The average American may not feel much shame for the Iraq War fiasco or the crippling debt it added to our children's obligations, but our unwillingness to prosecute those responsible sets an example of "superpowered" impunity for the law, that allows any tin pot dictator to point to our armed invasion, human rights abuses or how we've endangered our own children's economic future.
Carne Ross was an experienced British diplomat to the UN who resigned in protest of the Iraq war's illegality. Ross said he can show the UK did not consider available alternatives to military action and says the British Foreign Office is withholding documents that hold keys to the real reasons behind Britain's decision to go to war in Iraq. The BFO claims the documents can "not be found" and have refused to comment further, but only after warning Ross not to refer to a key memo any more! Which is it? Ross maintains that some of the info he wanted to show pertained to a visit by Blair to Syria and failure to deal with a pipeline that was enabling Iraq to illegally export oil.
US voters may have been bait-and-switched, but Britain hasn't given up on justice. Consider this article by anti-war activist Lesley Docksey, detailing the many ways determined Brits have been trying to hold former Prime Minister Tony Blair accountable for improperly committing Britain to the wishes of U.S. President George W. Bush's "Iraq Team".
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) was established with the UN, in order to settle disputes and provide legal counsel on request to recognized state bodies or coalitions. But there is little accountability to abide by the court - despite all UN Security Council member states providing judges for the court, only the UK has formally recognized it's jurisdiction. One British ICJ judge, Sir Christopher Greenwood, even helped UK Attorney General Lord Goldsmith illegally greenlight the Iraq invasion in March 2003, demonstrating how politics trample the rule of law.
The ICC cannot consider a prosecution unless efforts to prosecute in the home country have failed. And they did. It is believed the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) instructed the Metropolitan Police Force (the Met) that prosecution was off the table. Local police were offended by this, and by the CPS' letter of explanation that the Dorset Chief Inspector was forbidden to make public. Close watchers feel the exemption relied on state secrecy and technicalities, gleaning "the ICC Act was not detailed enough to allow for prosecution".
Unless a UN member state is attacked, military action is only possible with UNSC authorization. As with Bush in the US, citizens of the UK want to try Blair for war crimes, crimes against humanity, crime of aggression and attempting regime change, all prohibited under international law. The UK and the Dutch have retroactively declared the war illegal, but despite documentation and his own admissions, prosecution of Blair remains stalled. One on-the-record Downing Street document shows in March 2002 there was no evidence suggesting Iraq was a threat to the West, yet included a request to find legal ways to pursue regime change in Iraq while simultaneously acknowledging it's illegality!
Blair made cases he knew were debunked to the UK's House of Commons and Parliament. This was itself a domestic crime, as is "abuse of office" and profiting off criminal activity to the tune of millions (Blair's defense industry kick backs contributed to his ouster). But despite being a provable crime of aggression under his own 2001 ICC Act, Blair has skated on the worst charges because a technicality limits the dates of prosecutable crimes.
Blair still could be pursued under for "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity however. Though the issue saw wide national outrage in 2003 and 2004, Brits are still working today to get Tony Blair into court and seemingly it is secretive "deep state" cover preventing this.
