LONDON — I came to know David Cornwell, who wrote as John le Carré, just after the United States and Britain removed Saddam Hussein from power. He was a neighbor; we met in our local pub in Hampstead in North London. We were introduced by a mutual friend who knew the genial white-haired gentleman in brown suede shoes. “Who was that?” I asked as we reached our own table.
Chance encounters followed, as we found common ground in our anger at the lies used to harness public support for war, the abuses of intelligence invoked to justify an invasion of Iraq. We bonded over our reaction to Colin Powell’s flawed Security Council presentation and Tony Blair’s mendacious “dodgy dossier.”
My interest was the law: Did the intelligence establish a threat to security that could justify the use of force? He was concerned with matters of morality and espionage. “I have a great distrust of lawyers,” he said, yet with an intense interest in criminality. We connected over stories about motive, and what made these people act as they did.
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