The toughest three words in the language are “I am sorry” not so much to say them but to mean them.
Former Prime Minister Blair has finally managed to spit them out about Iraq…or has he?
This belated, 12-year delayed, apology is unlikely to offer any comfort to the relatives of the war dead.
Firstly, his words were heavily caveated.
After reading the transcript of Blair’s weekend interview it seems that he apologises not for his part in the war but for the faulty intelligence and the failure to plan for the aftermath of the conflict.
In other words he has apologised for everyone else’s mistakes but significantly not for his own!
Secondly, he makes the apology not to the official Chilcot Inquiry, not directly to bereaved families and not even in this country but on an American TV show.
Thirdly, the nature and the timing tends to lead to the suspicion that the old faker is at it again.
After all these long years in denial, this belated change of tack suggests that something else is afoot.
If, for example, he were about to be heavily criticised by Chilcot then what better gambit would there be than to get this half-hearted “apology” in first?
That is what this master of media management would do and thus what many commentators anticipate is the key Blair motivation.
Unlike the grieving families of the 179 dead British soldiers, Blair already knows what Chilcot has said about him because he has been sent these passages by Chilcot for his response.
All of this raises the stakes on Chilcot. Could it be that we are eventually going to see an inquiry which actually holds someone responsible?
And if Blair were held responsible then do criminal proceedings for engaging in an illegal conflict reemerge as a real possibility?