Hot waters
Ahhh yesssss....the capture of 15 Naval personnel in Iraqi/Iranian waters.
In the argument against holding our elected representatives to account for lying, much noise has been made by legal types - "Where's the loss incurred because of the lie ? If there's no loss, what are you holding them to account for exactly ?"
When our elected representatives are perceived as anything other than honest, Foreign Affairs are precisely where "the people" suffer "a loss".
Blair says we were in Iraqi waters, the Iranians say bollocks.
It would be nice to think that when the PM says "our lads were in Iraqi territorial waters" you could bet your life they were (after all, that's what "our lads" are doing).
It would be nice to think that in the face of such a clear denial, the Iranian Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki would feel ridiculous even questioning our PM's integrity.
It would be nice to think the UN and international allies would see Mottaki as ridiculous because he questioned our Prime Minister's integrity.
The foreign minister of Iran can put doubt in our minds, the minds of the UN and our international allies over anything our Prime Minister says for two reasons ;
1) The current governments track record.
2) The Belgrano.
The glory days of Thatcher and the Belgrano come 2nd in our series "Great Political porkies" of our time.
Hours after the Peruvian-brokered peace plan landed in London, Thatcher (cigar in mouth) said to the Argentinians, "If you don't stop that naval vessel coming toward the Falklands, I'm going to blow it out of the fucking water."
The Argentinians replied, "What the hell are you talking about ? We're sailing away from the islands. "
Thatcher said, "No you're not." and promptly blew them out of the fucking water.
In fact the Belgrano was sailing away from the Falklands.
She went on to lie in Parliament and on national TV about the incident.
Clive Ponting, a senior Ministry of Defence civil servant, was increasingly frustrated both by Whitehall's misuse of secrecy and by the way the Navy was using the Falklands experience to try to roll back the 1981 defence review, In July 1984, he gave Tam Dalyell MP documents to show how he and the Foreign Affairs Select Committee that was enquiring into the affair were being misled.
Clive was prosecuted under the Official Secrets Act (later) acquitted but civil service career effectively over.
P.S. Freedom of Information request into the Belgrano sinking was refused in June 2005
