Judicial Inquiry Clears Blair on Iraq Intelligence Claims

[dolstein]

Chairman Resigns After Judge Blames BBC for Broadcasting 'Unfounded' Allegations
By Glenn Frankel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, January 28, 2004; 12:55 PM


A judicial inquiry cleared Prime Minister Tony Blair on Wednesday of allegations aired by the British Broadcasting Corporation that he and his aides had exaggerated intelligence claims about Iraq's access to weapons of mass destruction and drove to suicide a British weapons expert who raised questions about those claims.

While exonerating Blair, Lord Brian Hutton blamed the BBC for broadcasting what he called "unfounded" allegations in May 2003 that the government had published a "sexed-up" claim that Iraq could launch such weapons within 45 minutes of an order despite knowing it was probably wrong.

Hutton ruled that BBC editors did not adequately scrutinize the allegations before they were broadcast and that editors and senior officials -- including the BBC's board of governors -- failed to investigate after Blair and the government heatedly denied the report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55902-2004Jan28.html?nav=hptop_tb


Read it and weep DU Blair bashers -- READ IT AND WEEP!!!!

[rfranklin]

1. Yep, cleared by an impartial judge...

and vindicated by that Iraqi nuclear weapon that incinerated most of Leatherhead and Dorking.

[papau]

2. Hutton failed: need independent inquiry into the build-up to war

Hutton failed and we need an independent inquiry into the build-up to war. Lord Hutton failed to settle the crucial question of whether Mr Blair took Britain to war in Iraq on a false prospectus. After he ruled that the intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was beyond his terms of reference, the Tories and Liberal Democrats renewed their demands for an independent inquiry into the build-up to war.

[peterh]

3. bull*cough*shit

x(

[T_i_B]

10. That's the reaction I keep hearing

from people over here. A lot of people suspect whitewash.

[Matilda]

4. The Establishment will always back the Establishment.

n/t

[wroberts189]

5. Classic Whitewash ..eom

[Elidor]

6. Imagine that

The man Blair appointed to investigate him found him innocent! Will wonders never cease? But it strikes me as odd that, having "ruled that the intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was beyond his terms of reference," Hutton then passes judgement on the use of said intelligence.

And as the article states: "Hutton's report seemed to accept virtually without question the government's narrative of events."
And you rejoice at all this, eh, Dolstein? The triumph of dishonesty is hardly something to celebrate, except for those who believe the ends justify the means. Your elation is unseemly and embarrassing.

[Matilda]

8. Now the inane John Howard is demanding an apology

from Australians who've accused him of lying on WMD as well. This
shameful little groveller who chokes when asked to say "sorry" to
the indigenous peoples whose land was stolen by white invaders is
demanding that we say sorry to him.

In your dreams, John.

[Sugarbleus]

7. David Kay.

Has anyone watched the hearings with David Kay on OUR intelligence regarding WMD? It is SUCH a farse. A bunch of goble de gook and back pedaling. I just want to smack them. As I've said so many times before:

WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE IN CONGRESS?

:grr:

[KeepItReal]

9. We're supposed to forget about what Kay said, huh?

Before the invasion he was THE Bush & Co. "WMD" expert who would play the TV Pundit role and shout down folks like former inspector Scott Ritter who were saying that Iraq was already contained and there was no threat.

Kay should not be let off the hook, no matter how many "mea culpas" he offers.

By saying that the intel is faulty, Kay is just diverting the subject away from how Bush & Co. cooked the books to get support for an unnecessary invasion of Iraq.

[AP]

11. The reasons for the invasion may have been crap, but that

doesn't mean the enemies of it are entitled to lie about Blair. If he did something wrong, tell that truth.

It amazes me that DU'ers don't see what's happening over there.

The media is telling lies to get Blair out (so they can get Tories in).

What's so hard about telling the truth about Iraq? Why did Gilligan have to lie?

[T_i_B]

12. Mr Blair misled us - and now he is looking silly

http://argument.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=485376

I met too many brave and dignified widows last October. The occasion was the memorial service at St Paul's Cathedral, London, for the troops who died in Iraq. It was moving and emotional. As I talked to the families of those who had been killed, I found that some were angry and others disillusioned, while many seemed simply hurt and bewildered. As a politician, I was fiercely aware that we had let them down. Tony Blair kept his distance.

I believe the Prime Minister made a disastrous error of judgment over Iraq and last week's ICM poll showed that 48 per cent of the population believe he lied. This is enormously damaging both to his integrity and the trust we should have in the office.

Of course, were it to be proved that the Prime Minister knew this 45-minute claim was false, but went ahead in making his case to the nation, he would certainly have to resign. But it is surely equally damaging that, convinced as he was of the scale of Saddam's arsenal and the threat he posed, without the hard facts to back up the case, Tony Blair drove us into an unnecessary war. Whether knowingly or not, Tony Blair misled us; his judgement was seriously flawed. Mr Blair clings to his assertions that in the end some evidence will be found by the Iraq Survey Group. This is now starting to make him look silly. Even if some weapons were eventually to turn up, they won't help him. It is quite clear there was no vast, battle-ready arsenal. Tony Blair took us to war on a false prospectus and we cannot, as a nation, let that pass unquestioned.

The Conservatives are helping to get the Prime Minister off the hook. Michael Howard is pursuing the wrong issue. He suggested in Parliament that the Prime Minister misled journalists in an informal briefing on a plane shortly after David Kelly died. Of course, what happened during that briefing is important, but set alongside the much greater untruth perpetrated by Saddam's weapons of mass destruction it's just a sideshow. And the Conservative leader has already conceded it's unlikely that Lord Hutton will even mention it.

[Spentastic]

16. Yeah that's true

We shouldn't lie about Tony.

Tony Blair incompetently led a nation to war on the basis of flawed intelligence. That is a more egregious crime than misreporting.

[Capt_Nemo]

18. Why, indeed, is so hard to get the truth about Iraq?

Why is it that for all the sloppy reporting of Gilligan, his assessment
of the intelligence is the one that matches the reality about Iraqi WMD,
while the September dossier has been revealed by facts on the ground as a compilation of
utterly unreliable intelligence?

Either Blair's government took it at face value and they are
incompetent and unfit to govern, or they lied their country into
a war of aggression (war crime) and they are unfit to govern.

[T_i_B]

13. What the Hutton report DIDN'T say

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3439405.stm

Lord Hutton said the validity of the Government's claim that Iraq had WMD ready for use was outside his remit.

The report also refused to comment on the Foreign Affairs select committee's grilling of Dr David Kelly.

Lord Hutton said he was not in a position to judge the accuracy of key claims in the Government's dossiers on Iraq's WMD. "Future discoveries or the absence of discoveries" will show whether the claims were based on correct intelligence, Lord Hutton said.

His report went on to say: "The question whether intelligence approved and provided to the Government by the JIC was reliable is a very important question." However, he said, it was "an issue which does not come within my terms of reference and on which I express no opinion".

[sweetheart]

14. People are misreading the report, indeed

It was over Dr. Kelly... nothing else.

Charles kennedy was on the radio last night calling for a second inquiry in to the buildup to the iraq war. That is a different affair entirely, and was beyond the hutton scope.

Leave it to the media to turn a pig in to a horse.

[DoYouEverWonder]

15. That headline is as misleading as

the Hutton report, itself.

The inquiry was into the events associated with Dr. Kelly's murder, excuse me apparent suicide. It was NOT an inquiry into whether or not Blair or anyone else lied about the reasons for invading Iraq and whether or not Saddam had WMD's.

[Capt_Nemo]

17. So Dolstein where are those 45 min. deployable WMD?

How about getting yourself some reading on the subject:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/hutton/story/0,13822,1133811,00.html

The fact is that Hutton with his ridiculosly biased report flying
in the face of the evidence made to his investigation has revealed
his true self as a Tony Blair's political comissar. Joseph Stalin
would be proud of New Labour. Maybe that's the kind of democracy
you deserve to live on...

and don't forget:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/hutton/story/0,13822,1133932,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1133697,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1133703,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1133702,00.html

[Capt_Nemo]

19. For american Blair apologists, one from Greg Palast

http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=311&row=0

[sweetheart]

20. Palast is being a bit sensationalist

Read the hutton report youself:

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Politics/documents/2004/01/28/huttonreport.pdf

It was not an inquiry in to the iraq war causes. He's ahead of himself, and IMO, a bit full of himself. Nobody is censoring his work. Nobody is out to either.

Better to open a full inquiry in to the intelligence of WMD's and the iraq war. The conclusions would then be admissible to the sort of rhetoric palast is on about.

Mr. Palast makes some serious allegations that are unsubstantiated by the report, and i can't but find him a bit sensationalist.

[Capt_Nemo]

21. I posted it for being he view of an american leftist on the issue

And if you read the Guardian links I posted you will see, from the
highly relevant evidence that Hutton overlooked, that the
Hutton Whitewash is "fair and ballanced" in the Murdoch sense.

On edit: since we are talking Hutton AND Murdoch it is pretty funny
watching Hutton "angrily" demanding an investigation into the Sun
"leak". It reminds me of O.J. Simpson claiming he would try to find
out who the murderer was.

[Spentastic]

22. I disagree

He's being foresighted.

Nothing done by the Third way is ever done in isolation. A stake has been thrust in the heart of the BBC and the third way adherents will happily hang draw and quarter it and serve it up as dinner for Murdoch.

The Hutton inquiry's self imposed limits make it virtually useless when discussing the reasons the U.K went to war. Did Tony Blair lie on the one point? Hutton says "no" Did Tony Blair lead a country to war against the will of many people on the basis of poor / skewed intelligence. The answer has to be yes.

[Briar]

23. Hutton may say "no"

but the evidence says "yes". Hutton's cherrypicking of what evidence he chooses to take into consideration and what he chooses to ignore is staggering. He obviously assumes that all public servants and all politicians are, by their nature, upright and truthful, while all journalists are trouble making subversives who must be put in their place. I prefer to go by the ample evidence of duplicitous, dishonorable and dishonest dealing revealed in front of Hutton's own oblivious nose, not by the biased judgment of an obviously fallible human being.

[Matilda]

24. You've hit the nail right on the head.

Blair is Murdoch's man - Murdoch helped him get elected, and Murdoch
publicly favoured war, so Blair led his country into war. And
Murdoch would just love to see the BBC carved up and sold off,
preferably to himself. The man will do anything to increase his
money and his power.

Dr Kelly's death cannot be separated from the question of whether
Blair and Co. knew there were no WMDs in Iraq by 2001, that's what
the whole sorry affair was all about. And either Blix and all the
inspectors were lying when they said there were no weapons to be
found, or Bush, Blair and Howard were lying when they said there
were. The inspectors knew their job, knew where to go and what to
look for, and they had no reason to lie. The three political
leaders did - for their various reasons they were determined on war,
and they were prepared to lie to do it. They lied then and they
continue to lie now, and innocent people have died and continue to
die because of these lies.

The Hutton Report is a political whitewash, and Hutton himself is
a disgrace.

[sweetheart]

26. Yes, but labour just reclassified cannabis!

and bought me off. :)

Tony blair lied and took the country to war, EVERYONE knows that! Hell, do i need some lord shrew to read me a courtoom inquiry to figure that out. I was on a Radio 5 call in with an american undersecretary just previous to the war, and accused them of overstating the soverign threat. The guy tried to bully me on live radio, rather than use facts... he threatened me as american left and suggested i should "stay over there" (in britain) as nobody else in america agreed with me... ha! The interview is now history, and they lied.

Blair wants to be vindicated for killing kelly, and IMO, he should apologize to kelly's widow for the despicable behaviour of the government he is responsible for. Shirking responsibility and blaming the BBC is no behviour of any man except an extremely desperate one.

Then, however, there is that issue, that if blair has to step down, i believe that labour will lose power... so rather than have That, and have cannabis reclassified back with heroin by the tory tossers of the night, i'd rather take the hutton report at face value, give blair his much wanted whitewash and go out and wash the melting snow.

He's got me between a rock and a hard place. Be his apologist, or be in prison for smoking cannabis. Even brown will set about arresting cannabis smokers again, so given the narrow margin of consideration by this extremely selfish person, blair looks exhonerated... his halo is clean. To bad about the BBC, though.

[Capt_Nemo]

27. Talk about single issue voters

:eyes:

But, you are joking, right?
Because we are talking about an issue that resulted in the deaths
of thousands of civilians. Those cannot enjoy smoking a joint anymore...

"Prime Minister, do you have blood on your hands?"
He most definetly does.

[Matilda]

28. Ah, but the Conservatives (some of them anyway) were discussing

decriminalising cannabis before the last election. Not that I would
particularly want to see them back again in a hurry, with or without
weed.

I don't realistically think Blair's likely to go any time soon,
because there's nobody credible who could take Labour into a third
term, and his critics in the party know that as well as he does.

But wouldn't it have been nice if he could just have said "Look,
I'm sorry, perhaps I overestimated the danger from Saddam, but
we're there now, and I'll just try to get the troops out as quickly
as I can." That would be a lie, but one maybe we could all live
with if we had to. As it is, I hope Dr Kelly is haunting his house
every night.

[Spentastic]

29. You're insane

Is cannabis really more important than killing 30000 people? I'd gladly not smoke another joint as long as I live to bring those Iraqis back to life.

By the way. That cannabis legislation is deceiving. You CAN still be nicked for doing it. The Police have the power now. It's as dangerous as it ever was.

[sweetheart]

35. in all honesty

I've not written a public word in the UK since they shut down the free speech forum at www.ukonline.gov.uk that used to be called "your say". I figure that as a guest in this country, i've not the right to really question the behaviour of the government... so i do it as a yank on a forum where i am more entitled to speak by ettiquette (here).

Blair was wrong, is wrong, and should come clean about lying. It is unimpressive, a war crime and otherwise sick. It has nothing to do with cannabis. I'm so so so sad that the great wellspring of goodwill i remember with labour coming in to office in 1997 has been squandered by a LABOUR government on mass murder projects. It sickens me to no end... and i make light of it, 'cuz otherwise its just fucking gross.

I think that the government should move out of central london to a new capital in the midlands with its own special security apparatus and such. This would allow the MP's to be more in touch with their constituents, as what disgusts me the most, is that london has become a separate country from britain... and once the MP's move to belgravia, they completely lose touch with sensibility.

Labour should reform the constitution, eliminate the monarchy, get rid of all the inherited peers YESTERDAY, and form an english parliament, legallize cannabis and generally do things on behalf of the real interests of the common labour person. Instead, we have institutionalized sickness.

I am soooo sickened by it, though certainly of a lesser evil than what is transpiring in the home of my passport (usa) that i've just gone bonkers at the sheer ludicrous irrationality of it all. We elect war criminals and arrest pot smokers? Mass murderers are smiling on television telling me how to live? WTF?

[Aries]

25. On the other hand...

http://xymphora.blogspot.com/2004_01_01_xymphora_archive.html#107536411794420862

Thursday, January 29, 2004

We all knew it was going to be a lying cover-up job when Hutton allowed Blair another secret kick at the can to explain the lies in his government's testimony, and even more so when Blair announced he'd resign if he was criticized by Hutton (something we know he wouldn't have offered to do unless he knew the fix was in), but no one could possibly have foreseen that it would be this bad. Hutton has firmly placed himself as one of the most mendacious cover-up artistes in British history. 'To hutton' should become the new verb for hiding government wrongdoing. British judges have a history of providing cover for the worst crimes of the powerful, the most famous of which is Lord Denning's incredibly lying account of the Profumo Affair, but this one has to be the new champion. It was so utterly outrageous that the journalists hearing it live couldn't control their laughter. A few comments:


A quick summary:


*Kelly killed himself.

*Kelly killed himself for reasons based on some psychobabble heard at the inquiry.

*Kelly was completely responsible for his own plight, and was wrong to be a whistleblower.

*The dossier wasn't 'sexed up'. Campbell didn't press to harden the terms of the dossier. The language was possibly sexed up, but not the essence of it, and the intelligence services were completely happy with the result.

*There was no strategy to name Kelly, and no leaking.

*Blair had nothing to do with the decisions made at the meetings he chaired, and knew nothing about them (so forget all about what Kevin Tebbit said).

*The Ministry of Defence didn't do anything wrong except for being insufficiently touchy-feely in the way it told Kelly of his fate.

*John Scarlett may have been 'subconsciously' influenced to produce a harder report based on his feelings about what Blair wanted (mystical psychobabble, perhaps involving ESP, and no mention of the clever way that Scarlett used the term 'ownership' of the dossier to arrange to have it prepared without meaningful input of the intelligence experts like Kelly).

*Kelly didn't say what Gilligan said he did, despite the fact that Gilligan is the only living witness to the conversations, Kelly himself basically confirmed the truth of what Gilligan said (although he remained confused, probably because Gilligan had another as yet unnamed source), Susan Watts also confirmed it, and it has been completely confirmed by all subsequent events.

*The whole war thing that the British people and the British Parliament didn't want, and the thousands and thousands of dead people killed on the basis of Blair's lies, and the lies about the weapons of mass destruction and the imminent threat (battlefield or strategic weapons, who cares!), and the 'crock of shit' concerning the 45 minute claim and on and on and on. You know whose fault it all was? Apparently, it was all the BBC's fault!

Of course, anyone looking at the facts can clearly see that every single one of Hutton's findings is very tenuous. In every single case where the facts could have been interpreted in two different ways, Hutton sided firmly with the government, and in many cases he really had to stretch the facts to do so...

...There is one issue on which I have to give Hutton credit. He could have created a more subtle and nuanced report, letting Blair off the hook but sacrificing a few of the minions. Such a report would have also been a lie, but would not have been an obvious lie. The report Hutton gave is such an obvious, total and complete crock of shit that no one will be fooled into believing any of it....

[Capt_Nemo]

31. perfect deconstruction of Hutton's farce

I love the "subconscious" thing. Campbell must be a bloody telepath
right out of Babylon 5!

[Must_B_Free]

37. That's what I can;t get over

how can any person look at the fact and think other than Kelley was murdered to save a corrupt war plan.

This is a total farce. Blair is a murderous disgrace.

[Briar]

30. Greg Dyke resigns

Well, the BBC Governors have folded. They've accepted Greg Dyke's apology. Next there will be a grovelling apology as the government appointed, pro-establishment remainder of the board let Bliar stomp all over them.

Murdoch will be celebrating. Greg Dyke was the most effective Director General in years. He made the BBC a ratings winner and an eloquent rebuttal of the Newscorp line that pouring licence money into channels nobody watched or listened to wasteful. The next stage of the Faux Newsification of the BBC and its ultimate carve up has begun.

[Spentastic]

32. FUCK

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK

Those Blair apologists will do well to remember this day. It's the day that the BBC was killed.

[Briar]

33. The Bliar apologists will be cheering

Without the BBC, who will be there to report the truth, not just government propaganda and spin?

Well, Jon Snow's Channel 4 News will be, to answer my own question. Doubtless he will be next.

But this still won't make us trust Bliar more.

[Jack Rabbit]

34. Regardless of what the Hutton report states, facts are stubborn things

There were no WMDs. Saddam had no association with al Qaida.

Saddam was not a threat as of March 2003.

The intelligence was there to make such an assessment. The Pentagon established the OSP to cherry pick intelligence in order to cull that information that would support a case for war and suppress that which would not support it. Statements to the effect that the intelligence was bad, such as those made yesterday by the Prime Minister in London or Dr. Kay in Washington, are incredulous.

Bush and Blair knew or should have known that Saddam was no threat. They remain either liars or incompetents.

It is a war crime to start an aggressive war with no causus bellem. A resolution before the UN Security Council giving authorization for the attack was withdrawn because it faced certain defeat. Consequently, there was neither a causus bellem nor a UN authorization for the action; therefore, Bush and Blair are war criminals.

As for the war, it was really fought with colonial designs. The purpose was to make rich American richer rebuilding Iraq with no regard for the welfare of the Iraqi people.

The consequence of the war is, in addition to a running count of the dead and wounded, the fact that half of the army's combat division are on occupation duty in order to prevent the Iraqi people from taking control of their own country instead of pursuing real terrorists.

Read that and weep. The war remains an unjustified colonial misadventure that leaves the west in worse shape than it would be in if the invasion had not taken place.

[Jack Rabbit]

36. Reaction from Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian

Posted in Editorials and other articles

From the Guardian Unlimited (UK)
Dated Thursday January 29


By Jonathan Freedland

A soft snowfall was swirling outside the high court just before Lord Hutton took his place on the bench. It's a pity it did not last, because a blanket of fresh, white snow would have made the perfect backdrop to what followed: an extraordinary one-man show, a performance which had its audience snorting and occasionally gasping in disbelief. Transferred to the West End, the show could only have one name: Whitewash.
For six months the government had been accused of the darkest of crimes: leading the nation to war on a lie and bullying a dedicated public servant to his death. In 90 minutes Lord Hutton crushed those claims entirely. He exonerated Tony Blair, Alastair Campbell, Geoff Hoon, John Scarlett and Kevin Tebbit more completely than any of them can have dreamed. The judge placed a little dollop of pure white snow on the reputation of each of them.
As theatre, the show may have lacked visual splendour: just a modern, Ikea-blond wood courtroom with a white-haired judge at its apex, hunched over his text, reading aloud in his gentle Ulster brogue. But what it lacked in set design and costume it more than made up in narrative drive. The Hutton report had no confusing ambiguities or detours. It all thrust in the same, clear direction: the government was right and the BBC was wrong . . . .
Forget all those memos from Mr Campbell to the intelligence chief asking for multiple changes in wording. There was no pressure to harden the dossier, Lord Hutton decided, just a possible twitch of Mr Scarlett's subconscious - and even that tiny "possibility" was remote. It was more likely that Mr Scarlett's sole concern had been to reflect accurately the intelligence available.
For the press benches, this was all too much. Several journalists began first to sniff, then to snort and finally to chuckle their derision. Jeremy Paxman, for once barred from asking questions, was shaking his head in bemusement as each new finding in favour of the government came down from the bench. When Mr Scarlett's subconscious was introduced, the room seemed to vibrate with mockery.

Read more.

We haven't heard the last of this.

[LeftHander]

38. This is not the droid your looking for....

Move along....


I detect a use of the darkside of the force here folks...