Heavily redacted pages from the private testimony of Sir Richard Dearlove to the Chilcot inquiryNever let it be said that Britain’s spies do not have a sense of humour. Ninety-three pages of evidence (pdf) !!!!given in private to the Iraq inquiry by Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6, have finally been released. Unfortunately, they have been so heavily redacted by the censors that some are entirely black, save for a lone, enigmatic question mark.
Dearlove, known officially as C, for chief, was head of Britain’s foreign intelligence service in the runup to the invasion. He has been criticised for helping the Blair government to „sex up“ the Iraqi WMD dossier. But it would be hard to glean much evidence of this from pages that, for example, now only contain the phrase „OK, thank you.“
In another exchange, Sir Lawrence Freedman, the war historian and member of the Chilcot panel, asks: „My final question on this episode of the dossier again […]“ The rest is redacted. Dearlove responds: „We were extremely worried.“
In the course of some tetchy exchanges, Dearlove says criticism that he had too close a relationship with Blair is „complete rubbish“. MI6 „doesn’t ‚do ministers‘,“ he added. Or transparency, it seems. http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Ex-MI6 boss makes sensational threat to reveal secrets of Iraq dodgy dossier
- Sir Richard Dearlove, 68 provided intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s WMD
- Had previously said he would keep his account of events leading up to Iraq War secret until after his death
By Mark Nicol Defence Correspondent
PUBLISHED: 01:05 GMT, 21 July 2013 | UPDATED: 13:50 GMT, 21 July 2
Revelations: in a bombshell email to the MoS Sir Richard Dearlove threatened to reveal new details behind the ‚dodgy dossier‘ scandal
A former head of MI6 has threatened to reveal explosive new details behind the ‘dodgy dossier’ scandal if he objects to the long-awaited findings of the Chilcot Inquiry into Britain’s role in the Iraq War.
Sir Richard Dearlove, 68, who provided intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) that was apparently ‘sexed up’ by Tony Blair’s Government, has spent the last year writing a detailed account of events leading up to the war.
He had intended to keep his work under lock and key and made available only to historians after his death.
But now Sir Richard has revealed to The Mail on Sunday that he could go public after the Chilcot Inquiry publishes its findings.
Sir Richard is expected to face censure from the inquiry’s chairman, Sir John Chilcot, over the accuracy of intelligence provided by MI6 agents inside Iraq – which was used in the so-called ‘dodgy dossier’.
In a bombshell email to the Mail on Sunday, Sir Richard, who is Master at Pembroke College, Cambridge University, disclosed: ‘What I have written (am writing) is a record of events surrounding the invasion of Iraq from my then professional perspective.
‘My intention is that this should be a resource available to scholars, but after my decease (may be sooner depending on what Chilcot publishes). I have no intention, however, of violating my vows of official secrecy by publishing any memoir.’
Sources close to Sir Richard say that while he accepts that some of MI6’s information on the WMDs was inaccurate, he insists that Chilcot should recognise the role played by Tony Blair and the Prime Minister’s chief spokesman Alastair Campbell in informing media reports which suggested Saddam could use chemical weapons to target British troops based in Cyprus – a claim which put Britain on a path to war in Iraq.
Mr Blair and Mr Campbell have repeatedly denied making misleading statements about WMD.
A bearded man of avuncular appearance had started early in replying to e-mails on the 17th July 2003. He was in the office of his pretty cottage, with the scent of roses telling of an English summer.
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