WP: Staff Chief Cautioned Blair Aides on Dossier

By Glenn Frankel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, August 19, 2003; Page A12


LONDON, Aug. 18 -- Prime Minister Tony Blair's chief of staff warned that the British intelligence dossier used to justify war against Iraq failed to provide evidence that President Saddam Hussein posed a military threat, a government inquiry was told today.
In an e-mail sent one week before the dossier was published last September, Jonathan Powell described the draft document as "good and convincing for those who are prepared to be convinced," but said it "does nothing to demonstrate a threat, let alone an imminent threat from Saddam."

The dossier "does not demonstrate he has the motive to attack his neighbors let alone the West," Powell added of Hussein in a message sent to three of Blair's senior aides.

Yet a week later, Blair's office published the dossier with a forward from the prime minister that declared: "I am in no doubt that the threat is serious and current, that he has made progress on WMD and that he has to be stopped."

Another e-mail, 12 days earlier, to Powell from Alastair Campbell, the prime minister's communications director, reported that the dossier was undergoing a substantial rewrite, under the direction of Blair and his staff. "Structure as per TB's discussion," wrote Campbell, referring to the prime minister. "Agreement that there has to be real intelligence material in their presentation."

more....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11426-2003Aug18.html

Article primarily noteworthy simply because the Post is covering this. It seems to be receiving a dearth of coverage in the US.

print the poll numbers on the poodle and the bbc. check the guardian`s article on tony`s "fall from grace". i wonder if karl will invite him back to the usa?

Tony seems to be dying the death of a thousand cuts. I fucking love it. Not with a bang, but a whimper, will he make his exit.

Is starting to tarnish. What a pity. O8)