Groundhog Day on Iraq, Again

Newsnight’s Iraq special, 10 years on from the war, was broadcast last night (have I mentioned it?).

I thought the BBC should be congratulated for the programme, which did not feature a single member or former member of the Socialist Workers Party (although there were a few “lies” and “war crimes” in the audience), and it gave a voice to Iraqis.

And the discussion on the future for liberal interventionism was hopeful, and helped to confirm that the Iraq war has failed to put Britain off the idea of interventions. They may often be difficult and contested and even, as in the case of Iraq, unpopular for some time before the decision is made (at the time that the House of Commons voted, public opinion supported military action by 53 per cent to 39 per cent), but it is not impossible, as Libya and Mali have shown, that Britain can still live up to its “Responsibility to Protect”, as the United Nations doctrine is now formally known.

Anyway, tune in tonight for the full 20-minute interview with Tony Blair.

There was just one thing with which I disagree with Newsnight on. Kirsty Wark commented in her introduction that some estimates put the death toll in Iraq since the invasion as high as 650,000, although she did add that both this and the most conservative estimate of 100,000 were “heavily disputed”.

I disagree with the implication that both are equally valid; the lower estimate is plainly closer to the actual toll. The 650,000 figure comes from a survey for The Lancet in 2006, although that figure for “excess deaths” included those from heart attacks and other natural causes. The central estimate for violent deaths in that study was 601,000, although it was a probability survey, with a range of 426,000 to 794,000 at the 95 per cent confidence level. That study was not reliable, and one of its researchers was censured by the American Association for Public Opinion Research for refusing to supply “basic facts” for its inquiry into his work. I do not think it is an estimate that should be used by the BBC.

The two best sources on this are the Iraq Body Count and the Iraq Family Health Survey Report 2006-07 carried out under the aegis of the World Health Organisation. They suggest that at least 120,000 civilians have died over 10 years, and a further 50,000 combatants.

I have said again and again that the case against the invasion of Iraq is strong enough not to require wild exaggeration. And yes, I know I go on about it – it is my groundhog day – but I think it is important.

Update: I have amended this to make clear that Wark did say the Lancet figure was “heavily disputed”.

Picture: by an anonymous artistic genius via Owen Jones

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• maias

  How many deaths from heart attacks and ‘natural causes’ could have been prevented if adequate medical facilities had been available and not allowed to deteriorate due to sanctions aimed at affecting services which benefitted the general public?

• plumplum

  You should really add in the deaths due to the protracted siege and bombing of Iraq (back to almost the Stone Age) since the early 90s.. You know, the cost Albright was prepared to pay? In other’s, civilian men women and children’s deaths?

• Stewey

  120,000 is still a lot though, not to mention the wounded and children who lost limbs

• Yves Ferrer

  I all this, what I find incredible is that such men as Campbell and Blair, Mandelson and others are free to carry on as they please (with police protection at our expense, for some) when we know that they have lied to Parliament, ergo to the nation, they have manipulated evidence and to this day deny that they had any questionable role in the war!
  ‘Yes, yes, but the important thing is/was…’ and with that pirouette, Blair in particular dances away from anything that looks remotely like incriminating evidence, ‘because his conscience tells him that he was right…’
  If the likes of Kirsty Wark are so clever at interviewing people (bullying and interrupting is closer to the truth) why don’t they dissect Blair’s utterances systematically?: ‘With respect, Mr Blair, you have not answered the question, I will repeat it for you verbatim…’
  Instead, the debate is diverted on a tangent course and we are left arguing in these columns!

• Jeremy K.

  Iraq Body Count relied on the deaths reported in the, mainly western, news media and is a gross under-estimate, which is why the Lancet report used a different method, the same as that used and accepted in the Rwanda genocide, and is reckoned by unbiased observers to be far more accurate. This is a dishonest article and what is the point of the gratuitous reference to the Socialist Workers Party?

• creggancowboy

  Nothing at all funny about Blair turning UK into a place where police can ki Tomlinson and get away with it. See you at G8?

• MarkHolt

  Who do you think you are, John Rentoul to say that the deaths of
  650,000 people as a result of the Anglo/American invasion of Iraq is not a
  credible figure? Sure the figure is an extrapolation but it was arrived at by
  a peer reviewed study carried out by The Lancet with help from one of America’s
  most prestigious universities.

  The study’s author L Roberts PHD and G Burnham
  MD have carried out similar extrapolations which for instance said
  1.7 million people died in the Congo. This figure was universally accepted and
  was quoted in a UN Security Council resolution. The figure of 650,000 Iraqi
  deaths was arrived at using exactly the same methodology and you ought to be deeply ashamed of yourself for attempting to discredit this valuable piece if science.
  What a creature you are still trying to justify the world’s most unjustifiable war. Shame, shame on you!

  Mark Holt Liverpool

• JohnJustice

  Not sure what you mean by “enabled” here. I suppose you would rather that Saddam had been left to get on with it, leading to either a continuation of his brutal repression of the Iraqi people or to, as David Aaronovitch puts it, another Syria on steroids if the Iraqis would have had the temerity to resist.

  Incidentally Aaronvitch’s article “Now we know why it was right to invade Iraq” in yesterday’s Times is one of the most cogent pieces I have read on the subject. I dare the antis to engage with the arguments he presents.

• http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevebenson/ Stephen Benson

  Twenty minute Tone rererelaunch? No, don’t don’t think I’ll be “tuning in”.

• http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=589811231 Rob Frey

  Oh dear my friend you are a fool to believe any figure out of the U.N.

  My opinion is we show our big guns, build ships and get the hell out and play ball.

  The truth is another story though, who supplies the world with black tar Heroine? It is so much deeper than you are able to believe. I don’t give a rip about studies, have you yet found one that is 100 percent defensible. The cold war we made a huge mess here to clean up that is not being done. Now we have the tech to be bad as it gets. Get over it this is America i want my country to succeed in every way. I am sick of saving the world. We didn’t fight for freedom for nothing and now we buy the so called discriminated with welfare no more. The stupid welfare system should go and only be for the truly need, teach your children for gods sakes be an example. No more open borders for drugs, smoke all the pot you want get the hard sh-t from coming in. We don’t need a war on drugs just border control and real immigration reform. Want to be an American Apply make it feasible for people to immigrate legally without 100k to do it. Throw out and don’t let the others in we can afford the fence not the health care of millions of aliens.