UK Diplomats Advised Regarding Military Action to Overthrow Robert Mugabe

Recently released documents reveal that the UK's diplomatic corps advised against British military intervention to overthrow the former Zimbabwean president, the long-serving leader, in 2004, stating it was not considered a "serious option".

Government Documents Show Deliberations on Handling a "Depressingly Healthy" Leader

Policy papers from the then Prime Minister's government indicate officials considered options on how best to deal with the "remarkably robust" 80-year-old dictator, who declined to leave office as the country fell into violence and economic chaos.

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

Isolation Strategy Considered Not Working

Diplomats concluded that the UK's strategy to isolate Mugabe and forging an international agreement for change was not working, having failed to secure support from key African nations, notably the then South African president, the South African leader.

Options outlined in the documents included:

• "Seek to remove Mugabe by force";
• "Implement tougher UK measures" such as freezing assets and shuttering the UK embassy; or
• "Re-engage", the approach advocated by the then departing ambassador to Zimbabwe.

"We know from conflicts abroad that altering a government and/or its bad policies is exceedingly difficult from the outside."

The FCO paper rejected military action as not a "serious option," and warned that "The only candidate for leading such a military operation is the UK. No other country (even the US) would be prepared to do so".

Cautionary Notes of Significant Losses and Legal Hurdles

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

"Short of a major humanitarian and political catastrophe – resulting in widespread bloodshed, significant exodus of refugees, and regional instability – we judge that no African state would agree to any efforts to remove Mugabe forcibly."

The document adds: "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 jurisdictional basis for doing so, without an authorising Security Council Resolution, which we would not get."

Long-Term Strategy Advocated

Blair's foreign policy adviser, a senior official, warned him that Zimbabwe "will be a significant obstacle" to his plan to use the UK's leadership of the G8 to make 2005 "a pivotal year for Africa". Lee concluded that as military action had been discounted, "it is likely necessary that we must play the longer game" and re-open talks with Mugabe.

Blair seemed to concur, noting: "We must devise a way of exposing the lies and malpractice of Mugabe and Zanu-PF ahead of this election and then subsequently, we could attempt to restart dialogue on the basis of a clear understanding."

The departing ambassador, in his valedictory telegram, had advocated critical re-engagement with Mugabe, though he understood the Prime Minister "might shudder at the thought given all that Mugabe has said and done".

Robert Mugabe was finally deposed in a military takeover in 2017, at the age of 93. Earlier assertions that in the early 2000s Blair had tried to pressurise the South African president into joining a military coalition to overthrow Mugabe were vehemently rejected by the ex-British leader.