At long last, those damned illusive WMDs have been found! The discovery of a secret and undeclared stash of chemical weapons comprised of tons of mustard gas and chemical shells by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons will surely be enough to warrant an immediate and full vindication of former Prime Minister Tony Blair won’t it? Not quite. The problem is that at the time of the invasion of Iraq we weren’t quite looking in the right place. In this case, a miss is as good as 1600 miles as these WMDs were found not in Iraq but in Libya. Still, kudos to Blair for getting the general region right (and to think that people have the audacity to criticise Blair for his alleged weak grasp on all things International. Shame on them!).

The fact that Colonel Gaddafi could surreptitiously stash these weapons is made all the more shocking by the fact it happened on Blair’s watch. This was the same Blair who described “Tyrannical regimes with WMD” as “begetters of chaos.” In light of such a view, we can assume that when he made his 2004 “deal in the desert” with Gaddafi, Blair was careful to put strict provisions in place to absolutely guarantee that these weapons were destroyed; perhaps insisting on a team of UN Weapons Inspectors and a number of vigorous tests and deadlines to be met without fail. Well, no. Instead Blair took the “Mad Dog” Gaddafi (clue is in the name) at his word and blindly accepted his assurances that chemical weapons, such as the ones found last week, would all be declared and subsequently destroyed.

Only a year prior to this “deal”, Blair was a far less trusting individual. This was no less true than when it came to the likes of Saddam Hussein, Iraq, international opinion and evidence (or rather lack of). For instance, he didn’t take Saddam at his word about the state of Iraq’s WMD arsenal and quite rightly so for rather obvious reasons. However, Blair’s distrust extended far beyond the Iraqi dictator personally. He was distrustful when the UN Weapons inspectors were allowed to return in 2002. He was distrustful when Iraq issued a 12,000 page document detailing the statuses of its weapons programme. He was distrustful when Hans Blix made his announcement that Iraq was cooperating with the UN’s team’s work and his citation of the destruction of 40 Iraqi missiles as proof. He was certainly distrustful when Blix announced he found no evidence of WMDs in Iraq. Such was the strength of Blair’s distrust that he was willing to go to war on it. In fact, the only thing Blair could trust was his own distrust of everything and everyone but himself and his US ally.

In his Commons address to MPs on the eve of invasion, Blair attempted to explain the disparity between his own distrust and the actual evidence:  “We are now seriously asked to accept that in the last few years, contrary to all history, contrary to all intelligence, he [Saddam] decided unilaterally to destroy the weapons. Such a claim is palpably absurd.” Blair wasn’t wrong and was in fact displaying sound reasoning and common sense – it would be hard to accept that Saddam had destroyed all his weapons, contrary to history. However, the question begs, why didn’t he apply the same sound reasoning and common sense when he made his deal with Gaddafi a year later? Anyone with a basic knowledge of the Libyan dictator would have found it hard if not impossible to accept that he, like Saddam, contrary to history and intelligence had decided to destroy all his WMDs – anyone but the “palpably absurd” Blair it seems.

So what makes a Prime Minister distrustful to the point of war and invasion one year, and then capable of casually accepting the assurances of an insane tyrant the next? Had Blair undergone some sort of personality transplant? Had his ever-growing faith in Christianity meant that he had become some sort of Patron Saint of Trust? Was it just bad (or appalling) judgement? Was it his trademark arrogance? As optimistic as these explanations are, one suspects the real explanation is something far more sinister and unacceptable.

Could the real reasons lie in the fact that Gaddafi, unlike Saddam, was willing to open up his country (and its oil reserves) to the UK and her economic interests without a fight by choosing to “come in from the diplomatic cold”? Iraq’s reluctance to do the same meant that Blair “had” to be distrustful, even if that meant going to war on a premise that lacked credible evidence. In other words, if Iraq wouldn’t come in from the diplomatic cold voluntarily, it would have to be dragged in, not only kicking and screaming but bleeding and dying.