UK Spy Chiefs 'Retract WMD Intelligence'

Blair's Iraq evidence 'confusing'
Blair's Iraq evidence 'confusing'

Two former intelligence officers have cast doubts over Tony Blair's use of evidence in the run-up to war in Iraq. The questions come as the government prepares for the Butler report into how intelligence on Iraq was handled.

Dr Brian Jones, a retired top Defence Intelligence Staff (DIS) official, told BBC's Panorama he was "confused" by Mr Blair's evidence in the Hutton Inquiry.

John Morrison, the former deputy chief of DIS, said Mr Blair's claims on Iraqi WMD were met by disbelief in Whitehall.

No-one on my staff had any visibility of large quantities of intelligence of that sort
Dr Brian Jones
Former DIS branch head

Dr Jones said he "couldn't relate" to the prime minister's evidence to Lord Hutton on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Mr Blair told the inquiry there was "a tremendous amount of information and evidence coming across my desk as to the WMD and programmes associated with it that Saddam had".

But Dr Jones, a critic of the government's Iraq dossier, told Panorama: "Certainly no-one on my staff had any visibility of large quantities of intelligence of that sort."

He said that no-one knew what chemical or biological agents had been produced since the first Gulf War in 1991.

'Collective raspberry'

He told the programme there was no certainty among intelligence staff that agents had been stockpiled.

The prime minister was going way beyond anything any professional analyst would have agreed
John Morrison
Former deputy chief of DIS

"There was a reasonable assumption that there may have been some stocks left over from the first Gulf War," Dr Jones said.
"If there had been any other production, then we have not identified that it had taken place."

Dr Jones told the Hutton Inquiry the dossier on Iraq was misleading because advice from DIS experts had been over-ruled by the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) which drafted it.

Mr Morrison told Panorama he could "almost hear the collective raspberry going up around Whitehall" when the prime minister told MPs the threat from Iraq was serious and current.

He accused Mr Blair of making public statements which went beyond what experts could have reasonably concluded from the same evidence.

"In moving from what the dossier said Saddam had, which was a capability possibly, to asserting that Iraq presented a threat, then the prime minister was going way beyond anything any professional analyst would have agreed," he said.

Mr Morrison also told the programme analysts had come under pressure after Operation Desert Fox, a bombing campaign carried out against Iraq in 1998.


He said analysts had felt pressured to back claims that targets actively involved in WMD production had been hit in the strikes - even if they were not sure that was the case.

Mr Morrison said: "I am sure Number 10 wanted it [Desert Fox] to be a success and I am sure the MoD wanted it to be a success.

"But wanting doesn't make it so... after Desert Fox I actually sent a note round to all the analysts involved congratulating them on standing firm, in the case, in some cases of individual pressure to say things that weren't true... in the sense that they didn't know whether they were true or not."

Panorama also claimed that John Scarlett, chair of the JIC, was warned a month after the dossier's publication that the intelligence was not strong enough to back the presentation of some of its claims.

Mr Scarlett may be among the intelligence bosses named when Lord Butler publishes his report next Wednesday.

Panorama: A failure of intelligence will be broadcast on BBC One at 2215 BST on Sunday.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/3883393.stm

Published: 2004/07/11 00:11:57 GMT

Tony Blair 'will stay on as PM'
Tony Blair 'will stay on as PM'

Colleagues of Tony Blair have insisted he will stay on as prime minister despite indications that he considered stepping down last month.
On Saturday morning, the BBC learned that four cabinet ministers were so concerned he may quit that they personally urged him to stay.

Downing Street has pointed to recent remarks made by Mr Blair when he said he was "absolutely up for" staying on. And one of the ministers, Tessa Jowell, says she is confident he will carry on.

Support

It is thought that, in separate meetings, Ms Jowell, John Reid and Charles Clarke assured Mr Blair he had wide government support, while Patricia Hewitt wrote to the PM. Their intervention came at a time of poor poll ratings, increased violence in Iraq and Labour's dire performance in local elections.

The Sunday Telegraph reports that Cherie Blair played a critical role in persuading her husband to continue. She told him that he should not step down at a time chosen by Gordon Brown, it reports. An unnamed Blair ally is quoted as saying: "Cherie was not going to allow Gordon to take over this early. She can't stand him."

The paper says Lord Falconer, the lord chancellor, also played a key role in persuading Mr Blair to remain in office.

'No deal'

BBC political editor Andrew Marr said that "underlying tensions in the cabinet are now as bad as at any stage in recent years". Mr Blair decided to stay on and he is now in steely mood BBC correspondent Andrew Marr.

Cabinet gossip was now of a deal between Mr Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown last November involving the prime minister handing over "around about now". But the prime minister had told friends this was "absolute rubbish", Mr Marr said. Mr Blair had come through "something of a long night of the soul about whether to carry on" but was now "in steely mood".

But it was also a crucial time for Mr Brown. This July may mark his last real chance to control the timing of any succession and to win a general election in his own name. The "tug of love" between Mr Brown and Mr Blair was now "fragile, angry and not entirely stable", Marr added.

'Ministerial business'

Tessa Jowell insisted on Saturday that the prime minister was not about to step down.

LEADERSHIP IN CRISIS?

16 May - Cabinet ministers are speculating about the PM's future, Mr Prescott says

29 May - Mr Prescott suggests that Mr Blair could step down mid-term "like Harold Wilson"

3 June - In a TV interview, Mr Blair refuses to endorse Mr Brown as the next PM

20 June - Mr Brown denies the PM is a "liability" for Labour after poor local election results

2 July - Mr Blunkett warns that senior ministers should not covet other people's jobs

7 July - Mr Blair admits the odd row with Mr Brown but says the media magnifies them

10 July - The BBC learns that the PM was considering resignation in June

But she refused to discuss reports that she had urged him to stay on.
She told BBC Radio 5 Live: "I don't think that Tony Blair has at any time indicated he is on the brink of resigning." She said she would not talk about conversations she had "in the normal course of ministerial business" because "that is what you would expect between cabinet ministers and the prime minister". She said Mr Blair's launch of a plan for health to cut waiting times showed this was "not a prime minister on the point of giving up". "The prime minister has the support of his cabinet behind him in what he is doing", she added.

A Downing Street spokesman said on Saturday that Mr Blair had always insisted he would fight the next election as Labour leader. Last month, the prime minister said he was "absolutely up for" the next general election. "You have got to have the support of the people and that's decided in an election", he said.

'Intelligence limitations'

The PM next week faces the publication of the Butler report into intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. The findings will be published on Wednesday, on the eve of key by-elections for Labour in Birmingham Hodge Hill and Leicester South. This is not a prime minister who is on the point of giving up I can tell you.

Tessa Jowell MP

The report will highlight the "limitations" of intelligence on Iraq, according to a member of the inquiry team Tory MP Michael Mates. It is also expected to criticise John Scarlett, who takes over as head of MI6 in August and who drew up the government's Iraq weapons dossier as chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC). Mr Blair has been criticised for appointing Mr Scarlett to head MI6 before seeing the Butler report's conclusions.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/3882077.stm

Published: 2004/07/10 22:35:32 GMT