1.1 | UK
Iraq strategy 1990 to 2000
intelligence
about production at individual plants, pieced together to provide a
figure for
the
combined capacity for Iraq’s production plants of 3,000-5,000
tonnes per annum”.49
The
estimate was based on two years’ production at full capacity since
the end of
the Iran-Iraq
War, and the range reflected the inherent uncertainties in the
calculation.
126.
The Butler
Report stated that:
•
the
consequence of the methodology adopted was “to leave the
intelligence
community
with an estimate for the size of the Iraqi chemical agent
stockpile
which was
over-cautious, and at its upper end worst case”; and
•
the
estimate was carried forward into subsequent Assessments but, after
May
1991, the
Assessments did not make clear the basis of the
estimate.
127.
The Report
continued:
“There will
inevitably have been a risk that that estimate, shorn of its
assumptions,
may have
become the ‘prevailing wisdom’, with subsequent Iraqi declarations
being
tested
against it for truthfulness, especially in circumstances where
intelligence was
sparse. If
so, that process would have tended to lead to deductions by
analysts
and
policy-makers that there were shortfalls in Iraqi declarations.
Furthermore,
suspicions
here will have been exacerbated by Iraqi prevarication,
concealment
and
deception in the early- and mid-1990s, reinforcing any suspicions
that Iraq had
substantial
stocks to hide.”
128.
Iraq
“consistently and emphatically denied that it had undertaken any
proscribed
biological
warfare related activity”.50
129.
In May 1991,
the JIC stated that, while it could not “be precise”, it was
“confident”
that Iraq
had “substantially under-reported the numbers of
missiles”.51
130.
The UN
Security Council adopted resolution 699 (1991) approving the plans
for
UNSCOM and
IAEA inspections on 17 June 1991.52
131.
In July,
UNSCOM supervised the destruction of 48 operational
missiles,
14
conventional warheads, six operational mobile launchers and other
equipment
49
Review of
Intelligence on Weapons of Mass Destruction [“The
Butler Report”], 14 July 2004, HC 898,
page
46.
50
UN Security
Council, 11 October 1996, ‘Report of the Secretary-General on
the activities of the Special
Commission
established by the Secretary-General pursuant to paragraph 9 (b)
(i) of resolution 687 (1991)’
(S/1996/848).
51
Review of
Intelligence on Weapons of Mass Destruction [“The
Butler Report”], 14 July 2004, HC 898,
page
50.
52
UN Security
Council resolution 699 (1991).
53
UN Security
Council, 11 October 1996, ‘Report of the Secretary-General on
the activities of the Special
Commission
established by the Secretary-General pursuant to paragraph 9 (b)
(i) of resolution 687 (1991)’
(S/1996/848).
47