Britain announces Iraq War investigation

(How important has the Iraq War been for Britain?) Militarily, the outcome wasn’t what was expected or promised. So the war wasn’t �won.� Also, over that process, as Britain got bogged down, attention was brought as to whether Britain should’ve been engaged and the original premise�British national security and interests�were actually true. And then people started to question why Blair had aligned himself with Bush so closely. I think there was a hard core of people who insisted the war was illegal and immoral, and there was another side that insisted that we had a moral obligation to unseat Saddam Hussein, and there were many people in the middle. (At the time there were many frontline political figures who were basically standing by Blair. Was that because of the relationship between the US and Britain?) Yes, many understand that Britain can’t do much in the world without the US. at the same time, it was closer to September 11th, so there were more emotions around that, and being in step with the US. (If the reasons for the Iraq War were not as originally portrayed, with did Blair stick with Bush?) He profoundly believed it. (Can Washington no longer count on London?) I don’t think so. Gordon Brown is at heart an Atlanticist. Brown is squeamish about being seen as too close to Europe as well. I believe this is short-sighted and na�ve, and we’ll always have a close alliance with the US and the European Union. But closely related to this is say Britain decides what our own national interests are.