The Report of the Iraq Inquiry

Iraq’s responses. That Section also sets out, from information available in open

sources, the evolution of the JIC’s Assessments of Iraq’s capabilities between 1990

and December 1998.

6. Section 1.2 addresses the UK’s Iraq strategy between September 2000 and

September 2001.

7. The wider context of the development of UK strategy and options for Iraq after the

attacks on the US on 11 September 2001 (9/11) is addressed in Section 3, including the

judgement that Iraq was not involved in 9/11, the absence of evidence of links between

Iraq and Al Qaida (AQ), and the potential consequences of military action for the threat

to the UK and UK interests from international terrorism.

8. Aspects of the UK Government’s actions in relation to its assessment of Iraq’s

weapons of mass destruction (WMD), and the way in which intelligence information

was deployed in support of the case for urgent action to disarm Iraq, have already

been addressed by four previous Inquiries.

9. The terms of reference for each of those Inquiries, which were narrower than those

of the Iraq Inquiry, are set out below.

10. The report of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC), The

Decision to go to War in Iraq (HC 813), was published on 7 July 2003.1 It sought to

“establish whether the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), within the Government

as a whole, presented accurate and complete information to Parliament in the period

leading up to military action in Iraq, particularly in respect of weapons of mass

destruction”.

11. The report of the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC), Iraqi Weapons of Mass

Destruction – Intelligence and Assessments (Cm 5972), was published in September

2003.2 The ISC stated that it had “looked at the supporting intelligence in critical areas to

ensure that the [JIC] Assessments reflected the intelligence correctly”.

12. The Report of the Inquiry into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of

Dr David L Kelly CMG by Lord Hutton (The Hutton Inquiry, HC 247), was published on

28 January 2004.3

1 Report from the Foreign Affairs Committee, Session 2002-2003, The Decision to go to War in Iraq,

HC 813.

2 Intelligence and Security Committee, Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction – Intelligence and

Assessments, September 2003, Cm 5972.

3 Report of the Inquiry into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of Dr David L Kelly CMG by Lord

Hutton [“The Hutton Inquiry”], 28 January 2004, HC 247.

2