SMH, Paola Totaro, 2009 November 30

London: A ‘smoking gun’ memo warning Tony Blair of the illegality of a military invasion of Iraq was written eight months before the war and has been handed to the Chilcot inquiry.

The controversial letter, from the former attorney-general Lord Goldsmith, was written in July 2002 and warned Mr Blair in the starkest terms that using force to depose Saddam Hussein's regime breached international law.

The Mail on Sunday has reported that the memo, which Mr Blair is alleged to have covered up, was provided to the inquiry in a collection of documents from the Attorney-General's department. It is now expected Mr Blair will be interrogated about the timing and wording of the advice when he is called to give evidence early next year. Lord Goldsmith was reported to have lost 19 kilograms in the months after his advice was rejected and denied by Mr Blair. He apparently threatened to resign but his family talked him out of it.

He gave qualified legal backing to the military action days before the conflict began in March 2003 but had provided his original advice on July 23, 2002 after a cabinet meeting in which British ministers were informed that the United States and Britain had embarked on a course for a change of regime in Iraq.

The existence of the letter contradicts Mr Blair's stand on the war's legality during and after it. In 2005, appearing on a flagship BBC TV program with the journalist Jeremy Paxman, Mr Blair was asked over and over again if he had seen confidential Foreign Office advice that the war would be illegal without specific United Nations support.
He responded: ''No. I had the Attorney-General's advice to guide me.''

The Mail reports that Lord Goldsmith, who attended that cabinet meeting, was "horrified" by the news and on July 29 wrote another letter to Mr Blair. As a close friend of the former prime minister, he headed it ''Dear Tony'' and signed it by hand ''Yours Peter''. In this letter, which later became public and infuriated Mr Blair, he gave a compelling and stark case for believing the war to be illegal under international law, including that he did not believe it could be justified as a means to "regime change".

He also argued that while the UN allows ''military intervention on the basis of self-defence'' this did not apply because Britain was not under threat from Iraq. Nor did UN rules that allowed intervention under cases of humanitarian breaches apply to the Iraq scenario.

Months later, Lord Goldsmith attended cabinet meetings only when asked specifically to do so. The Mail reports sources close to him have confirmed he is ready to defend his original letter and legal advice and feels confident he will be vindicated for his role in the months before the conflict.