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3.6  |  Development of UK strategy and options, November 2002 to January 2003
indicate that Iraq has no intention of full co‑operation … We need to encourage
UNMOVIC to keep careful data to establish whether there is a pattern of Iraqi
behaviour indicating they have no intention of complying”.
It would be important to keep the Security Council united, but that would
“not be easy”.
266.  Cabinet on 12 December was told that the Security Council had decided that Iraq’s
declaration had to be scrutinised before it was made available to a wider audience to
ensure that particularly sensitive information had been excised.84 An initial discussion
of the declaration was expected the following week.
267.  Mr Peter Gooderham, Political Counsellor in the British Embassy Washington,
reported on 12 December that a US official had told him that he expected the US
Administration to decide “probably sometime in mid‑January, to lay it on the line that Iraq
had ‘one last chance’ to co‑operate”.85 This would be accompanied by “an increasingly
overt military build up from early January”. Additional measures for putting pressure
on Saddam Hussein were also being considered. The US Administration was also
considering a public presentation of the evidence against Iraq.
268.  The letter was seen by Sir David Manning.86
269.  Mr Julian Miller, Chief of the Assessments Staff, advised Sir David Manning on
13 December that the Iraqi declaration was “largely based on material already presented
to the UN”, and that:
“There appears to have been no attempt to answer any of the unresolved questions
highlighted by UNSCOM or refute any of the points made in the UK or US
dossiers.”87
270.  The absence of new material was described as “striking, particularly in relation
to the biological weapons programme, where UNSCOM have described previous Iraqi
FFCDs as deficient in all areas”. The DIS had also clarified that Iraq had “only previously
admitted to testing VX in aerial munitions, not to any other weaponisation”.
JIC ASSESSMENT, 13 DECEMBER 2002
271.  A JIC Assessment issued on 13 December warned that any US‑led action
against Iraq and a subsequent occupation was one of many issues that could
draw large numbers to Islamist extremist ideology over the next five years.
272.  The Assessment is addressed in the Box below.
84  Cabinet Conclusions, 12 December 2002.
85  Letter Gooderham to Oakden, 12 December 2002, ‘Iraq: How Imminent is War?’
86  Manuscript comment Manning, 17 December 2002, on Letter Gooderham to Oakden,
12 December 2002, ‘Iraq: How Imminent is War?’
87  Minute Miller to Manning, 13 December 2002, ‘Iraq: WMD Declaration’.
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