Executive Summary
- There are lessons which should be implemented in using information from JIC Assessments to underpin policy decisions.
Iraq WMD assessments, October 2002 to March 2003
808. The following key findings are from Section 4.3:
- The ingrained belief already described in this Section underpinned the UK Government’s position that Iraq was a threat that had to be dealt with and it needed to disarm or be disarmed. That remained the case up to and beyond the decision to invade Iraq in March 2003.
- The judgements about Iraq’s capabilities and intentions relied too heavily on Iraq’s past behaviour being a reliable indicator of its current and future actions.
- There was no consideration of whether, faced with the prospect of a US‑led invasion, Saddam Hussein had taken a different position.
- The JIC made the judgements in the UK Government September dossier part of the test for Iraq.
- Iraq’s statements that it had no weapons or programmes were dismissed as further evidence of a strategy of denial.
- The extent to which the JIC’s judgements depended on inference and interpretation of Iraq’s previous attitudes and behaviour was not recognised.
- At no stage was the hypothesis that Iraq might no longer have chemical, biological or nuclear weapons or programmes identified and examined by either the JIC or the policy community.
- A formal reassessment of the JIC’s judgements should have taken place after Dr Blix’s report to the Security Council on 14 February 2003 or, at the very latest, after his report of 7 March.
- Intelligence and assessments made by the JIC about Iraq’s capabilities and intent continued to be used to prepare briefing material to support Government statements in a way which conveyed certainty without acknowledging the limitations of the intelligence.
- The independence and impartiality of the JIC remains of the utmost importance.
- SIS had a responsibility to ensure that key recipients of its reporting were informed in a timely way when doubts arose about key sources and when, subsequently, intelligence was withdrawn.
The search for WMD
809. The following key findings are from Section 4.4:
- The search for evidence of WMD in Iraq was started during the military campaign by Exploitation Task Force‑75 and was carried forward from June 2003 by the Iraq Survey Group (ISG). The UK participated in both.
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