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Lord Chalfont: My Lords, I did not accuse anyone of anything. I said that there was a degree of anti-Americanism in the debate, which there was.

Lord Wallace of Saltaire: My Lords, the noble Lord also referred to anti-Semitism. There may be a certain amount of it, but many noble Lords who are neither anti-Semitic nor anti-American have justifiable criticisms to make.

The noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, remarked on the neo-conservatives in the United States and their power in the Bush Administration. At the weekend I pulled out Bob Woodward's book, Bush at War. He remarks that three days after September 11th, the briefing to the President was given by the Deputy Defense Secretary—the noble Lord, Lord Desai, will note that it is not just people in think tanks—Paul Wolfowitz, whom I have known personally for nearly 40 years. It says that he,

"often voiced the views of an outspoken group of national security conservatives in Washington . . . These were men who believed that there was no greater menace in the world than Iraqi President Saddam Hussein".

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is quoted as saying:

"In his analysis, the only justification for going after Iraq would be clear evidence linking the Iraqis to the September 11 attacks. Short of that, targeting Iraq was not worth the risk of angering moderate Arab states whose support was crucial not only to any campaign in Afghanistan, but to reviving the Middle East peace process".

Colin Powell is quoted as saying to him on the aside:

"What the hell, what are these guys thinking about? Can't you get these guys back in the box?"

Those are Americans in the Administration criticising the push, which was there among the neo-conservatives well before September 11th, for taking Saddam out.

I agree strongly with what the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, said about the determination to use the unipolar moment to establish what they call a "democratic imperialism" across the world. At Davos on 26th January, Colin Powell said to his audience:

"I believe that the United States has earned the trust of men, women and children around the world".

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That is currently the pitch: you do not need the UN; you can trust the United States, and you can trust the Bush Administration.

Robert Kagan, in the opening paragraph of the book which the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, quoted, starts by saying:

"It is time to stop pretending that Europeans and Americans share a common view of the world, or even that they occupy the same world".

So much for the Prime Minister's appeal to our "shared values", which make Britain a natural bridge, as he argues, between Europe and the United States. Tom Friedman, one of the best, and rather conservative, commentators in the American press, said in the New York Times on 20th February:

"The Bush folks are big on attitude, weak on strategy, and terrible on diplomacy".

We have heard many comparisons in this debate about Munich. I believe that it is important also to remember Suez and Vietnam. I was studying and teaching in the United States in the early years of the Vietnam war and I remember very well the twisting of intelligence information by the political masters of intelligence and the denigration of the experts on the region. I was at Cornell University, which had an Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. It was vigorously attacked by the State Department and in Congress with threats of withdrawal of funds. There was over-confidence in the ability to resolve the problem through military force, a refusal to pay any attention to the different culture and assumptions of the opponent, and, indeed, denigration of the enemy as such.

Now, I am afraid to say, we have a similar mood within the United States. There have been some bitter attacks on the Middle East studies community, including calls for federal funding for all university institutes on Middle East studies in the United States to be withdrawn. Tom Friedman, whom I quote again, said:

"Every time I hear [the Bush Administration try to justify war on the grounds that Saddam is allied with Osama bin Laden], I think of the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. You don't take the country to war on the wings of a lie".

As I listened to the noble Lord, Lord Howell, say that there was amazing evidence that terrorists were closely linked to Saddam Hussein and that, indeed, since September 11th Iraq was at the heart of a new network of international terrorism, I have to say that I was not sure where he got that from.

I quote again Senator Byrd's powerful speech, which, sadly, received almost no attention in the American media. He complains:

"There is no debate",

within the United States,

"no discussion, no attempt to lay out for the nation the pros and cons of this particular war . . . The doctrine of pre-emption . . . appears to be in contravention of international law and the UN charter . . . This reckless and arrogant administration has initiated policies which may reap disastrous consequences . . . to turn one's frustration and anger into the kind of destabilising foreign policy debacle that the world is currently witnessing is inexcusable".

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That is not an anti-American diatribe from a European; it is from a member of the US Senate.

Many other speakers have referred to the radical character of this Administration and to the fundamentalist groups which have gained so much influence over it. Political fundamentalism, as the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, pointed out, means tax cuts, which are intended to force the dismantling of the welfare state, and cuts in funding for education, which are clearly and explicitly a radical departure from the Rooseveltian values which we all share and are intended to complete what the Reagan administration hesitated to carry through. There is also economic fundamentalism, which says that deficits do not matter, and religious fundamentalism, which includes support for Israel to occupy all the historic land, including further expansion of settlements and the expulsion of Palestinians. The capture of American Middle East policy by Likud is one of the most worrying dimensions of this. I quote again from the international edition of the New York Times of 25th February. The Israeli defence Minister said hopefully:

"'We have great interest in shaping the Middle East the day after a war".

The article continued:

"Israel regards Iran and Syria as greater threats and hopes that once Saddam is dispensed with, the dominoes will start to tumble".

Later in the article, a senior Israeli official is reported as hoping that,

"after the war would come a fork in the road for American policy",

in which the Americans would choose Israel rather than Europe. It went on to say that,

"the Quartet may itself prove a casualty of an Iraqi war . . . there are people in Washington who are going to say 'What do we need these people for?'"

By "these people", he meant the Europeans. The Israelis hope that the Quartet will die the death quietly during the course of the war.

There are circumstances in which it may be justifiable to intervene in Iraq and to remove Saddam Hussein from power. However, that has to be through the meticulous and careful use of UN procedures. It should also be with the understanding and, if possible, the support of other states in the region. This is not a strong basis for Britain and the United States alone to decide whether Iraq has met its objectives. We need to carry others with us.

There are some circumstances in which British forces should not follow American forces into Iraq alone—not without broader support from the international community, and not without parallel progress on the Arab/Israel conflict, which includes the publication of the road-map, which has been blocked by the Sharon government. There are now bilateral negotiations between the Israelis and the United States about the parts that the Israelis want changed. It seems to me to be a sine qua non of British involvement that the road-map is published beforehand and not left until afterwards.

We need a strategy towards terrorism. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Thomson of Monifieth, that we need also to be tough on the causes of terrorism. The

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most depressing thing about President Bush's Jacksonville speech was the extent to which he entirely merged intervention in Iraq with the war on terrorism. It was as if defeating Iraq would solve the terrorist problem. We all know that is not the case.

Lord Howell of Guildford: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. He was asking where all the evidence about Iraq's links with terrorism came from. The answer is that there is a very wide range of sources, mostly coming from Washington and from senior members of the Administration. However, if he does not want to look at those, he needs only to consult the excellent speech made by his noble friend Lady Nicholson. She gave ample evidence of Iraq's habit of being involved in terrorism.

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