Debate on the Address

I come straight to the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. The whole point about not going to war at the time of the Bosnian crisis—not intervening in someone else’s war, which we have done in the case of Kosovo and Iraq—was that doing such a thing opens up a Pandora’s box, after which one cannot control the consequences that flow from that. The hon. Gentleman referred quite understandably to ethnic cleansing. The war created a situation in which a contribution was made towards reducing the ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Albanians. However, we have now seen the ethnic cleansing of the Kosovar Serbs. The original purpose of the intervention was to ensure autonomy for Kosovo in Serbia, but we now know that that is non-deliverable. Kosovo is going to become an independent state and, probably, a centre of criminality. There will be further fragmentation of the region, but that was no part of the policy of the Prime Minister or NATO. The situation will lead to further dangers not only in the Balkans, but in other territorial disputes in Abkhazia, South Ossetia and elsewhere. Indeed, the Bosnian Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina will be asking why they cannot also have the independence that Kosovo is going to achieve. One would have hoped that the Prime Minister would have learned from the experience of Kosovo. When one intervenes in a war, one changes the dynamics of that war. The Kosovar Albanians, who, until then, had been yearning for autonomy and accepting that as the only realistic possibility, abandoned that aspiration when they saw that they had NATO behind them, even if NATO did not share their objectives. We now come to the situation in the middle east. I will not comment on Iraq in detail today, but, again, initiating a conflict without being able to control its consequences and creating a power vacuum has led to the precise opposite of what President Bush and our Prime Minister actually sought. Everyone who knew the middle east was aware that the real threat to the region came not from Iraq, but from the growing power of Iran. Iraq was a busted flush, not because Saddam Hussein was any nicer a man than he had been, but because 10 years of sanctions, the defeat in the Gulf war and the imposition of the no-fly zone had emasculated his power. That was not just my view or that of some individuals—why else did Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria, which joined the coalition during the first Gulf war, decline to join the coalition of the willing in the invasion of Iraq? It was because they knew that they were not facing a threat. Iran was already aspiring to become the power in the region, so it is an extraordinary irony that it has become the power in the region thanks to President Bush and our Prime Minister. It is a great irony that, having warned the world for the past few years against the growing power of Iran, it is now likely that the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom will have to go cap in hand to Iran to ask for assistance to get out of the mess that has been created in Iraq. The Iranians cannot believe their luck. They had two enemies—the Iraqi Government on one side and the Taliban on the other—and thanks to President Bush, they now have neither. That has been the most extraordinary consequence, although it was not unpredictable. What should be done about Iran at this moment in time? There is only one serious way in which it is possible that progress might be made and, as so often, the key is the United States. No one knows whether Iran is seriously interested in a negotiated solution that will enable it to give up its nuclear aspirations. However, the opportunity has to be put forward. The shadow Foreign Secretary rightly referred to the carrot-and-stick approach, but I think that there needs to be a more attractive carrot and a more credible stick than those which currently exist. I pay tribute to the potential dialogue with Iran that the United States has offered, but the one policy that might just deliver the right results would be a proposal from the United States that in exchange for Iran giving up in a credible way its nuclear aspirations and its support for terrorism, the United States would be prepared to consider not just dialogue, but a full normalisation of its relations with that country. That would represent an end to the axis of evil rhetoric, an end to calls for regime change—that is a matter for the Iranian people, not the American people—an end to the sanctions that the United States has imposed since 1979 and a willingness to treat Iran not as a friendly country, but as a country as friendly as the Venezuela of Hugo Chavez and many other countries throughout the world that are not the closest chums of the current Administration in Washington. Of course, that would be difficult for the United States, but would it really be much more difficult than the case of Libya? Colonel Gaddafi had sponsored terrorism. Colonel Gaddafi was responsible for the Pan Am bombing that led to the deaths of many hundreds of Americans and for many other similarly monstrous acts, yet the United States swallowed hard and not only resolved the problem with Libya, but established diplomatic relations and dropped economic sanctions. The United States is now pursuing a more normal relationship with Libya, so why should not the effort be made with Iran? If such effort was made, it is possible that it might work, which would be a tremendous achievement for the benefit of all. However, if it did not work, how much stronger would the position of the United States be when it called for credible, real, tough and effective sanctions against Iran? Economic sanctions would then, hopefully, be endorsed by the Security Council. Pressure would be exerted on financial institutions to stop their assistance to the Iranian Government. Indeed, other measures could not be ruled out. Such an effort must be made. I am conscious that many hon. Members wish to speak, so I will highlight a final area in which the Prime Minister’s policy has been a total failure: Europe. The Prime Minister said that he would be at the heart of Europe, but he has been unable to deliver—I am delighted to say—our conversion to the single currency. He has been unable to see the European constitution that he supported materialise because France and the Netherlands ruled that out for him. Indeed, through his policy on Iraq, he did more to divide all the new Europe than any single world statesman other than President Bush. The policy has been rotten. For the time being, British foreign policy is on hold. European policy is determined by Merkel, Chirac and Putin—the British Prime Minister has little of a role to play. The sooner we have a new Prime Minister to launch a new foreign policy, the better.