Al Gore has never been a supporter of Iraq war

By NICK TURNER*

Amid all the debate over Helen Clark's comments that if Al Gore had been United States President, he wouldn't have started the war on Iraq, the underlying facts have become seriously misrepresented and the public has been left grossly misinformed.

The Prime Minister has apologised to Washington for any offence caused. But she has not retracted her comments, and this has led to demands in Parliament by Act leader Richard Prebble, New Zealand First's Winston Peters and the National Party's Bill English that she make a second apology, admitting she was wrong in suggesting Mr Gore opposed the war.

She was not wrong at all. She was absolutely correct, and they are the ones who are wrong. Mr Gore has made crystal clear his strong opposition to the war and the rationale behind it. In fact, the recorded positions of Mr Gore and Helen Clark are virtually identical.

Mr Prebble told a political studies conference at Auckland University on April 13: "Al Gore is actually a hawk on Iraq and, as our internet search shows, he has made no statement criticising George Bush."

Act should get someone to tell it how to use internet search engines. If you use the leading search engine, Google, and enter the words "Gore Iraq", hundreds of responses come up relating to a speech in which Mr Gore scathingly attacked the Bush war policy.

Many sites give the full text of the speech and reaction to it. Typical headlines are "Gore blasts Bush on Iraq war" (USA Today) and "Gore assails Bush's Iraq policy" (Washington Post).

Act's deputy leader, Ken Shirley, actually quoted from this speech in a news release on April 8 headed, "Helen Clark wrong about Al Gore". He lifted a single sentence out of context to suggest that Mr Gore supported the Bush policy. If he had quoted the sentences immediately following, it would have been obvious that Mr Gore was condemning it.

Among key passages in Mr Gore's speech were: "I am deeply concerned that the policy we are presently following with respect to Iraq has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism."

And: "There's no international law that can prevent the United States from taking action to protect our vital interests when it is manifestly clear that there's a choice to be made between law and our survival ... I believe however that such a choice is not presented in the case of Iraq."

And: "In the immediate aftermath of September 11, more than a year ago, we had an enormous reservoir of goodwill and sympathy and shared resolve all over the world. That has been squandered in a year's time and replaced with great anxiety all around the world, not primarily about what the terrorist networks are going to do, but about what we're going to do."

And: "President Bush now asserts that we will take pre-emptive action even if the threat we perceive is not imminent. If other nations assert the same right then the rule of law will quickly be replaced by the reign of fear."

Since making that speech, Mr Gore has withdrawn as a 2004 presidential candidate and made fewer public pronouncements. But a Gore supporters' website carries a report that he told a closed symposium in Athens this month: "I would never start this war if I were President."

He apparently avoided dwelling on his opposition to the war, focusing instead on postwar reconstruction and the need for a multilateral approach.

The claims by Messrs Prebble, Shirley, Peters and English that Mr Gore supported the war have gone unchallenged for a month now.

And Helen Clark, evidently not wishing to further annoy Washington, has said only that she "meant what she said".

Earlier, when first advised of Washington's displeasure at her comments, she responded that if people were offended by statements of the obvious, they were "too sensitive".

As is now well known, those in the Bush Administration who have pushed the war policy are indeed extremely sensitive to any criticism of it, from within the US or from Canada, New Zealand or wherever.

Mr Gore himself has spoken several times of how the Administration succeeded in stifling debate about the war, aided by the American media's "relative intolerance of dissent".

The Prime Minister has nothing to apologise for regarding the accuracy of her comments about Mr Gore, or, indeed, of her statement that there were forces within the Bush Administration who had long wanted to "go after Iraq".

This also is a matter of record. Significantly, one of those longtime advocates of an American invasion happens to be Robert Zoellick, a member of the Bush cabinet and the man who will decide whether and when New Zealand is invited to negotiate a free trade agreement with the US.

* Nick Turner is a Wellington-based writer.

Herald Feature: Iraq war