Executive
Summary
•
There are
lessons which should be implemented in using information
from
JIC Assessments
to underpin policy decisions.
808.
The following
key findings are from Section 4.3:
•
The
ingrained belief already described in this Section underpinned the
UK
Government’s
position that Iraq was a threat that had to be dealt with and
it
needed to
disarm or be disarmed. That remained the case up to and
beyond
the decision
to invade Iraq in March 2003.
•
The
judgements about Iraq’s capabilities and intentions relied too
heavily on
Iraq’s past
behaviour being a reliable indicator of its current and future
actions.
•
There was
no consideration of whether, faced with the prospect of a
US‑led
invasion,
Saddam Hussein had taken a different position.
•
The JIC
made the judgements in the UK Government September dossier
part
of the
test for Iraq.
•
Iraq’s
statements that it had no weapons or programmes were dismissed
as
further
evidence of a strategy of denial.
•
The extent
to which the JIC’s judgements depended on inference
and
interpretation
of Iraq’s previous attitudes and behaviour was not
recognised.
•
At no stage
was the hypothesis that Iraq might no longer have
chemical,
biological
or nuclear weapons or programmes identified and examined by
either
the JIC or
the policy community.
•
A formal
reassessment of the JIC’s judgements should have taken place
after
Dr Blix’s
report to the Security Council on 14 February 2003 or, at the very
latest,
after his
report of 7 March.
•
Intelligence
and assessments made by the JIC about Iraq’s capabilities
and
intent
continued to be used to prepare briefing material to support
Government
statements
in a way which conveyed certainty without acknowledging
the
limitations
of the intelligence.
•
The
independence and impartiality of the JIC remains of the utmost
importance.
•
SIS had a
responsibility to ensure that key recipients of its reporting
were
informed in
a timely way when doubts arose about key sources and
when,
subsequently,
intelligence was withdrawn.
809.
The following
key findings are from Section 4.4:
•
The search
for evidence of WMD in Iraq was started during the
military
campaign by
Exploitation Task Force‑75 and was carried forward
from
June 2003
by the Iraq Survey Group (ISG). The UK participated in
both.
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