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President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair acted much like
Nazi war criminals in ordering the invasion of Iraq, the United Nations' former
chief weapons inspector to the country said on Friday.
Scott Ritter said the "aggressive warfare" of the United
States and Britain in Iraq was similar to German actions in Europe in World
War II.
"Both these men could be pulled up as war criminals for engaging in actions
that we condemned Germany in 1946," Ritter said in an address at the Chatham
House think tank in London.
"Tony Blair and George Bush are guilty of the crime of planning and committing
aggressive warfare."
Ritter was a UN weapons inspector in Iraq between 1991 and 1998, when he resigned,
citing a lack of UN and US support for his tough disarmament methods.
In his speech he also mocked Britain's supposed "special relationship"
with the United States, likening London's position to that of a "disregarded
mistress".
The sharing of information was a one-way system, with the US benefiting from
UK intelligence, Ritter argued.
"Britain gets nothing, other than to say they are America's closest ally
in Europe," he said.
