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Lord Prescott Doubted Iraq WMD Intelligence

30 Jul 10 - News Headlines

Lord Prescott has told the Iraq Inquiry he had doubts about intelligence on Saddam Hussein's weapons programmes before the 2003 invasion.

As Deputy Prime Minister in the crucial decision-making months leading up to the invasion in March 2003, <a title="Sky blog on Lord Prescott's peerage" target="_blank" href="http://blogs.news.sky.com/boultonandco/Post:c9304a63-52da-40eb-89c3-6573f2e4fb47">Lord Prescott</a> was at the very heart of the Blair Cabinet. Lord Prescott told the Chilcot Inquiry he felt that intelligence about Saddam's supposed weapons of mass destruction was "not very substantial", but had no evidence to refute it. Referring to the Joint Intelligence Committee reports on Iraq, Lord Prescott said: "When I kept reading them, I kept thinking to myself, 'Is this intelligence?' "It's basically what you have heard somewhere and what somebody else has told somebody. Presumably that's how intelligence is brought about. "So I got the feeling it wasn't very substantial, but it clearly was robust." Despite being a feisty and opinionated minister, Lord Prescott admitted he felt nervous about the claim that Saddam could launch WMD within 45 minutes. Lord Prescott said: "Certainly what they do in intelligence is a bit of tittle tattle here and a bit more information there." He added: "I didn't totally dismiss it, I didn't have any evidence to feel that they were wrong, but I just felt a little bit nervous about conclusions on Iraq's force that seemed to be limited intelligence." Lord Prescott claimed US politicians were determined to topple Saddam and launch a military invasion of Iraq several days after the September 11, 2001 attacks. "When I visited the US a few of days after 9/11, I had a meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney and some US senator friends of mine. "I was absolutely surprised to find them talking about an agressive attitude that Iraq was unfinished business that they had to 'sort out'. "It was clear they were planning to go in with us or without us and they were going to do it. "This was my first alarm - that it was being planned, a military intervention and regime change, while we [UK government] were talking about getting them through the UN." Lord Prescott insisted that the decision to go to war had not been taken lightly and Mr Blair had privately "agonised" over each and every death. "I have learned that true leadership is not about having the benefit of hindsight. It is about having the gift of vision, courage and compassion, and I believe that Tony Blair had all those three." The former minister acknowledged he was part of Mr Blair's so-called "sofa government" style, when many of the key decisions were taken at informal meetings. Asked by Sir Roderic Lyne whether he was "on the sofa" in the first half of 2002, Lord Prescott replied: "I was on the sofa all the time." But he went on to say he was not actively involved in policy despite chairing various post-war Cabinet meetings which were mostly about military issues in Iraq. Concluding the final hearing before the summer, inquiry chairman Sir John Chilcot said he had yet to decide whether to hold a final round of hearings in the autumn when witnesses could be recalled. He also revealed the inquiry team hoped to visit Iraq "to see for ourselves the consequences of UK involvement" before publishing the final report. </div> </div> </div> <div id="footer"> <form action="/search/" id="footer-search" name="footer-search"> SEARCH <input type="text" id="txtFooterSearch" name="q" /> <a href="javascript:document.forms['footer-search'].submit();"><img src="/img/css/footer_search_button.gif" /></a> </form> <a href="/">HOME</a>    |    <a href="/onair/">ON AIR</a>    |    <a href="/news/">NEWS & SPORT</a>    |    <a href="/traffic/">TRAFFIC & TRAVEL</a>    |    <a href="/weather/">WEATHER</a>    |    <a href="/events/">EVENTS</a>    </div> <div id="tandc"> Our public file is <a href="/inc/pdf/public-file.pdf" target="_blank">available for download</a>. </div> </div> </body> </html>

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Lord Prescott Doubted Iraq WMD Intelligence

Lord Prescott has told the Iraq Inquiry he had doubts about intelligence on Saddam Hussein's weapons programmes before the 2003 invasion.