UK Diplomats Advised Regarding Military Action to Topple Robert Mugabe

Recently released documents reveal that the Foreign Office cautioned against British military intervention to remove the former Zimbabwean president, the long-serving leader, in 2004, stating it was not considered a "serious option".

Policy Papers Show Deliberations on Handling a "Depressingly Healthy" Dictator

Policy papers from the then Prime Minister's government show officials weighed up options on how best to handle the "depressingly healthy" 80-year-old leader, who refused to step down as the country descended into turmoil and financial collapse.

Following Mugabe's Zanu-PF party winning a 2005 election, and a year after the UK participated in a US-led coalition to overthrow Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, No 10 asked the Foreign Office in July 2004 to develop potential courses of action.

Policy of Isolation Deemed Ineffective

Officials agreed that the UK's policy of isolating Mugabe and building an international agreement for change was failing, having failed to secure support from key African nations, notably the then South African president, Thabo Mbeki.

Courses considered in the documents were:

• "Seek to remove Mugabe by military means";
• "Go for tougher UK measures" such as seizing finances and shuttering the UK embassy; or
• "Re-engage", the approach supported by the then outgoing ambassador to Zimbabwe.

"Our experience shows from conflicts abroad that altering a government and/or its harmful policies is exceedingly difficult from the outside."

The FCO paper dismissed military action as not a "serious option," and warned that "The only nation for leading such a military operation is the UK. No one else (even the US) would be willing to do so".

Cautionary Notes of Heavy Casualties and Legal Hurdles

It warned that military intervention would cause significant losses and have "serious consequences" for UK nationals in Zimbabwe.

"Short of a major humanitarian and political catastrophe – resulting in massive violence, large-scale refugee flows, and regional instability – we judge that no African state would support any efforts to remove Mugabe forcibly."

The document continues: "Nor do we judge that any other European, Commonwealth or western partner (including the US) would sanction or join military intervention. And there would be no legal grounds for doing so, without an approving Security Council Resolution, which we would fail to obtain."

Playing the Longer Game Advocated

Blair's foreign policy adviser, a senior official, advised Blair that Zimbabwe "could become a real spoiler" to his plan to use the UK's presidency of the G8 to make 2005 "a pivotal year for Africa". Lee concluded that as military action had been ruled out, "we probably have to accept that we must play the longer game" and re-engage with Mugabe.

Blair appeared to agree, writing: "We must devise a way of exposing the falsehoods and misconduct of Mugabe and Zanu-PF ahead of this election and then afterwards, we could try to re-engage on the basis of a clear understanding."

The then outgoing ambassador, in his final diplomatic dispatch, had recommended critical re-engagement with Mugabe, though he recognized the Prime Minister "would likely be appalled given all that Mugabe has uttered and perpetrated".

Robert Mugabe was ultimately removed in a military takeover in 2017, aged 93. Earlier assertions that in the early 2000s Blair had tried to pressure Thabo Mbeki into joining a armed alliance to overthrow Mugabe were strongly denied by the ex-British leader.