Tony Blair had to persuade George Bush to tackle the Taliban before attacking Iraq in the weeks after September 11, the former British Ambassador to America said today.
The United States President came under pressure from hawks within his administration to topple Saddam Hussein in the first crisis meeting at Camp David after the 2001 terror strikes in New York and Washington.
But Sir Christopher Meyer said that when the Prime Minister met Mr Bush in the Oval Office a few days later he urged him to hit al Qaida and Afghanistan's Taliban regime first.
"Tony Blair's view was, 'whatever you're going to do about Iraq, you should concentrate on the job at hand and the job at hand was get al Qaida, give the Taliban an ultimatum'."
After listening to the appeal, the President took Mr Blair aside and promised he would keep Iraq "for another day," Sir Christopher, who recently left his post in Washington, told a documentary to be shown on America's PBS network tonight.
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