Syria and the Use of Chemical Weapons

Lord James of Blackheath Excerpts

Thursday 29th August 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord James of Blackheath]

My Lords, six and a half hours ago, my noble friend the Leader stood up to launch this debate and made a series of very interesting statements, of which four stuck in my memory at that time and have haunted me through the day.

First, my noble friend said that there were 3,600 hospital cases after the attack and 350 dead, but he did not say whether the 3,600 were all injured by the same condition that killed the other 350, because it was not defined whether all the injuries were caused by chemical attack or by blast bombs. He went on to say that there had been a series of attacks of artillery and mortar fire during the hours that followed but did not give an explanation.

Then we heard, thrillingly, from the noble Lord, Lord Watson, who I thought teetered on the edge of one of the most spectacular confessions in the history of television but then fell back from it. I thought for a moment that he was going to give us the reason for the artillery attack, which was of course to keep the television cameras out while they arranged the bodies of the children for the cameras to come in. I am sure that this is what has been going on.

My noble friend the Leader went on to say that there was no substance to any allegations made against the rebels for having done the attack because there was no evidence of any weapons. If my noble friend the Leader would like to put £20 on the table, I will match it with another £20 and we will toss which one of us goes to Waitrose tomorrow and which one to Sainsbury’s, and we will come back with the entire ingredients required to make enough ricin to wipe out the entire attendance in the House of Lords today, which reached a peak of 232—very similar to the 350 who were dead. He could always keep it of course and put it away in reserve for the day when he gets tired of his job and decides to abolish the House of Lords. This is a very easy construction; there is no massive secrecy about how to make this darned stuff. In fact, an author called Felix Francis, the son of the racing novelist, Dick Francis, has written a book in which he has very helpfully published the recipe for making ricin and provided the entire cooking instructions. It is available for about £2 and any terrorist can buy a copy of it.

I was first introduced to the whole question of this self-made device by Dr David Kelly when he was assigned to me by the SIS back in April 1989 when I had to research, identify and locate the components of the Iraqi supergun, which was initially thought to be for the delivery of poison gas. Dr Kelly explained to me very helpfully that it could not have been, because the diameter of the gun required what would have amounted to a 1 tonne shell. That was far too big for the successful and efficient distribution of nerve gas, which had to come in smaller shells because it dissipates so quickly after impact.

In these cases, we open up a whole host of questions which we need to urge upon the United Nations inspectors. We really need them to get this one put down. If we have 232 people in this Chamber today, they have been contained within an area of 3,400 square feet. We have been tightly packed but comfortable. If there were 3,600 injuries, as the Leader has said, we should be looking at 10 times that space to accommodate the gathering of people who were injured. However, if there were only 350 dead, it is inconsistent with the use of nerve gas across that whole level, because the whole impact of that nerve gas would spread out and kill most of the 3,600, so there are not enough dead to make sense in the figures that were given by the Leader.

We need the United Nations to provide us with a map of where the bodies were as accurately as it can. It could start off by buying 3,600 white-headed pins and putting one pin in the map of the area to show exactly where everybody was. After that, could it then please substitute red pins for the people who were killed by nerve gas and everything else so that we finally end up being able to see what has happened? At the end of the day, my money is very firmly on the fact that the rebels did it and not Mr Assad. We should pursue this one, otherwise we are going to be the biggest Pazzis in history in falling for this, and it is wrong.