In the Loop
‘Truth? what is that?’
In the Loop is a very funny film in the long tradition of British political satire with a nod towards the bitter humour of Evelyn Waugh. Just like Waugh, Armando Iannucci shows the unpalatable fact that so often in war (and its proxy, politics) it’s the backsliders, the cheats and the duplicitous scumbags whose careers seem to rise inexorably, while the real heroes (with their quiet moments of self-sacrifice) go un-noticed or betrayed. Despite this darker side to the comedy, the witty dialogue—sprinkled with a barrow-load of gross vulgarities—keeps the audience laughing, saving us from throwing our chairs at the screen in anger at the injustice, or hiding under them in embarrassment.
It’s such a funny film, that if I have a reservation, it’s that it was too easy to laugh my way through the whole two hours. Laughing at things robs them of their power, of course, so it’s commendable to laugh about the bullying machismo of the spin machine. But I have this niggling concern that there are things about the invasion of Iraq that we should remember through something other than comedy.
In 2003, after some significant soul-searching, a large chunk of the Labour Party (and I was among them) swung into line behind the proposal to invade Iraq. Political loyalty to the Prime Minister was one factor in this decision, and Mr Blair’s call to take action against regimes such as Saddam Hussein’s another. Not least this was because of what we were told Saddam threatened to do, including the allegation that chemical weapons were standing-by to be used by his government.
The Hutton Inquiry found that the Government’s dossier of September 2002 was not ‘sexed-up’ in the way a similar document is shown to be in In the Loop. But the Inquiry also concluded that political requirements may have subconsciously influenced the presentation of the intelligence. Nothing improper occured, but some of the pyschological boundaries appear to have been blurred, with an adverse effect on the truth. Moreover, specific advice was disregarded, apparently in the clamour to find a smoking gun: Defence Intelligence Staff suggested that the wording in the dossier was too strong, and that
‘instead of the dossier stating "we judge" that "Iraq has military plans for the use of chemical and biological weapons [...] Some of these weapons are deployable within 45 minutes of an order to use them", the wording should state "intelligence suggests".’
Citizens vote their sovereignty to their governments, giving them the responsibility that is predicated on that power. We know that we will not have access to every state secret, but in accepting that disempowerment, we demand responsible action on the part of Ministers: informed, conscientious action. Of those politicians of Cabinet status who had access to everything on Privy Council rules, who should have read everything, who should have understood exactly what was at stake and what actually were the facts surrounding the invasion of Iraq, only two resigned: Robin Cook and John Denham. And in his resignation speech to Parliament, Mr Cook was explicit about WMD:
‘Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target’
When in political office and taking difficult decisions, it’s almost inevitable that one surrounds oneself with other, like-minded people. An accidental consequence of this is to begin to see those who don’t entirely agree with your team and its mission as the counter-revolutionary running dogs of reaction: it’s the ‘with-us-or-against-us’ mentality when things are going well (and the ‘bunker mentality’, when they aren’t). So the fact that there were only two resignations before the invasion of Iraq is not an indicator of the strength of the case for war, but an indictment of the cabinet and their ability to think for themselves.
I wonder if people remember what Mr Brown’s position was in 2003, when the Government voted for military action against Iraq? He remained in the Cabinet, voting for the war, but it became known by some mysterious process that the Chancellor had had serious reservations about military action. Allowing knowledge of such scepticism to emerge would have had the advantage of both securing his left flank in the Labour Party, and by remaining a loyal Minister, practically guaranteeing the leadership on Tony Blair’s retirement.
None of this would be such an issue if it weren’t for the simple fact that it recently took the current Prime Minister five days to apologise for the scandalous and indefensible actions of his staff. As Watergate slowly wound to the heart of a mentality in Nixon’s Presidency—a paranoid, insecure Presidency doubting everyone’s veracity except its own—the current scandal has wound to the heart of the mode of living in Mr Brown’s government.
New Labour ideology has often swatted scrupulosity aside, claiming that compromise is necessary to achieve what really matters. And, of course, everyone does have to compromise in some way, at some point in their life. But the real skill, the skill that saves your soul, is knowing when your compromise is actually about the good of the country and not about saving your job or keeping your career staggering on for another year or two.
So I think it’s appropriate to give the last words to the late Robin Cook, a man who claimed to be an atheist, but who threw his career away to defend his idea of truth:
‘none of us can predict the death toll of civilians from the forthcoming bombardment of Iraq, but the US warning of a bombing campaign that will "shock and awe" makes it likely that casualties will be numbered at least in the thousands.
‘The threshold for war should always be high.’[1]
[1] Robin Cook’s resignation speech, 17 Mar 2003, Personal Statement, HC Deb 17 March 2003 vol 401 cc726-8.
In the Loop is a very funny film in the long tradition of British political satire with a nod towards the bitter humour of Evelyn Waugh. Just like Waugh, Armando Iannucci shows the unpalatable fact that so often in war (and its proxy, politics) it’s the backsliders, the cheats and the duplicitous scumbags whose careers seem to rise inexorably, while the real heroes (with their quiet moments of self-sacrifice) go un-noticed or betrayed. Despite this darker side to the comedy, the witty dialogue—sprinkled with a barrow-load of gross vulgarities—keeps the audience laughing, saving us from throwing our chairs at the screen in anger at the injustice, or hiding under them in embarrassment.
It’s such a funny film, that if I have a reservation, it’s that it was too easy to laugh my way through the whole two hours. Laughing at things robs them of their power, of course, so it’s commendable to laugh about the bullying machismo of the spin machine. But I have this niggling concern that there are things about the invasion of Iraq that we should remember through something other than comedy.
In 2003, after some significant soul-searching, a large chunk of the Labour Party (and I was among them) swung into line behind the proposal to invade Iraq. Political loyalty to the Prime Minister was one factor in this decision, and Mr Blair’s call to take action against regimes such as Saddam Hussein’s another. Not least this was because of what we were told Saddam threatened to do, including the allegation that chemical weapons were standing-by to be used by his government.
The Hutton Inquiry found that the Government’s dossier of September 2002 was not ‘sexed-up’ in the way a similar document is shown to be in In the Loop. But the Inquiry also concluded that political requirements may have subconsciously influenced the presentation of the intelligence. Nothing improper occured, but some of the pyschological boundaries appear to have been blurred, with an adverse effect on the truth. Moreover, specific advice was disregarded, apparently in the clamour to find a smoking gun: Defence Intelligence Staff suggested that the wording in the dossier was too strong, and that
‘instead of the dossier stating "we judge" that "Iraq has military plans for the use of chemical and biological weapons [...] Some of these weapons are deployable within 45 minutes of an order to use them", the wording should state "intelligence suggests".’
Citizens vote their sovereignty to their governments, giving them the responsibility that is predicated on that power. We know that we will not have access to every state secret, but in accepting that disempowerment, we demand responsible action on the part of Ministers: informed, conscientious action. Of those politicians of Cabinet status who had access to everything on Privy Council rules, who should have read everything, who should have understood exactly what was at stake and what actually were the facts surrounding the invasion of Iraq, only two resigned: Robin Cook and John Denham. And in his resignation speech to Parliament, Mr Cook was explicit about WMD:
‘Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target’
When in political office and taking difficult decisions, it’s almost inevitable that one surrounds oneself with other, like-minded people. An accidental consequence of this is to begin to see those who don’t entirely agree with your team and its mission as the counter-revolutionary running dogs of reaction: it’s the ‘with-us-or-against-us’ mentality when things are going well (and the ‘bunker mentality’, when they aren’t). So the fact that there were only two resignations before the invasion of Iraq is not an indicator of the strength of the case for war, but an indictment of the cabinet and their ability to think for themselves.
I wonder if people remember what Mr Brown’s position was in 2003, when the Government voted for military action against Iraq? He remained in the Cabinet, voting for the war, but it became known by some mysterious process that the Chancellor had had serious reservations about military action. Allowing knowledge of such scepticism to emerge would have had the advantage of both securing his left flank in the Labour Party, and by remaining a loyal Minister, practically guaranteeing the leadership on Tony Blair’s retirement.
None of this would be such an issue if it weren’t for the simple fact that it recently took the current Prime Minister five days to apologise for the scandalous and indefensible actions of his staff. As Watergate slowly wound to the heart of a mentality in Nixon’s Presidency—a paranoid, insecure Presidency doubting everyone’s veracity except its own—the current scandal has wound to the heart of the mode of living in Mr Brown’s government.
New Labour ideology has often swatted scrupulosity aside, claiming that compromise is necessary to achieve what really matters. And, of course, everyone does have to compromise in some way, at some point in their life. But the real skill, the skill that saves your soul, is knowing when your compromise is actually about the good of the country and not about saving your job or keeping your career staggering on for another year or two.
So I think it’s appropriate to give the last words to the late Robin Cook, a man who claimed to be an atheist, but who threw his career away to defend his idea of truth:
‘none of us can predict the death toll of civilians from the forthcoming bombardment of Iraq, but the US warning of a bombing campaign that will "shock and awe" makes it likely that casualties will be numbered at least in the thousands.
‘The threshold for war should always be high.’[1]
[1] Robin Cook’s resignation speech, 17 Mar 2003, Personal Statement, HC Deb 17 March 2003 vol 401 cc726-8.
