that could block the path to war. Her conscience led her to make that blanket instruction available to the media.
Katharine's objective, pure and simple, was to prevent a war of aggression. And, absent approval by the Security Council, that was precisely what an attack on Iraq would be. She expected that if she provided unimpeachable documentary evidence, including the full name of the senior NSA official ordering the "surge" in monitoring, this would demonstrate to the world how hell-bent Bush and Blair were on war.
Katharine Gun reasoned that exposing the details regarding the surge urged by the NSA order to eavesdrop on the conversations of Security Council members would bring a flurry of attention in the Western press. She expected that this, in turn, would give a boost to those trying to stop the launching of an unprovoked war. As things turned out, Katharine was shocked that the information she leaked was virtually ignored by the U.S. Fawning Corporate Media, which had long been cheerleading for war.
She was arrested and brought to trial. Her pro bono lawyers argued that she was trying to prevent a war. They contended that the war was illegal, which of course the British government denied. However, when asked to make public the opinion(s) of the British Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, on the legality of the war, the government refused.
Blair was not inclined to let his own and Lord Goldsmith's dirty linen hang out for all to see. As a result, Katharine escaped the vindictive fate that befell Frank Grevil.
I would now like to introduce to you that same Katharine Gun, and ask her to read the citation awarding Frank Grevil the Sam Adams award:
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The Sam Adams Associates
Corner-Brightener Candlestick
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