As the British army begins its offensive in Helmand province in Afghanistan and the Govenment warns of increasing casualties, I can't help but recall the astoundingly twp comments of Merthyr MP Dai Havard ( who actually spends more time out there than in this constituency) that 'it is not a war'. How many aid workers help a suffering country with  bombs and guns? One die-hard fact, Dai Havard : there were civilian casualties of over 2000 in the first 10 months of last year.

   The madness of the world continues, with both Obama and Brown believing they can defeat terror by fuelling it, as they support a corrupt regime.

   Yet, the revelation of the week has almost gone unnoticed. I sat down to watch Andrew Neill's 'Straight Talk' interview with Plaid Cymru MP Elfyn Llwyd last night in the hope that broadcast media had latched onto it, but the programme was aborted by breaking news from the States about a gas explosion.

   Elfyn Llwyd,a sober lawyer not a fantasist, has insisted that he should be called before the Chilcot Inquiry (in private, if necessary) because he has seen a confidential memo proving that Bush and Blair came to a secret agreement at the then President's ranch in Texas in April 2002.

   Llwyd has stated - ' the deal was struck, incontrovertibly'. Of course, this means (surprise,surprise) that Blair lied to the Chilcot Inquiry and that, as many suspected, the actual decision to go to war was made between these two men and had nothing to do with Cabinet or Parliament. In a week when there has been so much hysteria about MP's expenses, surely we should take things into perspective and demand as well, a proper trial for Blair and Bush, to hold them responsible for so much death and destruction?

   Chilcot has yet to call MP Llwyd and has also neglected to call that other vital player, Hans Blix, whose recommendations to Blair about the distinct lack of WMD would be crucial evidence. Blix recently expressed amazement that he wasn't giving his account. As George Galloway said on Question Time last week, the reason for invading was in fact the lack of WMD. If they had existed, the invasion wouldn't have happened and he cited North Korea as a case in point.

   The one topic not introduced has been the importance of oil. The whole motivation behind regime change was the need to secure the vast and profitable Iraqi oil-fields under the control of Western companies. There's a
great song by Texan singer-songwriter James McMurtry called 'God Bless America' which rails against US economic imperialism in a bitter, bluesy way . His image of 'sucking up the oil through the barrel of a gun' is especially evocative.

   Like Elfyn Llwyd's revelation, the news from Iraq itself seems to be sidelined from television. Blair, in all his smug self-righteousness, can claim that Iraq is so much better without Saddam Hussein and not be questioned. Yet, this year alone over a hundred people have died as a result of suicide bombings. Before the invasion, there was no Al Qaeda in Iraq. The war has managed to divide that country to an even greater extent, creating Sunni fanatics and an Islamic fundamentalism which hardly existed before. There is no doubting Saddam's dictatorship, but in overthrowing his regime methods were used which were remarkably similar to those he deployed.

   This poem came from reading the account of Omar Deghayes who was arrested in Pakistan because he had lived previously in Afghanistan (working as a businessman). He was tortured by the US secret service, with the British equivalent in attendance and spent six years in Guantanamo Bay, where no evidence was produced to suggest his guilt and where he lost the sight of one eye when a guard tried to gouge out both his eyes. He was eventually released and now lives near Brighton. Despite his promise, Obama has yet to shut down Guantanamo. The title is taken from Omar's own words.

                                         'I AM A NUMBER'

                                                  1.
I know
through the blur
one moon, one star -
I am a number

too many zeros in this world -
the black hole
of my left socket

not the number
they knew me by,
those guards and bolt-hole
mouths spraying pepper

but a number recurring -
one I insist on,
the horizon of clifflines

a number they wanted to gouge out -
I struggled to count
as my eyes turned liquid    turned blood.

                                                  2.

when I saw the landscape
of my face
what they had done to it

it was both east and west -
the starved desert of cheeks,
dead pit of one eye-ball

my nose a broken Tower of Babel -
even the wrinkles were treads
of boots of soldiers invading

when I saw this place
I knew I'd  fought with hands and feet -
battlefield where I return at night

and now, the salty breeze
can soothe these spoil heaps,
the history of my skin

but I won't rest as they defile others -
precious countries from the southern foothills
to headlands of the north.