Blair: Mirror photos 'almost certainly fake'

Tony Blair said today the Daily Mirror's photographs purporting to show Iraqi prisoners being tortured by British troops were "almost certainly fake" as army investigators prepared to expose them as a hoax.
The prime minister gave the surest indication yet that the government was now confident the photographs were not authentic when he made his comments during a heated debate in parliament.

It is the first time Mr Blair has cast doubt on the authenticity of the photographs, although the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, revealed on Monday that army investigators were sure the vehicle shown in one of the photographs had never been in Iraq.

The government's new-found confidence that the pictures were a hoax will pile yet more pressure on the newspaper's editor, Piers Morgan, who has robustly defended his decision to publish the controversial pictures.

http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,14173,1215099,00.html

Somehow I was pretty sure that the official debunking of these photos would come soon, after I read the WH statements on the beheading video. The authenticity of the pictures was very much debated from the beginning on, and I thought that they would save the "official debunking" for a convenient time. Just my wild speculation.

I don't think anyone has or will attempt to debunk those. Minimize, apologize, attempt to keep them in context, like after 9/11 everytime any US action was reported on the news, the reporters always said, of course, these images must be viewed in context of the events of Sept. 11.

the Red Cross report about the deaths and torture of Iraqis by British soldiers. This is an attempt to sidestep responsibility, gosh, where else did I see that? Hmmmmm......

fabricated these photos that Bush cannot blame the UK for what the US is doing.

atrocities listed in the Red Cross report and the lack of action on the report when it was received. Blair and bush are one and the same on this one, there is no separation, imo.

the UK government are totally complicit here, as is the British army. And it isn't just Blair - there is collective cabinet responsibility here. And you know what the worst thing is - I still have to go around and canvas for the Labour party in the next general election, because the alternative is the Tories. Talk about a shit deal.

before the next election, imo. If I were in Britian I would support Labour as well, providing that Blair was NOT the leader, he has disgraced and shamed his country and his party, imo.

The US is trying to create a perpetual war in Iraq, using Isreal-Palestinian style techniques.

The UK wants to settle things down not only in I-P, but all over the middle east because the middle east is the spigot for european economic development. A destabilized ME slows down economic growth and promotes inequities that lead to fascists getting elected to government.

Regardless of what's in that Red Cross report, it is very unlikely that the UK is on board with what the US was doing in that prison.

And the bottom line is that those pictures probably were fakes, so you really got to think hard about why anyone would be so interested in going to the trouble of trying to sink Blair with the same scandal that was about to engulf Bush.

because they depicted events which almost certainly did take place. Whether or not the specific pictures in question were faked, I find the notion that the British have their hands completely clean here incredulous.

the reason Blair is in Iraq at all is to prevent Bush from taking total control of European economic development by making sure that its spigot -- ME oil -- is totally unreliable and mired in expensive conflict which only serves the interests of fascists.

The British don't have their hands clean here, but the motivations of Blair and Bush seem perfectly obvious, and they are at odds.

imperialists don't interest me one bit AP. Iraqi oil for Iraqis, and Europe and the States both the hell out of there. I don't think just because America is busy stealing from the third-world we all need to jump in on the act so we aren't left behind.

...have to worry about rising fascism within Europe.

If Bush controlled the ME, he would turn off that spigot of economic development at his whim, and he do it help fascists get elected all over europe.

That's europe's battle in the ME. It's a rock and a hard place for Blair, but Bush's motives are painfully obvious.

a fire in your own house by going and lighting up your neighbour's parch, now do you?

Europe is big enough to take care of itself without exploiting the third world. There is no excuse whatsoever for what Blair is doing, and quite frankly I wish you would quit apologising for him. He may not be Bush, but then few people would live up to that comparison.

US dominates the world, and the EU is a reaction to that fact. And staying out of Iraq, although, short term might have said something about imperialism, would have meant in the medium term fascists coming to power accross Europe.

I think looking into the medium term is OK justification.

Not all politics is black and white.

The problem is that your central premise is wrong - not going into Iraq wouldn't have hurt the EU. After all, the vast majority of the EU isn't in Iraq, and isn't going to go in any time soon. If anything, France and Germany have now won the power struggle within Europe and are calling the shots by having stayed out. But even if you were right, an EU which needs saving at the price of 10,000+ Iraqi civilians and counting is not an EU worth having.

...should be a big clue that some RW'ers are probably trying to help Bush and hurt Blair so that they can get Blair out of their way and on with their fascist project.

Both the left and right in Britain want Blair dead. I know people across the whole spectrum here, from my friends in the Young Communist League to my Lib Dem friends, to my Tory friends. You know what the one thing uniting them is - they all despise New Labour. Labour's only hope would be to ditch Blair and about 9/10ths of his cabinet, but there is no way they will go. I will campaign for Labour in the next GE, but it will be with a grimace, and not a grin.

...going to see Lib Dems, Tories and Socialists get pretty frantic as it becomes more likely that Kerry will win.

Once Kerry wins, it's very likely that the Algerian-style imperialism the US is engaged in will come to end, that Iraq will move towards democracy, and that it will be welcomed into the community of nations that is becoming the rapidly expanding EU, and will both benefit from and create benefits for other members.

Ok, clearly there will be some fascistic elements resisting that situation, but I think people will appreciate the qualitative differences between Blair and Bush once Kerry becomes president, which will be big trouble for the Tories.

actually, I think by the time of the US election it may well be too late. As for the Lib Dems and Socialits - you are very very wrong. They are all praying to every deity under the sun that Kerry wins.

working towards in the UK.

It just seems to me it would be prudent for any anti-Tory to let Blair off the hook at least until the election.

If Bush loses, maybe the UK will have to start looking at new options which include finding a new leader to fend of Bush's goal of getting fascists in power all over Europe.

But, really, wake up. Tories know the election will be too late for them if Kerry wins, that's why the Red Cross report has suddenly risen to the level of the US's Battle of Algiers/French style torture/rape prisons.

The Tories need a late election, because they are nowhere near ready yet. They would of course prefer Blair out now, but that is only because getting a prime-minister's scalp is a good thing whenever it happens. Whether Kerry wins or not, Blair has already lost the trust of a large proportion of the British public. That will be very very difficult indeed to regain. And as for letting him off the hook - fuck him and the horse he rode in on. If the left shuts up now, we will never have the credibility to stand up to any abuse again. And if we are going to lose all of our credibility and conscience, we sure as fucking hell aren't going to do it for a Thatcherite wanker like Blair.

to run agains the dour, charisma-free Gordon Brown. Sure, they need their late election, but they need it agianst someone other than Blair.

I guarantee you that when Kerry becomes president, it will not be hard for Blair to redeem his character because it will become more clear what his motivations were -- that they weren't imperialism.

I think the best evidence of the Tories knowing this will be their frantic activity to discredit Blair before November. They'd like low if they thought that not even Kerry would help Blair.

head was offered to them on a plate, as it has been. The Mirror and Guardain are not Tory papers!

And actually, the latest opinion polls show that if labour ran with Brown, they would return with a higher majority than with Blair.

with the same brush that Bush is painted with is getting anything handed on a platter.

It seems very forced and contrived in an effort to elect Tories in the medium term.

As I said, Brown may do better than Blair today, but he has 'one-term' written all over him.

abuses, documented, repeat, documented and received but not acted upon, by the Blair government. Your comment:

'Regardless of what's in that Red Cross report, it is very unlikely that the UK is on board with what the US was doing in that prison.'

doesn't make sense, it has nothing to do with the atrocities committed by British soldiers. Why are you negating the Red Cross report?

the British or the US or Spanish or Hundurans or whomever. What's alleged in the Red Cross report is what you'd expect in a conflict zone -- it's stupid soldiers shooting innocent people because they're stupid hotheads or frightened out of their minds.

What the US appears to have done is systemic, plotting torture, of the kind used all accross the globe for decades to fight guerilla movements, such as by the French in Algiers and the Israelis agains the Palistinians.

I think it's pretty obvious by now that the British and the US have very different intentions in Iraq. The British and Europeans actually want peace, not imperialism, in the middle east, because the ME is on their doorstep and because it is the spigot of economic development for Europe.

The US seems to want permanent conflict and instability, because it helps American companies compete with European companies, because it helps the American government compete against the European governments, and because it creates war profiteering opportunities for America.

I'm all for criticizing all war attrocities and all rapes and all murders of Iraqis, but I'm not for trying to lump in that Red Cross report with what the US was doing in that prison (and those faked pictures seemed like a pretty ham-fisted way to achieve it) because there is a significant difference between what the US is doing in Iraq and what Europe is trying to do.

That's my opiniion, anyway.

is the one on BRITISH atrocities NOT US ones. Let's just discuss the wrongdoings of the British soldiers in this thread and leave the US atrocities out of it. Did or did not the Red Cross deliver a report on British troop atrocities to the Blair govt? What did the Blair govt do once they received the report?

It alleges eight murders by trigger happy troops and rapes. That is EXACTLY what happens in war zones probably from the Revolutionary War throught WWII and up to even Kosovo by both the good guys and the bad guys.

What it doesn't allege is the sort of imperialist rape/torture prisons the US are running in Iraq, the French ran in Ageria, the Americans in the Phillipines, and every anti-guerrilla imperialist force requires to subjugate the idigenous people.

I think there's an important difference because it says something imortant about motivations and ethics that goes beyond the obvious ethical problems inherent in war. I still think that war against fascism is good, and war to promote imperialism is very bad.

I know there are serious problems with the UK's involvement, but I still think it's pretty obvious Europe is trying to prevent fascism, whereas the US is trying to further imperialist fascism.

the Blair govt is "good", it is okay to rape and kill. I have seen the same thing posted on DU that have been taken from right-wing sites, justifying and excusing the bush admin. Another point, Britain is NOT Europe, it is Britain, a member of the EU. France, Germany, etc were against the invasion and occupation of Iraq and they, too, are members of the EU.

...but I don't think that British, unlike the Americans, were showing screenings of the Battle of Algiers as a how-to instructional video for dealing with Iraq.

That's the part that is extra-special wrong, and it's the difference between what was going on in those prisons and what's generally wrong with war.

Do you disagree that?

to follow. To use the words "extra-special wrong" defies definition in my mind. What the British troops did, according to the Red Cross report, was wrong, not "extra-special wrong", not "less extra-special wrong", simply wrong and against the Geneva Convention. The debate about the US wrongdoing and the British wrongdoing are totally separate yet you continue to compare.

Name a war where there weren't Algiers-Phillipines-Israel/Palestinian-style torture/rape prisons.

The US used the movie the Battle of Algiers as an instructional video for Iraq. The Battle of Algiers is NOT the way most wars are fought. The Battle of Algiers is a film about imperialism and shows the sorts of tools that are required to fight imperial battles against people in their own countries. That is particularly evil and it never works.

I think there is enough evidence to suggest that this is America's particular and peculiar strategy in Iraq, which the British don't share in the areas they control, nor do the Poles or any other European nation, because those nations are not interested in the same ends as the US. In other words, they aren't doing what the US did in those prisons because they too watched the Battle of Algiers and see it as a cautionary tale.

Get my point?

But you know what, get rid of Blair, Brown loses the next election to the tories, Bush wins a second term, then you in the UK can have a government which sees the Battle of Algiers as a how-to movie, rather than a cautionary tale.

in contravention of the Geneva Conventions. No amount of excuses can negate that. That is the issue.

punished) and what the US is doing with it's Battle of Algiers style strategy?

With the US prison torture/rape, it's definitely a condemnation of the US's motivations and the entire chain of command right up to the president.

the motivations and actions of both leaders is equally in question. As to the Battle of Algiers, we do not know what was shown to the British troops or that the movie wasn't shown to them but it, in itself, is a moot point. You are arguing moral equivalencies where none exist.

The allegations in the Red Cross report don't seem to amount to that.

You really think it's moot?

The European forces in Iraq might be the only thing preventing the whole country from slipping into an Algeria-type scenario for the next 50 years.

Why are you even talking about some movie that has NO relevance to the guilt or innocence of the torture allegations perpetrated by British troops?

The Blair government received the Red Cross Report and that report lists atrocities and yet they did nothing about them. That is a fact not some movie script.

The allegations in the Red Cross report don't seem to amount to what? Some movie?

The prize was WMD and they were pursued ferociously. After all both men were embarrassed and looking like fools every day during the time WMD couldn't be found. And suffered public abuse because of their claims.

Blair and junior adamantly claimed WMD would be found.

So the motive for prisoner abuse is quite obvious to this poster.

"They crossed the line when they served them British food."

These pictures appear to show British soldiers and have caused an outrage in the U.K. The British have played the PR very well, and certainly they had much less problems in their part of Iraq. To me it looked like the good cop - bad cop scheme.

However, these pictures added very much to the pressure on Blair. Sudddenly the British saw themselves on the bad side. If these pictures are debunked, it will not make the real atrocities undone. But it will help Blair to save his ass - like "hey, us Brits did not do these bad things and it's a good thing to stay in Iraq".

If these pictures are a hoax, this will also be used to discredit other claims of abuse.

way to slime the press corps and avoid responsibility at the same time!

If he makes this claim, and it later turns out to be untrue, it will destroy his last shred of credibility. If his evidence is convincing, it will help his image somewhat, although it will not take away the fact that the justification for the war was untrue all along (WMD). I would say he has more to lose than gain, however.

By Jan Disley

Two more soldiers say they saw Iraqis abused and humiliated by British troops.

Soldier E said prisoners were regularly battered and kicked - a practice condoned by senior officers.

Soldier F claimed captives lived in fear at a British jail.

He said: "We treated them worse than dogs."

_______________

SOLDIER E
'Our troops went into the truck one by one and beat this fellow up. His nose was half way across his face'

BRITISH squaddies took turns to beat up a prisoner in Iraq, it was claimed yesterday.

The damning allegation came as yet another soldier stepped forward with horrifying new testimony.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14232016%26method=full%26siteid=50143%26headline=two%2dmore%2dbrits%2dtell%2dof%2dabuse-name_page.html

We must have standards here. The Corrupt Imperial Plaything has forfeited any credibility he might have had.