4.2 |
Iraq WMD assessments, July to September 2002
•
Although
the sanctions regime had been “targeted on goods of most
concern”,
no
sanctions regime would “be completely effective in stopping a
ruthless and
well-funded
regime getting its hands on some of the goods and
technology
needed for
a WMD programme”.57
134.
In his
press conference, Mr Blair stated that Saddam Hussein was,
“without
any
question, still trying to develop” a “chemical, biological,
potentially nuclear
capability”;
and that to allow him to do so would be
“irresponsible”.
135.
Mr Blair
announced that the “dossier” setting out the evidence of
Iraq’s
attempts to
develop its “chemical, biological and potentially nuclear
capability”
would be
published in the “next few weeks”.
136.
Mr Campbell
wrote that the hardest question to answer was “Why
now?”
137.
On 3
September, in his Sedgefield press conference, which lasted 90
minutes,
Mr Blair
stated:
“… I think
I would be right in saying that many of your questions will be on
Iraq …
I sense
that some of you believe we have taken all the key decisions but
just haven’t
got round
to telling you. That isn’t the case … We, at every level of
government,
have been
and remain in close dialogue with the United States of America
about this
issue and
where we are in absolute agreement is that Iraq poses a real and
unique
threat to
the security of the region and the rest of the world. But Saddam
Hussein
is continuing
in his efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction … We have
to
face up to
it, we have to deal with it and will. The issue is then what is the
best way
138.
A number of
questioners pointed out that public opinion had moved against
the
idea of a
strike against Iraq “partly because people feel that there hasn’t
been much
evidence …
We have heard again and again that there is a dossier of evidence
about
Saddam
Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. Why haven’t we got it up to
now and
when are we
going to see it?” Would there be any evidence in the dossier which
had
been
“gleaned in the last four years” that Saddam Hussein had “moved any
further down
the route
to nuclear weapons? There were suggestions that there was “not
going to be
much new”;
and that, in terms of public opinion, there was “a mountain to
climb”.
139.
In response to
the first question, Mr Blair replied:
“Originally
I had the intention that we wouldn’t get round to publishing the
dossier
until we’d
actually taken the key decisions. I think it is probably a better
idea to bring
that
forward.”
57
Minute Gray
to Ricketts, 3 September 2002, ‘Iraq: Containment: Query from
No.10’.
58
The
National Archives, 3 September 2002, PM press
conference [at
Sedgefield].
139