Officials tell inquiry Iraq and al-Qaeda 'not allies'

Tbe BBC report into the second of the public enquiry summarised below with the key quotes. Original article is here

news.bbc.co.uk...

The UK investigated claims of links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda but decided they were not "natural allies", the Iraq inquiry has been told. Despite "sporadic" contacts between al-Qaeda members and Iraq in the 1990s, there was no "serious collaboration", Foreign Office officials said.

They also said it was a "surprise" that no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were found in Iraq after the invasion. "It was not what we had expected" said ex-defence director Sir William Ehrman. Asked to explain the absence of WMD and why the UK government had got this wrong, Sir William noted a "great deal" of the intelligence about Iraq's chemical and biological weapons production provided before the war had been withdrawn afterwards as false. He also said the situation had been complicated by Saddam Hussein not wanting to reveal the true state of his weapons arsenal for fear of showing himself "quite so weak" to Iran.

The reasons for going to war in Iraq - including the now discredited claim that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction which could be used within 45 minutes of an order being given - are a long-standing source of controversy.

Sir William Ehrman, the Foreign Office's director general for defence and intelligence between 2002 and 2004, said it had discussed the issue with Washington which had put "more weight" on the claims. But he said: "Our view was that there was no evidence to suggest serious collaboration of any sort between Iraq and al-Qaeda."

Addressing the overall threat posed by Iraq in 2001, the Foreign Office said it was "not top of its list" of countries causing concern because of their stated desire to develop weapons of mass destruction, ranking below Iran, North Korea and Libya.

As for biological and chemical weapons, Mr Dowse said most evidence suggested Iraq's programme had largely been "destroyed" in 1991.

However, he said recent intelligence had suggested Iraq was seeking to rebuild its capacity and there were "unanswered questions" about its actual capability since weapons inspectors had been expelled in 1998.

Weapons inspectors entered 10 out of 19 Iraqi sites under suspicion of concealing WMD in the weeks before the invasion, Sir William said. He told the inquiry they uncovered illegal materials, documents and weapons components at four of these sites although none proving the existence of an active WMD programme.

Essentially the majority of the evidence, that incidentally contradicted the Foreign Offices' impression of Iraq, put forth to justify the war has now been deemed "false". With Washington pushing these claims in the halls of power in Britain, claims which are now midly put "discredited", it evokes serious questions of the competence of those in government at that time to seek and justify a war based on the fears of terrorism whereas its own intelligence agencies advised them that Britain would become more of a target in retaliation.

Former CIA Director George Tenet revealed some years ago that the Bush administration was pushing for a case of war to be made despite his personal doubts on the legality of it. Despite all of this, it was revealed recently that none of the top brass in the UK government would be convicted guilty of deceit or war crimes based on this information.

[edit on 25-11-2009 by Shino]