On Thu, 5 Feb 2004 10:45:32 -0000, "IMM" wrote:


"Julian Fowler" wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 5 Feb 2004 09:22:46 -0000, "IMM" wrote:


BTW, and the 45 minutes was only for battlefield weapons.

A fact that the Prime Minister has stated *he did not know* at the
time he spoke to the HoC about the need for military action in Iraq,
and that he therefore was justifying military action - in part - on an
understanding that Iraq possessed *strategic* WMDs with 45 minute
readiness.

Sounds like an intelligence cock up. Nevertheless a trivial point. They
could have WMD within days. Kelly said so.

I don't know why I bother ... however: the UK was taken to war on a
justification based on Iraq's possession of WMDs and their readiness
to use them. Two senior government ministers have stated that they
know that the "15 minute" claim applied to battlefield weapons (which
fortunately was untrue, given the state of unreadiness of the UK
troops sent into Iraq), and not to strategic weapons. Clearly they
(Hoon and Cook) were aware of the details of intelligence reports - so
hardly an "intelligence cock up" from the persepctive of availability
to government. The PM has stated that *he* did not know this. Hardly
a "trivial point" -- *why* did he not know this? Was he not told?
Did his "advisors" conceal this, or neglect to highlight the
distinction? Was he under such stress that he did have the
information but did not understand it?

The assertion that Iraq's WMDs were of clear and present danger to
*other countries*, especially to Israel and to US-controlled oil
interests in the Gulf, was *crucial* to the argument in favour of
unilaterial military action against Iraq. If the British Prime
Minister was under the impression that intelligence related to
tactical battlefield weapons also applied to strategic capabilities,
*when this was clearly being separated in the intelligence analyses*
then his judgement must be called into question.

Julian

--
Julian Fowler
julian (at) bellevue-barn (dot) org (dot) uk