Dear David,

I was wrong about Iraq. Though undeviatingly opposed to the invasion I believed it might succeed within its own terms. In February 2003 I wrote in The Times:-

“I am not afraid that this war will fail. I am afraid it will succeed. I am afraid it will prove the first in an indefinite series of American interventions. I am afraid it is the beginning of a new empire that I am afraid Britain may have little choice but to join.”

Later, in 2005, your defence of the war in The Times was anchored in your claim that in that column I had said that “I'm against war because it will antagonise moderate Arab opinion.” I had said the opposite: that such a view was wrongheaded.

An honest misreading, no doubt; not least among the collateral damage caused by this conflict has been a media rancour born of intense feeling on both sides.

But of all the horrors that have unfolded since, one that seemed to me possible has not come to pass. American hegemonism struck me as capable of stabilising the region for a while, while finally destabilising international order. Instead, in failing to stabilise the region, America itself has been knocked right off balance. The region, meanwhile, is in a greater mess than ever.

Nobody — surely not even you in your own innermost thoughts, David — can really think this has been a success. In both practical and propaganda terms the strategy now is a damage-limitation exercise.

Oddly enough, I doubt it is the Iraqi people who suffered the greatest avoidable damage. Iraq was just an artificial state and a toxic mess, beyond our capabilities to cure.

We bobbed uncomprehending on the angry surface of currents we had not created, but only unleashed. History would have done so later, anyway.

The damage we did ourselves, however, was avoidable. The casualties have been heartbreaking. Domestic trust in our political class has haemorrhaged. Good faith has been questioned. A premiership has been ruined. Billions have been squandered. Our Armed Forces have been put on the rack in an unpopular war. Afghanistan has been neglected. European relations have been soured.

Britain's credit in the Middle East has been spent. Our American ally has overreached and discredited itself.

And — and this you bloody well know, David — al-Qaeda, which at the start had little to do with Iraq, have been enabled to take root among Muslims everywhere, including Britain. The dishonesty of conflating Islamic fundamentalism with the Iraqi conflict, and the dishonesty of Blair's pitch on WMD, still make my blood boil.

I thought they did yours, too, David. On February 2, 2003, you wrote (in The Observer) “I don't believe Saddam is a major backer of al-Qaeda.”

Ten weeks later, in The Guardian, you wrote: “If nothing is eventually found, I — as a supporter of the war — will never believe another thing that I am told by our Government, or that of the US ever again. And, more to the point, neither will anyone else. Those weapons had better be there somewhere.”

What happened to your argument?

Yours sincerely,

Matthew

Times Recommends

• Should Knox’s trial even have reached the courtroom?
• 'Was it real?' The US bailout nightmare
• Iranian opposition plays the long game