The Report of the Iraq Inquiry

360. The official also commented that the draft was “a substantial improvement” and

suggested adding a number of points, including:

• “Something showing the elaborate Iraqi apparatus of concealment would

demonstrate to just what lengths this government is going to keep its hands

on WMD”.

• It “would be desirable to give more detail of dodgy procurements … We need

to show the lengths Iraq has been willing to go to get its hands on WMD

components”.

• Explaining why Iraq’s unilateral destruction of WMD was of such concern,

“ie it allowed Iraq to obscure its WMD stocks and capabilities, eg by claiming

to have destroyed more items than was actually the case”.

In the first section of his speech to the Trades Union Congress (TUC) on 10 September,

Mr Blair set out the rationale for tackling the problem of Iraq – “why I say Saddam is a

threat that has to be dealt with”.171

Mr Blair stated that “when the weapons inspectors were evicted from Iraq in 1998 there

were still enough chemical and biological weapons remaining to devastate the entire

Gulf region”. He also stated that Saddam Hussein had a nuclear programme, which

he had denied and which had been “disrupted” by inspections. He was in breach of

“23 outstanding UN obligations requiring him to admit inspectors and disarm”.

361. The Assessments Staff reported that No.10 was understood to want the

dossier to be as strong as possible within the available intelligence, subject

to it being owned by the Joint Intelligence Committee.

362. On 11 September, Mr Blair wrote to the Speaker of the House of Commons, and

to the Lord Chancellor, asking for Parliament to be recalled in the week beginning

23 September (see Section 3.4).172 Mr Blair wrote:

“By then, important discussions at the UN will have taken place. And the

Government will be in a position to publish the dossier on what we know of the Iraqi

regime and its WMD programme.”

171 The Guardian, 10 September 2002, Full text of Tony Blair’s TUC address.

172 Letter Blair to Martin, 11 September 2002, [untitled].

182