Hearing Transcripts

1 Monday, 15th September 2003

2 (10.35 am)
3 LORD HUTTON: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
4 Yes, Mr Dingemans.
5 MR DINGEMANS: My Lord, this is the commencement of stage 2
6 of your Inquiry. We have been delayed for a few minutes
7 by some technical hitches but they have now been
8 overcome.
9 In addition to those appearing before you in
10 stage 1, my learned friend Mr Jonathan Sumption QC,
11 Phillip Sales, Mr David Lloyd Jones QC and
12 Mr James Maxwell Scott appear for the Government and
13 individual witnesses. Otherwise the representation is
14 as it was before.
15 Stage 1 of the Inquiry commenced on
16 11th August 2003, some five days after the funeral of
17 Dr Kelly. Over some 15 days of evidence, concluding on
18 4th September 2003, your Lordship heard from in excess
19 of 65 witnesses. Your Lordship has also seen thousands
20 of pages of documents, most of which have been referred
21 to, however briefly, in stage 1 of the proceedings. The
22 transcripts of the oral evidence given and the
23 documentary evidence adduced in stage 1 of the
24 proceedings have been made available on the Inquiry
25 website.

1
1 So far as it is possible to predict and manage these
2 matters, it is intended that stage 2 of the Inquiry will
3 hear evidence and submissions over four days this week
4 and four days next week. It is therefore intended that
5 the hearing will be concluded by 25th September 2003.
6 In this statement I intend to outline why it is
7 necessary to have stage 2, the outline issues already
8 raised by the evidence and the witnesses to be heard in
9 stage 2. To the extent that everyone is inwardly
10 groaning at the thought of listening to me talk at
11 length, I can say that no more than one hour has been
12 allocated for this opening statement and I am conscious
13 that I have used 3 minutes of it already and we have
14 lost 8 minutes for the technical hitches.
15 The reasons for stage 2.
16 There are two principal reasons for stage 2 and both
17 are equally important. First, although your Lordship
18 heard from many witnesses in stage 1 there are areas of
19 the evidence which need to be tidied up. This may be
20 because the witness was not available in stage 1 of the
21 proceedings, it may be because it has not yet proved
22 possible to determine why a certain event has occurred
23 or it may be because there are some inconsistencies in
24 the evidence already heard which need to be addressed.
25 The second reason is that your Lordship, having

2
1 heard the evidence at stage 1 of the proceedings, has
2 been able to identify in private letters to the persons
3 concerned some possible criticisms which might be made
4 of them. You have asked those persons to state, in
5 private letters, whether they accept or reject the
6 possible criticisms. This process has also enabled the
7 institutions responsible for the individuals involved to
8 identify what possible criticisms might be made of them.
9 Stage 2 of the proceedings provides an opportunity
10 for those individuals, if they wish, to give further
11 oral evidence and to make oral and written submissions.
12 Further, the represented parties, the Government, the
13 BBC, the family and counsel for individual witnesses may
14 want to cross-examine witnesses for other parties. This
15 may be in order to elicit evidence which might enable
16 them to answer possible criticisms of the party whom
17 they represent or to suggest further possible criticisms
18 of those other witnesses, so that your Lordship might be
19 persuaded to criticise those witnesses. But
20 your Lordship has already made it clear that
21 cross-examination will be confined to issues which you
22 think are relevant to the matters which fall to be
23 considered under your terms of reference.
24 It should be apparent, therefore, that persons
25 giving evidence in stage 2 may be giving evidence for

3
1 a number of different reasons. They may have been
2 unavailable at stage 1 of the proceedings. It may have
3 been identified from evidence at stage 1 of the
4 proceedings that they could give relevant evidence.
5 They may be giving further evidence to clarify any
6 consistencies. They may be giving evidence to show
7 a possible criticism is not well founded. They may be
8 giving evidence because another party wants to
9 cross-examine them in order to elicit relevant evidence
10 or to advance a possible criticism. They may be giving
11 evidence as a result of a combination of a number of
12 these reasons.
13 These facts underline the point made by
14 your Lordship on 4th September at the conclusion of
15 stage 1 of the proceedings, namely that speculation
16 about whether certain persons may or may not be the
17 subject of criticism from their appearance or
18 nonappearance at stage 2 of the Inquiry may be
19 ill-founded.
20 It is intended, therefore, that stage 2 of
21 the Inquiry will enable your Lordship to have a full an
22 understanding as possible of the relevant evidence and
23 to enable each party to have a full and fair opportunity
24 to adduce relevant evidence and to make submissions.
25 The issues.

4
1 It appears from the evidence that has been heard in
2 stage 1 that your Lordship may wish to consider, in
3 particular, some or all of the following issues:
4 1. How was the dossier of 24th September 2002
5 prepared and who was responsible for drafting it?
6 2. What part did Dr Kelly play in the preparation
7 of the dossier?
8 3. What knowledge did Dr Kelly have of the contents
9 of the dossier and of earlier drafts of the dossier?
10 4. Were the Prime Minister and Mr Alastair Campbell
11 and other officials in No. 10 Downing Street responsible
12 for intelligence being set out in the dossier which was
13 incorrect or misleading or to which improper emphasis
14 was given?
15 5. What was said by Dr Kelly to Mr Gilligan on
16 22nd May 2003?
17 6. Whether or not Mr Gilligan accurately reported
18 what was said by Dr Kelly to him in his broadcasts on
19 29th May and in his Mail on Sunday article on
20 1st June 2003.
21 7. Whether or not the matters reported by
22 Mr Gilligan on 29th May and in his Mail on Sunday
23 article on 1st June were in fact true. It is for this
24 reason that your Lordship has heard evidence and will
25 hear further evidence about the September 2002 dossier.

5
1 8. The response and complaints made by the
2 Government to the BBC relating to the broadcast on
3 29th May 2003.
4 9. The BBC reaction to those complaints.
5 10. The decisions and the steps taken by the
6 Ministry of Defence and the Government after Dr Kelly
7 informed his line manager in the Ministry of Defence
8 that he had spoken to Mr Gilligan on 22nd May.
9 11. The circumstances in which a press statement
10 was released by the Ministry of Defence on 8th July 2003
11 and the question and answer material that came to be
12 deployed in support of it. This also involves
13 identifying what Dr Kelly was told about this process
14 and determining whether or not he agreed to it.
15 12. Whether or not there was an attempt in
16 Government dealings with the media to downplay
17 Dr Kelly's importance as a civil servant and his role in
18 the production of the dossier which did not reflect the
19 reality and which was designed to assist in the dispute
20 with the BBC. In this respect, your Lordship has
21 already been assisted by journalists, including Mr Blitz
22 and Mr Baldwin, who said they were briefed by Whitehall
23 sources in the time leading up or after the publication
24 of Dr Kelly's name but who, for proper reasons, refused
25 to identify the persons involved in that briefing.

6
1 13. The circumstances leading up to Dr Kelly's
2 giving of evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee and
3 the Intelligence and Security Committee and the hearings
4 before those Committees.
5 14. How Dr Kelly died, and is it clear that
6 Dr Kelly died by his own hand?
7 15. If Dr Kelly died by his own hand, the matters
8 which, so far as it is possible to tell these things,
9 were likely to have led him to take his own life. This
10 is of course judged with the benefit of hindsight and
11 expert psychiatric evidence which was not available to
12 the parties at the time. Professor Hawton has already
13 made it clear that those in contact with and who had
14 dealings with Dr Kelly at the time could not reasonably
15 have foreseen that Dr Kelly might take his own life.
16 After the private letters were sent out on behalf of
17 your Lordship, I have had extensive discussions with the
18 other parties in an attempt to agree a timetable for
19 stage 2 of the Inquiry. It was a particularly relaxing
20 week.
21 However, I can now give your Lordship the proposed
22 timetable. As has already been published on the Inquiry
23 website, witnesses today include Mr Cragg and
24 Air Marshall Sir Joe French, both from the Defence
25 Intelligence Service, an individual from the Security

7
1 Services, Mr Scott Dr Kelly's line manager from
2 Porton Down, and Mr Greg Dyke from the BBC. They will
3 all be examined today by counsel to the Inquiry, meaning
4 either myself or my learned friend Mr Knox.
5 On Tuesday 16th September evidence will be given by
6 Detective Constable Coe and Mr Hunt, the pathologist.
7 They will be examined by counsel to the Inquiry.
8 Mr Howard will give evidence. He will be examined
9 by his own counsel, cross-examined by counsel for the
10 Kelly family and the BBC and counsel for the Inquiry.
11 Evidence will be give by Dr Shuttleworth of DSTL,
12 who will be examined by counsel for the Inquiry.
13 Miss Wilson, a press officer employed by the Ministry of
14 Defence, will also give evidence. She will be examined
15 by counsel for the Inquiry and cross-examined by counsel
16 for the family and counsel for the BBC.
17 On Wednesday 17th September evidence will be given
18 by Mr Wilding and Mr Sammes, computer experts who
19 will give evidence about Mr Gilligan's Sharp organiser.
20 They will be examined by counsel for the Inquiry.
21 Mr Gilligan will be examined by his own counsel,
22 cross-examined by counsel for the family, counsel for
23 the Government and counsel for the Inquiry.
24 Mr Sambrook will be examined by his own counsel,
25 cross-examined by counsel for the Government and counsel

8
1 for the Inquiry.
2 On 18th September, Thursday this week, Mr Hatfield,
3 Ms Teare and Sir Kevin Tebbit will all give evidence.
4 They will be examined by their own counsel and
5 cross-examined by counsel for the family and by counsel
6 for the Inquiry. That will conclude the evidence for
7 the first week.
8 On Monday 22nd September the Secretary of State for
9 Defence, Mr Hoon, will give evidence. He will be
10 examined by his own counsel and cross-examined by
11 counsel for the family, counsel for the BBC and by
12 counsel for the Inquiry.
13 Mr Hughes, the Secretary to the Inquiry, will
14 produce further documents which have been made available
15 to the Inquiry.
16 Mr Campbell will be examined by his own counsel,
17 cross-examined by counsel for the BBC, counsel for the
18 family and counsel for the Inquiry.
19 On 23rd September Mr Tom Kelly will be examined by
20 his own counsel, cross-examined by counsel for the
21 family and by counsel for the Inquiry.
22 Mr Godric Smith will be examined by counsel for
23 the Inquiry.
24 Mr Scarlett will be examined by his own counsel,
25 cross-examined by counsel for the BBC and by counsel for

9
1 the Inquiry.
2 Mr Page, Assistant Chief Constable, who has already
3 given evidence, will be examined by counsel for
4 the Inquiry; and Mr Gavyn Davies will be examined by his
5 own counsel.
6 On 24th September Mr Davies will be cross-examined
7 by counsel for the Government and the Inquiry.
8 Mr Lamb will be examined by his own counsel and
9 cross-examined by counsel for the family.
10 Dr Wells will be examined by counsel for the Inquiry
11 and cross-examined by counsel for the family.
12 Wing Commander Clarke and Mr Harrison will be
13 examined by counsel for the Inquiry.
14 Closing submissions will be made by counsel for the
15 family on 23rd September. On 24th September closing
16 submissions will be made by counsel for the Government,
17 counsel for the BBC and counsel for individual
18 witnesses. I will also make closing submissions.
19 Your Lordship and others may be relieved to hear
20 there is a limit of one hour for each counsel for the
21 represented parties and a shorter period of time for
22 counsel for individual witnesses. Those submissions
23 will be televised, as is this submission, in accordance
24 with your Lordship's earlier ruling on televising of
25 proceedings.

10
1 There is therefore a considerable amount of evidence
2 to be called and submissions to be made and it is
3 proposed to do this within 8 court days. There may be
4 circumstances which disrupt the timetable set out above.
5 As part of the timetable, time limits have been agreed
6 with counsel for the cross-examination of witnesses; and
7 your Lordship is aware of those time limits. Witnesses
8 ought to be aware that time for cross-examination may be
9 extended if your Lordship forms the view that they are,
10 to use a cricketing analogy, playing for lunch and not
11 providing speedy and accurate answers.
12 A final point is this: the aim of the Inquiry is to
13 urgently conduct an investigation into the circumstances
14 surrounding the death of Dr Kelly. While stage 2 is
15 necessary for the reasons which have been set out
16 earlier, it is hoped that these proceedings will
17 continue to attempt to be fair, courteous, but still
18 designed to elicit the truth. It is partly by our
19 dealings with each other, whatever the circumstances may
20 be, that we define ourselves.
21 LORD HUTTON: Thank you very much, Mr Dingemans. You are
22 certainly within your time limit. Hopefully that will
23 continue in the next 8 days.
24 MR DINGEMANS: My Lord, I think we need a short break.
25 LORD HUTTON: Very well.

11
1 (10.55 am)
2 (Short Break)
3 (10.56 am)
4 LORD HUTTON: Yes, Mr Dingemans.
5 MR DINGEMANS: Before Mr Cragg is introduced, can I correct
6 an error in dates that I made in my opening submission?
7 Closing submissions will be made by counsel for the
8 family on 24th September and it is on 25th September
9 that final closing submissions will be made by the other
10 parties.
11 MR ANTHONY JOHN CRAGG (called)
12 Examined by MR DINGEMANS
13 Q. Sorry, Mr Cragg. Could you give his Lordship your full
14 name?
15 A. My Lord, my name is Anthony John Cragg.
16 Q. What is your former occupation?
17 A. I am presently a retired civil servant.
18 In September 2002 I was Deputy Chief of Defence
19 Intelligence, having taken up the post
20 in September 1999. I retired in January 2003.
21 Q. What was your task as Deputy Chief of Defence
22 Intelligence?
23 A. My principal task was to manage the work of the Defence
24 Intelligence Analysis Staff, which was responsible for
25 producing military intelligence assessments for the

12
1 chiefs of staff and also to contribute to the central
2 Government intelligence analysis arrangements under the
3 Joint Intelligence Committee.
4 Q. So were you a member of the Joint Intelligence
5 Committee?
6 A. I was.
7 Q. And did you deal with weapons of mass destruction and
8 the study of weapons of mass destruction?
9 A. The Defence Intelligence Analysis Staff did under my
10 supervision, yes.
11 Q. Who did that in Defence Intelligence?
12 A. It was spread over all three of the directorates of the
13 DIAS, if I can call it DIAS.
14 Q. DIAS standing for?
15 A. Defence Intelligence Analysis Staff. There were three
16 directorates, one dealing with regional affairs which
17 are a geographically based organisation; one
18 a generically based organisation, looking at issues such
19 as weapons of mass destruction, terrorism,
20 proliferation, export control, the grey arms market and
21 such like; and thirdly, the technical and scientific
22 staff who looked at weapons performance and
23 characteristics.
24 Q. What was your understanding of Dr Kelly's position
25 within the Defence Intelligence Assessment Staff?

13
1 A. He was not a member of the Defence Intelligence Staff or
2 of my organisation.
3 Q. Did he, as far as you were aware, contribute to any
4 discussions?
5 A. Personally I was unaware of this happening. But I have
6 discovered as a consequence of this Inquiry that he was
7 in contact, from time to time, with members of my staff.
8 Q. And which members were those?
9 A. I think normally on the scientific and technical side.
10 I have no particular evidence of widespread discussions
11 with other parts of the organisation.
12 LORD HUTTON: Mr Cragg, can I just ask you: Dr Bryan Jones
13 who gave evidence, he was in the technical and
14 scientific side.
15 A. He was, my Lord, yes.
16 LORD HUTTON: There was a director of that particular
17 section, was there?
18 A. Yes, my Lord. Shall I go into a little detail on this?
19 LORD HUTTON: Yes, I think that would be helpful. If you
20 could just explain Dr Jones' position as it were in the
21 hierarchy.
22 A. Yes, certainly my Lord. Dr Jones supervised the
23 nuclear, chemical and biological weapons section in the
24 scientific and technical organisation. His superior was
25 the director of scientific and technical studies, who

14
1 covered the entire organisation in which Dr Jones
2 worked, including other functions such as the study of
3 missiles, both aerodynamic and ballistic, enabling
4 technologies and technical intelligence on equipment of
5 interest to the Army, Navy and Air Force. So it is
6 a very widespread organisation, my Lord.
7 MR DINGEMANS: We have heard evidence that the
8 Prime Minister announced a dossier would be published on
9 3rd September. You were a member of the Joint
10 Intelligence Committee. What was the first meeting
11 after that announcement on 3rd September?
12 A. The first meeting, I think, must have been on Wednesday,
13 4th September.
14 Q. Was the Prime Minister's announcement discussed?
15 A. Not to my recollection. Having checked the minutes of
16 the JIC on that date, there is no reference that I can
17 find to a discussion or mention of the dossier or of the
18 whole question raised by the Prime Minister.
19 Q. There were other issues discussed?
20 A. There were indeed. There was a related issue. That was
21 the study of the first draft of a paper on Iraqi WMD
22 capability.
23 Q. Can I take you to a document, which is CAB/17/3. This
24 is a draft of the JIC assessment of 5th September, which
25 was this:

15
1 "Iraq has probably dispersed its special weapons,
2 including its CBW weapons. Intelligence also indicates
3 that from forward-deployed storage sites, chemical and
4 biological munitions could be with military units and
5 ready for firing within 45 minutes."
6 Is that what you were referring to? That, so far as
7 we are aware, was dated 5th September but no doubt
8 people may have known about it beforehand?
9 A. Yes. That would not have been discussed at the
10 4th September meeting, for obvious reasons. As
11 I recall, it would have contributed to the discussion at
12 the JIC or the first serious draft of the report on
13 11th September.
14 Q. So what was your personal involvement with the dossier
15 between 4th September and the next meeting on
16 11th September?
17 A. I was not present at the meeting on 11th September.
18 I did, however, study the first serious draft, as I call
19 it, of the dossier which appeared on 11th September
20 I think pretty well contemporaneously with the JIC
21 meeting.
22 LORD HUTTON: When you say you were not present at
23 11th September, was the Chief of Defence Intelligence
24 present at that meeting, as far as you know?
25 A. He was, my Lord, yes.

16
1 LORD HUTTON: Yes, I see.
2 MR DINGEMANS: Before we get to 10th or 11th September, did
3 you have any personal involvement in the dossier or in
4 the arrangements for the drafting of the dossier?
5 A. Not personally. The first draft I saw at JIC level was
6 on 11th September.
7 Q. Were members of your staff involved in drafting the
8 dossier in this period, between 4th and 11th September?
9 A. Yes. There was a meeting chaired by the Cabinet Office
10 assessment staff at which members of my staff were
11 present. That was, I think, on 9th September.
12 Q. Is the Cabinet Office assessment staff separate from the
13 JIC?
14 A. No, it serves the JIC.
15 Q. So it reports up to the JIC?
16 A. Indeed. It is, if you like, the engine room of the JIC
17 in the sense that it takes responsibility for preparing
18 most draft assessments for the JIC.
19 Q. And there were members of your staff on that Assessment
20 Committee, drafting the dossier for the 10th/11th?
21 A. Yes. I believe, although I was not present and I have
22 not had the opportunity to study this in detail, that
23 the substance of the detail on 9th September was
24 concerned more with the overall size and shape of the
25 draft rather than with detailed drafting.

17
1 Q. You did not attend the meeting on 9th September?
2 A. No, I did not. No.
3 Q. Can I take you to DOS/2/2? If we look at the
4 top right-hand corner you will see
5 "10th/11th September 2002". This is the first draft of
6 the dossier you saw, is that right?
7 A. I think it must be, although since I returned to look at
8 papers from my retirement I have seen many versions.
9 Q. Can I take you to DOS/2/37, which is page 36 of the
10 document. We can see in the top of the page it says
11 this:
12 "Within the last month intelligence has suggested
13 that the Iraqi military would be able to use their
14 chemical and biological weapons within 45 minutes of an
15 order to do so."
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. So that is what you have available, probably, for the
18 JIC meeting on 11th September. But you have told us you
19 were not there.
20 A. I was not.
21 Q. Did you see the minutes relating to that?
22 A. Yes, I looked at them ex post facto.
23 Q. And were you also, no doubt, told of the discussions
24 which had happened on 11th September?
25 A. Yes, I was.

18
1 Q. From those sources, are you able to say whether the
2 dossier was discussed?
3 A. I think it is difficult for me to say -- I am sorry
4 about this, but --
5 Q. You were not there?
6 A. No, no. My suspicion -- sorry, my feeling is that it
7 was discussed in general terms, because at that time, to
8 my recollection, the actual draft itself had not been
9 circulated. There had been a, on the previous day
10 I think, note circulated by the JIC Chairman which
11 covered some of the main areas he wanted to deal with in
12 existing extant intelligence.
13 Q. Did you then deal with members of the Defence
14 Intelligence Service after the meeting on 11th September
15 in relation to the dossier?
16 A. Yes, I did, in the sense that there was a further draft
17 circulated on 16th September.
18 Q. Can I take you to DOS/2/58, which I think should be that
19 draft.
20 A. Hmm, hmm.
21 Q. You can see "16th September".
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. If we go on to DOS/2/72 you can see what is said about
24 the 45 minutes at the bottom of the page.
25 A. Yes.

19
1 Q. If we scroll down you can see this, the last bullet,
2 last sentence:
3 "The Iraqi military may be able to deploy chemical
4 or biological weapons within 45 minutes of an order to
5 do so."
6 Which appears to be a weakening of the language from
7 that which had appeared on 10th or 11th September.
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. And indeed differed from the language we saw in the JIC
10 assessment.
11 A. Hmm.
12 Q. Were you aware of any of the discussions leading up to
13 that weakening of the language?
14 A. No, I was not.
15 Q. Were you made aware of any discussions within the
16 Defence Intelligence Services about the language used in
17 the dossier?
18 A. At that time DIS had produced several pages of comment
19 on the previous dossier which been probably
20 incorporated, although I have not checked it in detail,
21 into the draft of 16th September. So that the process
22 was a draft circulated on 11th September, several pages
23 of comments by the DIS which took into account the views
24 of everybody consulted, it was a widespread
25 consultation, which were sent back to the assessment

20
1 staff, I think on 12th September, and would have
2 informed the next draft which appeared on
3 16th September.
4 Q. Then after the 16th September draft the process appears
5 to have been repeated, with various memoranda.
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. We have seen a document dated 17th September.
8 A. Yes. From --
9 Q. And 19th September.
10 A. Oh yes, from the DIS, yes. That is correct.
11 Q. Yes. What was the process by which those comments were
12 collected? You outlined there were a number of branches
13 of the Defence Intelligence Services.
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. Who was responsible for collating that? I do not need
16 necessarily to know the names.
17 A. There was an individual in the proliferation study
18 section of the global issues directorate of the Defence
19 Intelligence Staff who was doing the collation. He had
20 been appointed much earlier, I think several months
21 before, when the first drafts of a slightly different
22 document were being produced. So he just carried on
23 doing the work because he was well versed in doing it.
24 His task was to make sure that all involved or
25 interested in the draft were consulted and their

21
1 comments taken on-board.
2 I myself read the draft of 16th September, and
3 indeed of the 11th, and had no particular comments
4 because, not surprisingly, it was pretty well in line
5 with either extant intelligence over several years or
6 new intelligence which had come in in recent weeks. So
7 I was generally satisfied with it. So I myself did not
8 feel it necessary to contribute to the actual substance
9 of the comments going back to the assessment staff.
10 I am sorry for such a long answer.
11 Q. You were not feeding in then to the individual who was
12 responsible for collating from the DIS?
13 A. No. I would have done if I had felt it necessary to do
14 so, but I did not.
15 Q. Were you aware that Dr Jones' group was feeding into the
16 comments going back to the JIC, as it were?
17 A. I was aware in the sense that I would have expected that
18 to happen and indeed it did.
19 Q. Right. But no-one made you aware of the specific
20 comments?
21 A. No.
22 Q. Dr Jones has given evidence, and you are no doubt aware
23 of that, where he said he became sufficiently agitated
24 to write a memorandum on 19th September. We will come
25 to that.

22
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. Before that, had you picked up anything to suggest he
3 was unhappy or members of his staff were unhappy?
4 A. Yes, I had, from the comments of 16th September, in
5 fact, which went back to the Cabinet Office assessment
6 staff where they questioned the language, not the
7 inclusion of wording on 45 minutes or on chemical
8 weapons production but the language of it. And those
9 points, those queries were put back to the assessment
10 staff and they are there in the letter of
11 16th September.
12 Q. Right. And that was the extent of your knowledge of
13 comments or unhappiness, as it were, in relation to
14 those matters?
15 A. Indeed it was. I received no indication of further
16 unhappiness, either on the part of Dr Jones and his
17 colleague or else in the DIAS.
18 Q. When is the next meeting after 11th September of the
19 JIC?
20 A. The next meeting would have been on the 16th.
21 Q. On the 16th, of the JIC?
22 A. I am sorry, the JIC would have been on the 18th,
23 I think, if I remember ... yes, on 18th September.
24 Q. On 18th September?
25 A. Yes, that is correct. I am sorry, excuse me.

23
1 Q. Was there a discussion about the dossier at that time?
2 A. At the meeting of the 18th September. If I may refer to
3 my notes?
4 Q. Yes, of course.
5 A. Thank you very much. Yes, I attended the meeting on
6 18th September and the Chief of Defence Intelligence
7 being absent on duty. At that meeting the drafting
8 process was very well advanced and the Chairman
9 congratulated or thanked everybody for the
10 contribution --
11 Q. That is Mr Scarlett?
12 A. Yes -- that they were making; and confirming he was
13 intending to pass the document itself to the printers
14 the following day.
15 In the event, that timetable slipped. He also added
16 that a small number of new intelligence reports had been
17 received on a particular issue relating to the dossier,
18 which would need speedy analysis.
19 Q. Was there any more extensive discussion of the dossier
20 than that?
21 A. No, there was not, not to my recollection.
22 Q. You have mentioned some DIS material that was dated
23 16th September. Are you sure about the date?
24 A. Yes. I think what happened was the draft was circulated
25 on 16th September and comments were collected. The

24
1 actual work on preparing the comments went on very late
2 until the evening; and I think that in the event the
3 comments themselves were sent early on the 17th,
4 although I cannot be certain about that at the moment.
5 Q. Can I take you to a document which we have received,
6 which is CAB/33/116.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. This, if we scroll down, says "Executive Summary".
9 A. Correct.
10 Q. Various judgments.
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. You can see halfway down the page:
13 "Executive summary, para 3, 2nd bullet:
14 "The judgment 'has military plans for the use of
15 chemical and biological weapons, some of which could be
16 ready within 45 minutes of an order to use them' is also
17 rather strong since it is based on a single source.
18 'Could say intelligence suggests ...'"
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. That is referring to the executive summary which was
21 produced on 16th September. I have shown you the
22 dossier which was produced.
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. That had had the word "may".
25 A. Yes.

25
1 Q. Executive summary we can see at CAB/11/141. If we then
2 go to page 142 we can see at the second bullet at the
3 top of the page:
4 "Has military plans for the use of chemical weapons,
5 some of which could be ready within 45 minutes of an
6 order to use them."
7 That is what was picked up at CAB/33/116.
8 A. Hmm.
9 Q. What appears to have happened is that on 16th September
10 two documents are produced, the executive summary which
11 says "has" and "ready for use" and the dossier which has
12 the use of the word "may".
13 The Defence Intelligence Staff put in a response on
14 17th September saying: we are not very happy with the
15 executive summary. They do not appear to make any
16 specific point on the dossier point. As you rightly
17 point out, they do not object to the fact it is
18 included.
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. The only other document produced on 16th September is at
21 CAB/11/38. This is a foreword which was not produced by
22 the Intelligence Services so I will not necessarily take
23 you through all of the aspects of it but just show you
24 this is another document being produced on
25 16th September.

26
1 So on 16th September we now have the foreword which
2 is drafted on the Prime Minister's behalf and with his
3 assistance by Mr Campbell.
4 A. Hmm.
5 Q. Then we have the executive summary. We have heard
6 evidence that Mr Scarlett was responsible for that; and
7 we have the dossier itself.
8 A. Hmm.
9 Q. Your response on 17th September, from the DIS, is to
10 point out that the executive summary is too strong.
11 A. Hmm.
12 Q. In fact, there was also another response on
13 17th September, which pointed out that perhaps the
14 dossier was too weak. Can I take you to CAB/11/66?
15 This is a memo dated 17th September from Mr Campbell.
16 If we go to 67 and to point 10, we can see:
17 "On page 17, 2 lines from the bottom, 'may' is
18 weaker than in the summary."
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. On the same day you have the Defence Intelligence Staff
21 putting in its response saying: we are not so happy with
22 the executive summary, we do not mind the dossier. And
23 you have Mr Campbell putting in: we are quite happy with
24 the summary, not so happy with the dossier.
25 A. Yes.

27
1 Q. If you then go on to page 70 you can see the response,
2 which is dated 18th September 2002. This is from
3 Mr Scarlett. If you go over to 71 at 10 you we can see:
4 "The language you queried on the old page 17 has
5 been tightened", which picks up the point in the
6 dossier.
7 A. Hmm.
8 Q. It seems, therefore, that Mr Scarlett was taking
9 on-board the comment from Mr Campbell but not
10 necessarily taking on-board the comment from the Defence
11 Intelligence Staff.
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. Do you know whether or not that caused any unhappiness
14 amongst the Defence Intelligence Staff?
15 A. I think that the Defence Intelligence Staff, as you say,
16 were concerned about the executive summary and its
17 discontinuity with the main text. I put this down to
18 the fact that the executive summary pulled together or
19 reflected not merely recent intelligence which was
20 being -- which was contained in the main text, but also
21 the general context of the new intelligence which had
22 been received, such as knowledge, which we had had for
23 many years, of the capabilities of the Iraqis in their
24 use of chemical weapons and also our knowledge that they
25 had commander control arrangements for the use of these

28
1 weapons in place. These other issues informed the
2 judgment in the executive summary to which the Defence
3 Intelligence Staff were objecting slightly or wanting to
4 modify the wording.
5 Q. On 18th September, after 16th September, the next
6 dossier which is produced appears to be dated
7 19th September in the morning.
8 A. Correct.
9 Q. No-one has had a chance to note that at the
10 18th September JIC meeting.
11 A. Hmm.
12 Q. With that to refresh your memory, was there any
13 discussion on 18th September about the inconsistency or
14 apparent inconsistency between the executive summary and
15 the wording of the dossier?
16 A. At the JIC meeting?
17 Q. Yes.
18 A. Not to my recollection. If I can just track back
19 a little.
20 Q. Yes, of course.
21 A. I apologise. The assessment staff reviewed the text of
22 16th September at a meeting which they chaired, at which
23 the DIS were present. The points raised about the
24 concerns on the executive summary, about the 45 minutes,
25 were raised at that meeting and the argumentation I have

29
1 just deployed to you was used to explain why the
2 executive summary said what it did. This was reported
3 back to me at a meeting which I held, I think, on the
4 afternoon of 17th September.
5 Q. So when was the date of this meeting, then?
6 A. Which meeting? I am sorry.
7 Q. When this inconsistency was being reviewed, as it were.
8 A. At a Cabinet Office assessment staff meeting on
9 17th September.
10 Q. On the 17th?
11 A. Correct.
12 LORD HUTTON: Then, in the light of what you were told at
13 that meeting, you decided to call a meeting yourself, is
14 that correct, Mr Cragg?
15 A. No, my Lord, I was interested in the comments which had
16 been made by the staff on the draft dossier and I wanted
17 to have a session with those who had attended the
18 Cabinet Office meeting to talk through that. That was
19 one purpose of the meeting. A second purpose was that
20 we were expecting, and I think by then --
21 LORD HUTTON: Sorry, you arranged that meeting, did you?
22 A. I did. It was an internal DIS meeting attended by the
23 two directors most concerned, plus those who had
24 attended the meeting in the Cabinet Office.
25 LORD HUTTON: Who were those two directors?

30
1 A. The Director of Global Issues and the Director of
2 Science and Technology, my Lord.
3 LORD HUTTON: Yes, thank you.
4 A. The second purpose of the meeting was to review the way
5 ahead, in the sense that we were expecting there to be
6 a statement in Parliament the following week and we
7 needed to make sure that we were prepared to provide
8 back up for the issuing of that statement. So that, in
9 a sense, was the main purpose of that, the meeting on
10 17th.
11 MR DINGEMANS: What did those who had attended the Cabinet
12 Office assessment tell you about the discussion of the
13 inconsistency that we can see between the documents on
14 16th September?
15 A. They said firstly, on the actual detailed intelligence,
16 recent intelligence underpinning the main text and
17 partly the executive summary, that the Secret
18 Intelligence Service, SIS, were satisfied that the
19 source was established and reliable and they were --
20 they supported the reporting, which had itself already
21 been included in a JIC assessment on 9th September.
22 Q. I do not want to ask you about the wording of the recent
23 intelligence.
24 A. No.
25 Q. Or indeed where it had come from.

31
1 A. Right.
2 Q. But is this right: the recent intelligence did not deal
3 with the 45 minute issue?
4 A. It did.
5 Q. It did?
6 A. Yes. If I could just track back again. My staff also
7 reported to me there had been a discussion, as I say, of
8 the general context in which the new intelligence had
9 appeared which convinced them that it was quite
10 reasonable to take the line they did in the executive
11 summary concerning the likelihood or the capability of
12 the Iraqis to deploy weapons of mass destruction within
13 45 minutes of a decision to do so.
14 LORD HUTTON: Mr Cragg, did part of this discussion relate
15 to the point that I think Dr Jones had been concerned
16 that the intelligence about the 45 minutes claim was
17 single sourced, but then, as I follow the evidence, the
18 SIS, at the meeting that you conducted or at the meeting
19 in which you took part, said that they were satisfied
20 about the reliability of that source? Was that what
21 occurred? Have I understood it correctly?
22 A. SIS were present at the Cabinet Office meeting, my Lord.
23 At that point -- I was not there myself, but
24 I understand from my staff that there was a discussion
25 on the validity of the source, which would almost

32
1 certainly have included whether it was single source.
2 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
3 A. And the answer, I think, on the single source issue is
4 that, as I believe Mr Scarlett said in his first
5 appearance, my Lord, that single source clearly has to
6 be looked at with some care; but this was a known
7 sourced, established and reliable with a good reporting
8 record. And the statements he was making, the
9 intelligence he was providing was well in context of
10 known Iraqi approaches.
11 LORD HUTTON: Yes. I see. Yes.
12 A. So in that sense -- I think Mr Scarlett said it fairly
13 clearly -- there were no qualms about including this
14 reporting.
15 LORD HUTTON: I see. Yes. Thank you.
16 MR DINGEMANS: What was your understanding about ownership
17 of the dossier --
18 LORD HUTTON: Just before you ask that, may I ask you: at
19 the conclusion of the meeting which you attended, and
20 you had knowledge that Dr Jones and his staff were
21 concerned about the wording relating to the 45 minutes
22 claim, what was your conclusion about the validity of
23 their concerns?
24 A. I felt, my Lord, bearing in mind the views expressed by
25 SIS and supported by the assessment staff, that their

33
1 concerns had been dealt with satisfactorily. That was
2 my judgment.
3 LORD HUTTON: Yes. I see. Yes. Yes.
4 MR DINGEMANS: And your view was then made known to the two
5 directors who had attended?
6 A. We discussed this round my table, so they knew.
7 Q. The Director for Science and Technology was the line
8 manager for Dr Jones, is that right?
9 A. He was, correct.
10 Q. I was turning to the issue of ownership of the dossier.
11 Was the word "ownership" ever used at the time, as far
12 as you were aware?
13 A. I find this very difficult to remember. It was very
14 clear though that the management of the dossier was
15 being carried through by John Scarlett.
16 Q. Can you help with a document, which is CAB/27/2, which
17 is dated 18th September. We can see if we go down to
18 CAB/27/3 at the bottom -- perhaps even 27/4, sorry.
19 Yes. 18th September 2002. Going back then to CAB/27/2,
20 having dated that document, and scrolling down to
21 ownership of the dossier. A document or a memorandum
22 dated 18th September appears to state:
23 "Ownership of the dossier.
24 "Ownership lay with No. 10."
25 If we scroll up to the top of the record of the

34
1 meeting, this appears to be a meeting which was held,
2 one infers, on 18th September because it says:
3 "The following main points were agreed at a meeting
4 held in John Scarlett's office..."
5 Were you present at that meeting at all?
6 A. No.
7 Q. So the extent that the meeting is concerned you
8 obviously cannot assist us?
9 A. No.
10 Q. Do you know whether anything was said about ownership
11 before or after 19 September?
12 A. I cannot immediately think of anything. My basic
13 understanding was that John Scarlett was in charge --
14 had ownership of the dossier and operated -- worked his
15 ownership through the medium of the Cabinet Office
16 assessment staff, the main drafters.
17 Q. We have heard of the drafts that were produced
18 10th/11th September, 16th September, then 19th. The
19 19th September appears to have been distributed early in
20 the morning. Do you know if there was any sort of
21 deadline for responses?
22 A. Yes. To my recollection it was 15.00, 3 o'clock in the
23 afternoon, but that is the memory.
24 Q. Right. We have also seen, so I will not take you back
25 to it, a series of comments that were passed by DIS.

35
1 A. Correct.
2 Q. At this stage, were you aware of anything following your
3 meeting with the head of GI and head of science and
4 technology about unhappiness with the 45 minutes claim?
5 A. No, I was not at that stage, although later in the day
6 it became clear.
7 Q. How did it become clear later in the day?
8 A. When I received a copy of Dr Jones' minute of
9 19th September.
10 Q. Can I take you to that, which is MoD/22/1.
11 Dr Jones has given evidence about this. The
12 distribution says:
13 "MA/DCDI."
14 I imagine that means it came to you?
15 A. It came to my office and was given to me.
16 Q. Dr Jones has given evidence about this. He says at (1)
17 that:
18 "A number of people have been involved in the
19 generation of the Iraq dossier which has involved
20 a number of iterations.
21 "It is my understanding that some of the
22 intelligence has not been made available to my branch."
23 A. That is correct.
24 Q. He must have picked that up following the meeting you
25 had had with his director.

36
1 A. Yes. I specifically asked his director to make it clear
2 that some intelligence, not on the 45 minutes but on the
3 production issue, was not available to them because it
4 was being held on a very small circle to which he was
5 not party and, indeed, nor was I.
6 Q. So the recent intelligence was not on the 45 minutes
7 issue?
8 A. No, it was on chemical and biological weapons
9 production.
10 Q. Right. Was that the recent intelligence that had been
11 referred to at the Cabinet Office assessment meeting,
12 that was the genesis of your subsequent meeting?
13 A. Well, my subsequent meeting covered two issues on this
14 matter; firstly, the 45 minutes and secondly, the
15 question of new intelligence, recent intelligence on the
16 production of chemical and biological weapons. So there
17 were the two issues.
18 Q. Sorry to interrupt.
19 A. I was going to say, at the meeting chaired by the
20 Cabinet Office on the 17th it was agreed that the SIS
21 representative would make further representations to us
22 about this material. In the event, he spoke to my
23 Director of Science and Technology, who then himself
24 spoke to Dr Jones to explain, firstly, that this was
25 very tightly held intelligence and, secondly, SIS

37
1 believed that it was good intelligence.
2 Q. Right. But that recent intelligence was not 45 minutes
3 intelligence?
4 A. No, it was not. No. The 45 minutes intelligence came
5 in, to my recollection, on 30th August.
6 Q. Yes. We have heard other evidence it came in at the end
7 of August.
8 A. Indeed, yes.
9 Q. Then we have seen the two assessments.
10 A. It was assessed, yes.
11 Q. The 5th and 9th September.
12 A. Yes, the draft on the 5th and the final on the 9th.
13 To continue, he certainly saw Dr Jones. I cannot be
14 precise when, it was probably on the 17th or the 18th,
15 to explain where we stood on the production issue.
16 Q. Dr Jones' director?
17 A. Yes, he did.
18 Q. Yes.
19 A. I think, from Dr Jones' own testimony, that there was
20 discussion of the dossier in general. But I am afraid I
21 cannot give any further advice on that.
22 Q. We have seen this document, 19th September, when
23 Dr Jones has commented on it.
24 A. Hmm.
25 Q. He says he had only been moved to write it, a document

38
1 similar to this, I think he said once or perhaps twice
2 before in his 13 years as an intelligence assessor.
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Is this strong language for intelligence personnel?
5 A. Yes. I was quite surprised to receive the minute,
6 because we had gone -- we had tried to explain what the
7 situation was, certainly on the production issue and, as
8 far as I can tell also perhaps, although I am not
9 certain, on the 45 minutes.
10 Q. And having received a document that surprised you, what
11 did you do as a result of that?
12 A. Well, it arrived late on 19th September. I cannot be
13 sure, but it would have been my normal practice to try
14 to discuss it with him, but I did not. I think, and I
15 cannot be sure about this, because by then he had left
16 the office and I was faced with the document itself.
17 Q. Were you given another version after 19th September?
18 A. Of the dossier?
19 Q. Yes.
20 A. There was another version on the 20th, but I was on
21 leave on the 20th September. What I was referring to
22 was I found myself with Dr Jones' minute, which I had to
23 decide what to do with.
24 Q. So, for the reasons you have given, you do not do
25 anything about it on the 19th?

39
1 A. Oh I did.
2 Q. Sorry?
3 A. In the sense that I reflected on Dr Jones' concerns and
4 decided that on the issues he raised I was satisfied
5 with the actual text of the dossier, which I had in
6 front of me. I can expand further if you wish.
7 Q. Yes, please do.
8 A. Dr Jones, quite rightly -- I have no problems with him
9 raising issues, indeed I have always encouraged debate
10 in the DIS on these issues. On the question that --
11 I took the view that on the question of the 45 minutes
12 and of the chemical weapons production, this had already
13 been considered at length with the Cabinet Office in
14 their meeting of 17th September and that I was satisfied
15 with the decisions reached and consequently with the
16 wording of the dossier at that point.
17 On the other issues raised, which I think relate to
18 the importance attached to the possession of chemical
19 weapons, the absence of proof that they are seen as a --
20 they are not seen, excuse me, as a weapon of last
21 resort. And the absence of proof, definitive proof,
22 that efforts are being made to conceal them. I took the
23 view that on each of those there had been much
24 intelligence over the years, not merely in the past few
25 weeks but over a long period, which sustained the view

40
1 taken in the dossier.
2 LORD HUTTON: Did you consider, Mr Cragg, whether you should
3 report Dr Jones' concerns to the Chief of Defence
4 Intelligence or to the JIC? In a sense, I think you
5 have perhaps given an explanation already, but I would
6 just like you to respond to that particular question, if
7 you would, please.
8 A. Well, certainly, my Lord, the Chief of Defence
9 Intelligence, who was not in the office on the Thursday,
10 was in the office on the Friday and himself took a view
11 on Dr Jones' concerns. No doubt you will hear from him
12 on that point.
13 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
14 A. On the question of approaching the Chairman of the JIC,
15 I took the view that since all of the issues had either
16 been discussed with the Cabinet Office or were well
17 within the general thrust of known intelligence that it
18 was not necessary to raise the issue with Mr Scarlett.
19 If I had done, I am as sure as I can be that he would
20 have asked: what is the view of yourself and the Chief
21 of Defence Intelligence on this issue?
22 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Thank you.
23 MR DINGEMANS: On 20th September there was another document
24 which was produced. Can I take you to CAB/33/114? We
25 can see the date of that top left-hand corner.

41
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. It says this: "Iraq Dossier", at A a memo dated
3 19th September 2002. And then the draft issued on
4 20th September.
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. We can see from what A is from paragraph 1:
7 "At reference A Bryan Jones recorded concerns of his
8 branch ..."
9 We know that is the document we have just looked at.
10 A. Correct.
11 Q. "I have now seen the draft issued today and although one
12 of the points referred to in reference A [has] been
13 addressed, others remain. The 20th September draft
14 still includes a number of statements which are not
15 supported by the evidence available to me. I have set
16 out below my concerns about CW aspects of the paper
17 since this is my area of responsibility."
18 Then he goes through the Prime Minister's foreword
19 and he makes two comments on that, scrolling down the
20 page, concluding with:
21 "And the document discloses that his military
22 planning allows for some of the WMD to be ready within
23 45 minutes of an order to use them."
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. He says this:

42
1 "A similar statement appears in the dossier. This
2 is reported as fact whereas the intelligence comes from
3 a single source. In my view the intelligence warrants
4 no stronger a statement than 'intelligence suggests that
5 military planning allows...'"
6 Then over the page, to 115, he talks about the
7 executive summary.
8 A. Hmm, hmm, hmm.
9 Q. And a number of points continuing to the bottom of the
10 page.
11 A. Hmm.
12 Q. For perfectly understandable reasons we have the bottom
13 blanked out. I am sure you know who was the person who
14 sent this memo.
15 A. I do, yes.
16 Q. But this appears to be a separate memo from the memo
17 sent by Dr Jones.
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. One memo might perhaps be understandable. Is two
20 beginning to indicate a pattern?
21 A. First of all, if I could say that I was absent from the
22 office on 20th September, so I did not see this
23 document.
24 In terms of patterns or trends, I think not really,
25 in the sense that the views of Dr Jones were being

43
1 informed, quite rightly, in part by the individual who
2 wrote this, the expert who wrote this text. So it is
3 not as if they are approaching the issue from two
4 different angles. This is reinforcing what was already
5 there.
6 Q. I do not want to know the name of the individual but is
7 this an individual we have heard evidence from as Mr A?
8 A. No.
9 LORD HUTTON: Without naming him, was he a member of
10 Dr Jones' section?
11 A. Yes, he was, my Lord.
12 LORD HUTTON: And Dr Jones was his superior?
13 A. Superior, yes, my Lord.
14 LORD HUTTON: Yes, I see. Yes.
15 MR DINGEMANS: Can I also ask this: I asked about Dr Jones'
16 reaction or description of his memo. He said: very
17 unusual, I think 2 or 3 times in the 13 year period.
18 This memo seems to be in broadly similar language to
19 that of Dr Jones; is that fair?
20 A. Yes, I think so, broadly similar.
21 Q. When did you first see this memo of 20th September?
22 A. To my recollection, this is going back a year, I believe
23 I only saw it when I came into the office earlier this
24 week to review the papers.
25 Q. Right. If you had seen it at the time, would that have

44
1 altered the view that you had taken for the reasons that
2 you have already given?
3 A. I do not think so, because it covers the same ground in
4 terms of the 45 minutes and in terms of the production,
5 both of which were underpinned by intelligence to which
6 SIS attached importance and both of which were within
7 the general trend of known intelligence.
8 Q. You go on leave, I think, on the evening of
9 19th September.
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. Do you return before the dossier is published?
12 A. No, I returned the following Wednesday, the day after it
13 was published.
14 Q. Which must be 25th September.
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. And so you have no further involvement in the steps
17 leading up to publication?
18 A. No, I did not.
19 Q. Can I then just ask you to look at something that was
20 said by the Foreign Affairs Committee about the
21 45 minutes claim? It is at FAC/3/28.
22 If we scroll down, they refer to what Dr Inch had
23 said, someone writing in The Times, Bronwen Maddox, and
24 what the Foreign Secretary had said. They say at the
25 bottom:

45
1 "This answer begs the question why the 45 minutes
2 claim was highlighted by the Prime Minister when he
3 presented the dossier to the House, and why it was given
4 such prominence in the dossier itself, being mentioned
5 no fewer than four times, including in the
6 Prime Minister's foreword and in the executive summary?
7 We have not seen a satisfactory answer to that question.
8 We have been told that the entire document, including
9 the executive summary, was prepared by the Chairman of
10 the JIC, except for the foreword, which he approved. We
11 node with disappointment that we were unable to find out
12 why Mr Scarlett chose to give the 45 minutes claim such
13 prominence, as we have been prevented from questioning
14 him."
15 Did you think that the 45 minutes claim was given
16 undue prominence in the dossier?
17 A. Bearing in mind the structure of the dossier I think
18 not, in the sense that it was mentioned in the main body
19 and then picked up in the executive summary and then
20 referred to in the foreword. It was an important piece
21 of intelligence, but I am not surprised that it was
22 mentioned four times because of the way that the dossier
23 was structured.
24 Q. I am afraid we have not yet been able to scan in the
25 Intelligence and Security Committee report. Have you

46
1 had a chance to read that?
2 A. I have seen the conclusions and recommendations.
3 Q. If I can read it out. Sorry you do not have it in front
4 you have. At paragraph 108 they talk about the drafting
5 process and they note that the JIC Chairman stated
6 unequivocally he did not feel under any pressure and
7 said the document was not sexed up by Alastair Campbell.
8 At paragraph 109 they say Mr Campbell did not chair
9 meetings on intelligence matters.
10 At paragraph 110, to put it in context, the use of
11 the phrase "continued to produce chemical and biological
12 weapons" in the foreword and the absence of detail on
13 amounts of agents produced could give the impression he
14 was actively producing both chemical and biological
15 weapons. They comment on that.
16 A. Hmm.
17 Q. They say in paragraph 111 "not considered a current or
18 imminent threat."
19 At 112 they say this, I am sorry to give you the
20 context but it is not in front of you:
21 "The dossier was for public consumption and not for
22 experienced readers of intelligence material. The
23 45 minutes claim, included four times, was always likely
24 to attract attention because it was arresting detail
25 that the public had not seen before. As the 45 minutes

47
1 claim was new to its readers, the context of the
2 intelligence and any assessment needed to be explained.
3 The fact that it was assessed to refer to battlefield
4 chemical and biological munitions and their movement on
5 the battlefield, not to any other form of chemical or
6 biological attack, should have been highlighted in the
7 dossier. The omission of the context and assessment
8 allowed speculation as to its exact meaning. This was
9 unhelpful to an understanding of this issue."
10 Would you agree with that paragraph that I have read
11 in full?
12 A. I am trying to think back to the actual text of the
13 intelligence report itself.
14 Q. Can I help you, rather than test your memory, and take
15 you to CAB/17/3. This is the redacted assessments.
16 (Pause). Having had a chance to read that memorandum --
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. -- would you agree with the paragraph that was written
19 by the Intelligence and Security Committee?
20 A. Well, I think it was very difficult at the time because
21 the intelligence did not go into great detail, to my
22 recollection, on the types of weapons, to go much beyond
23 what was actually in the intelligence without
24 speculating. So I think it was a best effort on the
25 available information. I am not trying to pass the

48
1 buck, but I do think that John Scarlett may be able to
2 help you more on this because he was party to the
3 precise formulation.
4 Q. Right. Mr Scarlett has already given some evidence.
5 A. Yes. But certainly, just to complete it, I was
6 satisfied that the text of the dossier reflected both
7 the intelligence itself and the JIC assessment which
8 appeared on 9th September.
9 Q. Can I take you to a document, SJW/1/39? These are
10 comments said to have been recorded from Dr Kelly to
11 Ms Watts. If we look at 39 and scroll halfway down the
12 page, Dr Kelly said this:
13 "You have to remember I'm not part of the
14 intelligence community -- I'm a user of intelligence.
15 Of course I'm very familiar with a lot of it, that's why
16 I'm asked to comment on it. But I'm not deeply embedded
17 into that xxx. So some of it I really can't comment
18 because I don't know whether it's single sourced or
19 not."
20 He is asked:
21 "But on the 45 minutes."
22 He said this:
23 "Oh that I knew because I knew the concern about the
24 statement. It was a statement that was made and it just
25 got out of all proportion. You know someone. They were

49
1 desperate for information. They were pushing hard for
2 information which could be released. That was one that
3 popped up and it was seized on, and it was unfortunate
4 that it was, which is why there is the argument between
5 the intelligence services and cabinet office/number ten,
6 because things were picked up on, and once they've
7 picked up on it you can't pull it back, that's the
8 problem."
9 From your involvement in the process, would you say
10 what Dr Kelly had said there was accurate?
11 A. No, I do not think so, on the grounds that the dossier
12 reflected the JIC assessments on the recent
13 intelligence; and the JIC assessments were an accurate
14 reflection, put into context, of the intelligence
15 itself. So it was a flow of perfectly reputable
16 intelligence conveyed by the assessment staff and
17 ourselves into the JIC assessment and thence into the
18 dossier.
19 Q. Can I take you to CAB/23/15, which is a memo of
20 11th September. I think you may have seen this or seen
21 reference to it before. This was a memo which, if we
22 scroll down, says:
23 "We have now received comments back from No. 10 on
24 the first draft of the dossier [which is the 10th/11th].
25 Unsurprisingly they have further questions and areas

50
1 they would like expanded."
2 Then they relate those. At the bottom,
3 prepenultimate, they say this:
4 "I appreciate everyone, us included, has been around
5 at least some of these buoys before, particularly
6 item 4. But No. 10 through the Chairman want the
7 document to be as strong as possible within the bounds
8 of available intelligence. This is therefore a last(!)
9 call for any items of intelligence that agencies think
10 can and should be included."
11 A. Hmm.
12 Q. Was that a document that you saw at the time?
13 A. No, I did not. No.
14 Q. Were you aware of a perception amongst members of your
15 staff that they were being pressed, as it were, for any
16 intelligence that would make the case to be presented in
17 the dossier stronger?
18 A. I was aware of what you might call general grumbles in
19 my staff that they were being -- that they were involved
20 in an exercise which involved multiple drafting and was
21 an attempt to try and ensure that the draft was as
22 accurate as possible, in terms of the intelligence, but
23 also a telling public document.
24 Q. Can I go back to SJW/1/39 and pick up below the answer
25 that I have just referred to. Ms Watts asked this:

51
1 "But it was against your advice that they should
2 publish it?
3 "I wouldn't go as strongly as to say that particular
4 bit, because I was not involved in the assessment of it,
5 no. I can't say that it was against MY advice. I was
6 uneasy with it. I mean my problem was I could give
7 other explanations, which I've indicated to you, that it
8 was the time to erect something like a scud missile or
9 it was the time to fill a 40 barrel, multibarrel rocket
10 launcher.
11 "45 minutes might well be important and -- I mean I
12 have no idea who debriefed this guy. Quite often it's
13 someone who has no idea of the topic and the information
14 comes through and people then use it as they see fit."
15 At 40 at the top of the page:
16 "So it wasn't as if there were lots of people saying
17 don't put it in don't put it in, it's just it was in
18 there and seized upon -- rather than number ten
19 specifically going against?
20 "Dr Kelly: There were lots of people saying that --
21 I mean it was an interesting week before the dossier was
22 put out because there were so many things in there that
23 people were saying well we're not so sure about that, or
24 in fact they were happy with it being in but not
25 expressed the way that it was, because you know the

52
1 wordsmithing is actually quite important, and the
2 intelligence community are a pretty cautious lot on the
3 whole but once you get people putting it/presenting it
4 for public consumption then of course they use different
5 words. I don't think they're being wilfully dishonest
6 I think they just think that's the way the public will
7 appreciate it best. I'm sure you have the same problem
8 as a journalist, don't you? Sometimes you've got to put
9 things into words that the public will understand."
10 The comments Dr Kelly is reported as having said
11 there, would you say that those were accurate?
12 A. I think they go far beyond what my understanding was of
13 the concerns expressed by my staff, which came down to
14 two individuals commenting about two specific issues.
15 I think that is all I can say on that.
16 Q. Or perhaps even -- two individuals who do it in writing?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. And a third individual I think we have heard of through
19 the video link.
20 A. Yes, who did not work for me.
21 Q. Sorry, who did not work for you but came in at least to
22 one meeting?
23 A. Yes, yes. If I could say on this as a sort of general
24 contextual point, that is I was, myself, perfectly
25 satisfied with the way in which the drafting of the

53
1 document, the dossier, was taking place under the
2 management of the assessment staff, supervised by
3 John Scarlett. I am quite sure, from having read the
4 dossier many times, it does not go beyond the remit, as
5 it were, of available intelligence.
6 Q. We have heard reference to the wordsmithing that has
7 been used.
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Indeed we have seen a number of documents in which
10 specific suggestions are made. I showed you the
11 memorandum that was produced at CAB/11/66, which was
12 comments made by Mr Campbell. Perhaps I can just show
13 you that again.
14 A. Hmm.
15 Q. You can see:
16 "Please find below a number of drafting points."
17 He goes over the page to detailed comments on the
18 draft.
19 A. Hmm.
20 Q. I think you have seen that document and Mr Scarlett's
21 response?
22 A. Hmm.
23 Q. Are those the sort of comments that one might see made
24 by persons assessing intelligence?
25 A. Well, to take one particular point, 6, "vivid and

54
1 horrifying", those are the sort of words which are not
2 used in the preparation of intelligence assessments.
3 What you would expect in preparing the assessments is to
4 ensure the text is aligned as effectively as possible
5 with the intelligence and that any background
6 contextualising information is accurate and valid, both
7 from the sense of assessments already made and in terms
8 of the language used, to ensure that it is actually
9 accurate, in the sense of gallons of toxin or whatever.
10 Q. But going back to this document --
11 A. Yes, I am sorry.
12 Q. -- we have seen your personnel writing: you should not
13 use "shows", you should say "indicates".
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. Here we can see someone saying "may" is weaker than the
16 summary, "could" is weak, et cetera.
17 A. I see what you mean, I beg your pardon, yes.
18 Q. With that context, would you say this is similar to the
19 task that was being carried out by those assessing the
20 intelligence?
21 A. On some issues or on the presentational issues, which is
22 what I think Alastair Campbell was interested in, then
23 by definition almost there will be arguments about what
24 words you can use and how far they are acceptable in the
25 sense of reflecting the intelligence. So in that sense,

55
1 yes.
2 Q. What was your own view of whether or not Mr Campbell,
3 for example, should have been making these types of
4 comments?
5 A. Well, if I may say so I did not know at the time that
6 Mr Campbell was commenting on the text.
7 Q. Right. So any view would be only with the benefit of
8 hindsight?
9 A. Yes, indeed.
10 Q. With that qualification?
11 A. I have no problems about Mr Campbell making proposals on
12 the presentational side of the dossier, provided that it
13 does not go beyond the intelligence underpinning the
14 dossier itself.
15 Q. What were your exact dealings with Dr Kelly? I think
16 you have told us that you were aware that he came into
17 Dr Jones' section. Did you have any other personal
18 dealings with him?
19 A. If I may say so, I had no personal dealings with
20 Dr Kelly at all. I did not know of him until his name
21 became public.
22 Q. Right. And you did not see any documents which he
23 produced for your purposes at all?
24 A. I did not, no.
25 Q. Is there anything else surrounding the circumstances of

56
1 Dr Kelly's death that you can assist his Lordship with?
2 A. I do not think so, my Lord. If I could make a couple of
3 points in conclusion which do not relate to the specific
4 circumstances of the death of Dr Kelly.
5 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
6 A. That is that in my view, from my perspective, the
7 dossier was prepared and produced by a rigorous process
8 of drafting. I myself saw what you might call the
9 rolling draft as being the principal means by which the
10 JIC membership, the individuals, contributed to and
11 exercised influence over the process. It is certainly
12 the case that as drafting proceeded, some points were
13 accepted and some were not. That is the nature of
14 drafting of course. But I am quite sure, in my own
15 mind, that the reasons for accepting or rejecting were
16 rational and good reasons, it was not done in an
17 arbitrary way.
18 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
19 A. I and my senior managers were satisfied with the
20 outcome. I have no reason to believe that
21 Air Marshall French himself was not personally satisfied
22 with the outcome. If I had not been satisfied, I would
23 have said so.
24 One further point, if I may; and that is I would
25 like to extend, on my behalf and I am sure also on

57
1 behalf of my former colleagues in the DIS, our deepest
2 sympathy to Mrs Kelly and her family.
3 LORD HUTTON: Thank you very much indeed Mr Cragg.
4 A. Thank you, my Lord.
5 LORD HUTTON: This might be a convenient time for a short
6 break.
7 (12.05 pm)
8 (Short Break)
9 (12.10 pm)
10 AIR MARSHALL JOSEPH CHARLES FRENCH (called)
11 Examined by MR DINGEMANS
12 MR DINGEMANS: Could you tell his Lordship your full name.
13 A. Yes. My full name is Joseph Charles French.
14 Q. Your current occupation?
15 A. I am a serving officer in the Royal Air Force and I am
16 Commander in Chief of our personnel and training command
17 in the Royal Air Force. I was previously Chief of
18 Defence Intelligence from November 2000 to April 17th
19 this year.
20 Q. So that took in the period of time that the dossier was
21 published?
22 A. Yes, it did.
23 Q. Can you give an outline of your role as Chief of Defence
24 Intelligence?
25 A. I answered to the Permanent Secretary, Sir Kevin Tebbit,

58
1 and the Chief of Defence Staff. As you are probably
2 aware, the Ministry of Defence covers two functions; one
3 is a department of state and the other is the senior
4 military headquarters within Her Majesty's armed forces.
5 As such we were collecting and analysing intelligence to
6 actually inform deployed operations, also to help in
7 determining future equipment programmes and also in the
8 formulation of policy within the department.
9 Q. Did you sit on any Committees as a result of your role
10 as Chief of Defence Intelligence?
11 A. Yes. Specifically, within the context of this hearing,
12 the Joint Intelligence Committee and I was one of the
13 two Deputy Chairmen of that Committee.
14 Q. When did you become aware that the Government was likely
15 to publish the dossier it did publish in September 2002?
16 A. Obviously there was talk of a different context of
17 a document which dealt with weapons of mass destruction
18 in four countries and associated issues much earlier in
19 last year but eventually, obviously, we led to
20 the September dossier which was printed on
21 24th September.
22 Q. Were you involved in any of the decision-making to
23 decide to publish the dossier?
24 A. Through the body of the Joint Intelligence Committee,
25 yes.

59
1 Q. And what was decided in relation to that? When was the
2 first meeting that discussed the publication of the
3 dossier?
4 A. I am not sure I could actually give a date where it was
5 put in such explicit terms; but obviously the agenda was
6 set for the Joint Intelligence Committee, which I played
7 a full part in through various situations on the dossier
8 leading up to its printing.
9 Q. We have heard that the Prime Minister announced on
10 3rd September that the dossier was to be published. Had
11 the Joint Intelligence Committee discussed the dossier
12 on dates before that?
13 A. In that it had been a rolling process from, as I say,
14 earlier in the year, I think April, but explicitly in
15 the terms, again I am not sure when we would have been
16 told explicitly that. The next meeting after that date,
17 the 3rd, was obviously the following day, on the
18 Wednesday, which is the weekly Joint Intelligence
19 Committee meeting day.
20 Q. Did you attend the meeting on 4th September?
21 A. Yes, and also the meeting on 11th September.
22 Q. Was there any discussion about the announcement that had
23 been made the preceding day by the Prime Minister?
24 A. I have not seen the minutes of that but I would be very
25 surprised if it had not come up under Any Other Business

60
1 that we would have been told explicitly by the Chairman,
2 Sir John Scarlett.
3 Q. Do you recollect any discussion about the dossier?
4 A. No, I do not, not on that day.
5 Q. What was your involvement between 4th and 11th September
6 in the drafting of the dossier?
7 A. We had several iterations of the dossier and I saw all
8 of those; and through the Director of Global Issues who
9 was coordinating across the DIAS at the director level
10 I gave him my own views on part of the structure and
11 some of the information that was actually in the various
12 drafts in the dossier.
13 Q. On 10th September, a document which is at CAB/33/131, if
14 I can show you this.
15 The first draft of the dossier on 5th September did
16 not include any part relating to the role of the JIC
17 et cetera. But if you look at this document scrolling
18 down in paragraph 1:
19 "Some of you will have seen Alastair Campbell's note
20 to me of 9th September setting out the broad, proposed
21 structure for the 'dossier' on Iraqi WMD which is now
22 under active presentation. Alastair did not refer to an
23 additional section, which I have agreed with him, would
24 be considered for inclusion in the 'dossier'. This
25 would give an account of the JIC assessment of

61
1 developments in Iraqi WMD programmes since UNSCOM
2 inspectors were withdrawn in late 1998. On present
3 plans, within the dossier, it would follow the section
4 setting out the intelligence based account of what the
5 Iraqis had been doing since late 1998..."
6 Were you aware of any of those discussions leading
7 up to that memorandum?
8 A. Obviously through the memorandum, which came to me, yes.
9 Q. Yes.
10 A. But given Alastair Campbell's role in the presentation
11 then it does not surprise me, nor the comments from
12 John Scarlett. That was very much consistent with the
13 discussion in the JIC on the 11th, where we were at
14 pains to make sure the dossier reflected assessed
15 intelligence and assessed the intelligence available to
16 us.
17 Q. Now, we have heard from Mr Cragg, who was not present on
18 11th, but you were?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. What was discussed in relation to the dossier on
21 11th September?
22 A. There were three broad issues I recall. One was that we
23 were broadly content with the way the drafting process
24 was going forward. The second, reiterating the point
25 I just made now, was to make sure that it was based on

62
1 intelligence. The third issue was that it would be
2 appropriate at some point to actually share the nature
3 of the drafting the process and what was coming out in
4 the dossier with Ann Taylor, who was Chairman of the
5 ISC.
6 Q. We have seen some e-mails that passed between Mrs Taylor
7 and the Cabinet Office in that respect.
8 A. Thank you.
9 Q. Did you discuss the detail of the dossier?
10 A. No. In that it was an ongoing process and, as has been
11 described before, particularly in Dr Jones' transcript,
12 which I have read obviously, that we had a process
13 surrounding JIC meetings and assessments that would
14 allow the staff first to be involved with the assessment
15 staff to prepare a draft for members of the JIC; and
16 certainly in the case of the Defence Intelligence Staff,
17 its staff rather than services, we met probably late
18 morning on the Wednesdays ahead of the meetings to
19 actually go through any of the issues that the staff
20 felt were not appropriately resolved by the assessment
21 staffs at the current intelligence group, then I would
22 decide whether it was appropriate or not to pursue those
23 with the Committee itself later in the day.
24 LORD HUTTON: With whom would you meet on those occasions,
25 Air Marshall?

63
1 A. It would be very much the individual specialist staffs
2 who were dealing with the specific issues. If I could
3 reiterate a point made earlier by Mr Cragg, that whilst
4 Dr Jones was an expert in his own particular field, he
5 was one of many who were contributing to the overall
6 discussion of the dossier on the part of the DIS and
7 indeed the intelligence community as a whole.
8 MR DINGEMANS: In terms of the 45 minutes claim, that
9 related primarily to the area in which Dr Jones was the
10 expert; is that fair?
11 A. No, I would say that it came across the piece and that
12 the technical aspects would be his, but in terms of
13 dealing with tactics for employment or the doctrine for
14 employment that would fall in another part of the
15 defence analysis staff. Also, again, I think we have to
16 remind ourselves that these were issues we had been
17 dealing with for many many years, and also that the
18 Iraqis had used these weapons in the past, and put in
19 a military context, that you could have various
20 readiness states, the ultimate being instant readiness.
21 I am afraid as a military man the fact that 45 minutes
22 was mentioned does not surprise me at all within this
23 consideration.
24 Q. Why is that?
25 A. Well, in that you could go -- they had used military

64
1 weapons or weapons of mass destruction in the past and
2 that if you went to instant readiness, which is one of
3 our states, and knowing their tactics and doctrine, then
4 it could well have been, in certain circumstances, that
5 the Iraqis themselves would have been on an instant
6 readiness state.
7 Q. After the meeting of 11th September, did you attend any
8 other JIC meetings before the dossier was published?
9 A. No, I was not in office on the 18th and was represented
10 by Mr Cragg, who is a member of the JIC himself.
11 Q. And we have heard from Mr Cragg.
12 A. Yes, you have. Yes.
13 Q. On 11th September you say you had a meeting beforehand
14 to discuss any issues that had been raised. On 10th to
15 11th September there is the first draft of the dossier,
16 which is produced after the 45 minutes claim has been
17 finally assessed by the JIC. Was the 45 minutes claim
18 raised at that stage?
19 A. Not in the JIC on the 11th, no.
20 Q. Was it raised in the meeting with you beforehand?
21 A. I am not aware at this stage. Obviously the assessment
22 went through. It could well have been brought to my
23 attention, but I would have not been surprised nor do
24 I go against the mention of 45 minutes.
25 Q. If it had been mentioned to you, would you have raised

65
1 it at the Joint Intelligence Committee?
2 A. No, because from a military perspective the 45 minutes
3 is something that I would fully understand that in
4 certain circumstances forces could be well able of
5 actually starting to deliver systems within that
6 timeframe.
7 Q. When did you become aware of any unhappiness or concerns
8 about the 45 minutes claims within members of the
9 Defence Intelligence Staff?
10 A. Well, the concern came out when I returned to the office
11 on the morning of the 20th, where I was shown Dr Jones'
12 minute, which you have obviously shown to Mr Cragg
13 earlier in the morning.
14 Q. Were you aware of any earlier comments on the 45 minutes
15 claim? For example, CAB/33/134 which is dated
16 17th September. If we scroll down that. Sorry I think
17 that must be a rogue reference. I will come back to
18 that one.
19 On 17th September, we have seen a document this
20 morning whereby the Defence Intelligence Staff reported
21 on the draft of 16th September. Were you aware of that?
22 A. Without specifically looking at the document, I
23 cannot --
24 Q. You were away on 18th September?
25 A. I was away on the 18th. But obviously the nature of all

66
1 that was going on at the moment, you have to remember we
2 had been in operations through Afghanistan and a whole
3 range of issues that we actually deal with, that I was
4 in regular contact with the office and I got back on the
5 morning of the 19th and was actually shown, in my flat
6 in London, a copy of the draft of the dossier that day.
7 Q. The reference I gave you is 134. Can we try CAB/33/116?
8 This is the letter of 17th September. Did you see that
9 before you went away or was that sent to you?
10 A. (Pause). I am not -- I cannot give a straight answer to
11 that because we saw so many documents relating to it.
12 Obviously I did see, though, Dr Jones' minute and the
13 other minute unnamed which you showed earlier.
14 Q. Yes, this is not that document.
15 A. No.
16 Q. This is, I think, the collection of comments, but --
17 A. It would have been dealt with at the officials level, at
18 the director level, as Mr Cragg has said, with the
19 Directors of Scientific and Technical, Global Issues and
20 others, coordinating on behalf of the DIS.
21 Q. I appreciate that. But this letter is the coordinated
22 letter sent into the Joint Intelligence office
23 assessments staff.
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. We can see, halfway down the page, that there is being

67
1 expressed at this stage, which is 17th September, on
2 behalf of the DIS as a whole, the comment that the
3 45 minutes was rather strong because it is based on
4 a single source. Were you aware, at any time before you
5 saw Dr Jones' memo, of these concerns being expressed
6 more generally?
7 A. No, and I am not sure I would express it in those terms
8 "concerns more generally"; we come back to the process
9 where the staffs were invited to actually put their
10 comments through. It was discussed in detail with the
11 assessment staff, with representations not just from the
12 scientific and technical personnel, which is what you
13 are actually alluding to there, but a range of others
14 who would have been experts in this field, and also
15 those who contributed from the agencies within the Joint
16 Intelligence Committee overall.
17 Q. Is this document here from the science and technology
18 group alone?
19 A. No, it was an amalgam of the comments from across the
20 Defence Intelligence Staff.
21 Q. Which rather suggests, having amalgamated the comments,
22 the Defence Intelligence Staff took the view that the
23 45 minutes claim was, as expressed in the dossier --
24 they have given the dates, 15th September -- rather
25 strong.

68
1 A. In the staff view at that level. Ultimately the
2 document had to be cleared at the Joint Intelligence
3 Committee level and I was content with the wording that
4 appeared in the final draft. I come back to, again,
5 this is a regular process. As Dr Jones' minute makes
6 clear or infers, he had had many of his points actually
7 included in the document and we had actually got down to
8 the last one or two points, which is where I had been
9 informed on the 20th that these issues were still then
10 in the minds of the staff.
11 Q. Right.
12 LORD HUTTON: Air Marshall, when you say it has to be clear
13 at the Joint Intelligence Committee level, do you mean
14 by that at the level of the JIC assessment staff --
15 A. Well, it goes through a twofold process, my Lord. One
16 is for the assessment staff to present the draft, the
17 final draft ultimately on the 20th, to the Joint
18 Intelligence Committee itself. And then ultimately for
19 the Committee members on the part of the Defence
20 Intelligence Staff, myself, to say that I am content
21 with the wording as it stood.
22 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Thank you.
23 MR DINGEMANS: Before we get to the 19th September memo,
24 there was a memo, I think you were in court earlier on
25 this morning when Mr Cragg looked at it, which discussed

69
1 ownership of the dossier. I appreciate it was a meeting
2 you were not at. It was a memo dated 18th September.
3 What were you aware of in relationship to ownership of
4 the dossier?
5 A. The dossier rested with the Joint Intelligence Committee
6 and that was obviously under the chairmanship of
7 Mr Scarlett.
8 Q. At all times?
9 A. At all times.
10 Q. You return from your travels, I think, on
11 20th September.
12 A. 19th. I was back in the office the first thing on the
13 20th. I was in London on the 20th.
14 Q. You did not come into your office?
15 A. No, but I received work, including the dossier, from my
16 office directly to my flat in London.
17 Q. Did you receive Dr Jones' memo at that stage?
18 A. No because, as I understand it now and obviously having
19 gone through the times on it, he did not release it
20 until about 17.00 on that Thursday and I was shown it
21 the next morning when I got into the office.
22 Q. Can we look at that? That is MoD/22/1. I think you
23 were in court earlier on when Mr Cragg saw it.
24 A. Yes, I was.
25 Q. I will not therefore necessarily take you through it, if

70
1 I may. Mr Cragg was going off, I think, on leave for
2 the next week and was away for the next week. So for
3 the reasons he has given he did not do anything about it
4 directly on the evening of the 19th September, and you
5 were dealing with it, he knew, on the morning of the
6 20th September. What did you do with this document?
7 A. I think he said he satisfied himself, Mr Cragg, with the
8 main issues that were actually raised within it.
9 Q. Yes.
10 A. I got this document the next day and, having obviously
11 seen these issues or discussed these sorts of issues in
12 the weeks leading up to this, I come back to the point
13 again that this is heavily qualified in the intelligence
14 that was available to Dr Jones and to people within his
15 particular area of the DIST. And that what I had been
16 through with the directors over the two or so weeks
17 beforehand, that the 45 minutes, I think we have covered
18 already, on some of the chemical and biological weapons
19 issues, the intelligence there was on a very limited
20 distribution; and as you quoted earlier, that the ISC
21 did consider this and, as they put in their own report
22 last Thursday, they fully understood the conclusions
23 that both the DIS and myself in this instance and the
24 JIC came to on that limited distribution intelligence.
25 Q. The limited distribution intelligence did not refer to

71
1 the 45 minutes claim?
2 A. No, it was chemical and biological issues.
3 Q. So to the extent that Dr Jones was making comments about
4 the 45 minutes issue, that was or was not answered by
5 the recent intelligence?
6 A. Not that chemical and biological. There was
7 intelligence which I think was either 29th or
8 30th August which dealt specifically with the
9 45 minutes.
10 Q. We have heard of the reporting of that.
11 A. I have to keep reiterating, Dr Jones more specifically
12 would be looking at the technical aspects of weapons,
13 how they were put together, the effects of actually
14 using them. It would be other parts of the
15 organisation, who certainly had no quibble with the
16 45 minutes, who would also contribute equally well to
17 that discussion.
18 Q. Having seen Dr Jones' memorandum, what did you do as
19 a result of that?
20 A. We were on the 20th, which was the final draft day.
21 Q. Yes.
22 A. And that ultimately I had to make the decision whether
23 or not the DIS was content for the document to go to
24 print; and I was content for it to go to print.
25 Q. Were you sent a copy of the dossier that was produced on

72
1 20th September?
2 A. Yes, I was.
3 Q. Did the JIC meet in committee to approve that dossier on
4 the 20th?
5 A. No, in that we have gone through several iterations and,
6 as is normal Government practice, something that had
7 been in the drafting that long quite often we would have
8 out of committee clearance and sometimes that clearance
9 would be on silence procedures, i.e. if you have not
10 reported by the due date time then it would be
11 recognised that you were content for the document to go
12 forward.
13 Q. So a copy was distributed and it was up to you to make
14 any objections known?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. The other document that we have seen is at CAB/33/114,
17 which is 20th September 2002. Mr Cragg said this came
18 from someone else in Dr Jones' team. It refers to the
19 45 minutes claim. If we look at the bottom of the page
20 you can see --
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. -- the 45 minutes claim.
23 "This is reported as fact whereas the intelligence
24 comes from a single course ... the intelligence warrants
25 no stronger a statement than ... suggests."

73
1 That has come pretty close to the DIS representation
2 that was made on 17th September to the Joint
3 Intelligence office of the assessment staff. What did
4 you do with all those three combinations?
5 A. With those combinations you still ultimately have to
6 decide what is going to go to print. The 45 minutes,
7 the question of single source -- I think again as was
8 covered by the ISC, single sources should not be
9 dismissed. Again Dr Jones', and the other minute here
10 was someone working for him, does have to be set in the
11 broader consideration of this issue. Dr Jones was an
12 expert in his field, but actually determining the
13 dossier overall many other fields had to be considered.
14 Q. I think the ISC report makes that clear. But when you
15 are looking at the language of it, dismissing it would
16 mean not putting it in at all. No-one is suggesting
17 that. What is being suggested --
18 A. It was not dismissed. It would come down to, as has
19 been said several times, wordsmithing. I am afraid
20 I had no difficulty with the language that was used in
21 the final dossier.
22 Q. You were content with that?
23 A. I was content, yes.
24 Q. Did you communicate those views to Dr Jones at all?
25 A. I did not directly; but his director did speak to him

74
1 when he returned the week after the minute of the 20th.
2 Q. And that was how it was dealt with?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Were you around when the dossier was published?
5 A. Yes, I was. Yes.
6 Q. Were you aware of any involvement of Dr Kelly in the
7 dossier?
8 A. Only what I have heard as a result of this Inquiry.
9 I did not know Dr Kelly at all.
10 Q. And had not seen any of his work beforehand?
11 A. No.
12 Q. I have taken Mr Cragg, and you were here so I need not
13 necessarily show you the references again, to passages
14 in the Foreign Affairs Committee report commenting on
15 the 45 minutes claim and also in the Intelligence and
16 Security Committee report commenting on the 45 minutes
17 claim. Is there anything that you wanted to say in
18 relation to those passages?
19 A. No, I have read what the Committees have said.
20 Obviously I gave evidence to the Intelligence and
21 Security Committee twice.
22 Q. You were content with the wording used for the
23 45 minutes claim?
24 A. I have accepted what they put in the report. Again, if
25 you are looking at 45 minutes I think it has to be

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1 understood that the intelligence that we were using in
2 the Defence Intelligence Staff was not just an
3 understanding of what the Iraqi forces may be capable
4 of; we also had to put it in the context of our forces
5 deployed to the region. We had had forces there
6 continuously since 1991, and any potential conflict that
7 might arise with them, we would have to make sure that
8 we had an understanding that was passed on to our armed
9 forces so that they could make the appropriate defensive
10 measures themselves should they come under any sort of
11 attack from these sorts of weapons.
12 Q. Can I just take you to some passages of Mr Gilligan's
13 transcript, to ask what you say in relation to these?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. I have taken Mr Cragg to the Ms Watts' ones. I will
16 take you to his broadcast, if I may. BBC/1/4. This is
17 early in the morning. I am going to take you to two
18 parts of the broadcast, because there is a difference in
19 language used, and ask you to comment on both.
20 What Mr Gilligan says is this:
21 "... what we've been told by one of the senior
22 officials in charge of drawing up that dossier was that,
23 actually the Government probably erm, knew that the
24 45 minutes figure was wrong, even before it decided to
25 put it in. What this person says, is that a week before

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1 the publication date of the dossier, it was rather erm
2 a bland production."
3 Was that a fair assessment of the dossier in the
4 weeks before it was published?
5 A. It went through iterations. I think you have said
6 yourself and the Intelligence Committee said that the
7 emphasis and the language did change, but I think that
8 eventually have to come to the final document rather
9 than this. Obviously I am not party to where
10 Andrew Gilligan got his information from.
11 Q. No, but we are. He says that was Dr Kelly:
12 "It didn't, the, the draft prepared for Mr Blair by
13 the Intelligence Agencies actually didn't say very much
14 more than was public knowledge already and erm,
15 Downing Street, our source says, ordered a week before
16 publication, ordered it to be sexed up, to be made more
17 exciting and ordered more facts to be discovered."
18 I have shown Mr Cragg the e-mail of 11th September,
19 which is the only document which comes round, which we
20 have seen, which asked for further intelligence where
21 supported.
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. What was your view of that request?
24 A. I did not see this. The distribution list actually
25 looked quite limited from what I saw of the copy on the

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1 screen.
2 Q. Mr Humphrys asked:
3 "When you say 'more facts to be discovered', does
4 that suggest that they may not have been facts?
5 "Well, erm, our source says that the dossier, as it
6 was finally published, made the Intelligence Services
7 unhappy, erm, because, to quote erm the source he said,
8 there was basically, that there was, there was, there
9 was unhappiness because it didn't reflect the considered
10 view they were putting forward, that's a quote from our
11 source and essentially, erm, the 45 minute pointer er,
12 was, was probably the most important thing that was
13 added."
14 Would you agree with that comment, that the
15 45 minutes point was probably the most important thing
16 that was added?
17 A. No, I would not. It was one fact within the dossier
18 overall, which covered a whole range of issues.
19 Q. The reason it had not been in the original draft was it
20 only came from one source and most of the other claims
21 were from two. The intelligence agencies say they do
22 not really believe it was necessarily true because they
23 thought the person making the claim had made a mistake,
24 got it mixed up.
25 We know that it did come from a single source.

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1 A. It came from a single source and, as Mr Cragg said and
2 I know myself from discussions with the SIS, it was
3 a very reliable source, one they had had for quite some
4 time. Again, as the ISC have said, the fact that there
5 is a single source should not have led to its excision
6 from the document.
7 Q. And the reason that it was added late, did that have
8 anything to do with it being single source or some other
9 reason?
10 A. No. Again, as you will appreciate from the evidence you
11 have had, Iraq was a hard target. That information came
12 late in August but it only confirmed what we had judged
13 ourselves and what we had seen by Iraq's use of these
14 weapons in the past.
15 Q. Can I take you over the page to BBC/1/5? Halfway
16 through Mr Humphrys' introduction, having noted weapons
17 of mass destruction had been a reason advanced, he says:
18 "None of those weapons has been found. Now our
19 defence correspondent, Andrew Gilligan, has found
20 evidence that the Government's dossier on Iraq that was
21 produced last September, was cobbled together at the
22 last minute with some unconfirmed material that had not
23 been approved by the Security Services."
24 Is that allegation right or wrong?
25 A. Are we talking of the 24th dossier or something else?

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1 Q. Yes, the 24th.
2 A. Certainly I did not think it was cobbled together at the
3 last moment, and that it was based very much on
4 intelligence, again, and it was confirmed by the ISC
5 last Thursday.
6 Q. I think we have seen in the passage I showed Mr Cragg
7 that Dr Kelly reported that the last week before
8 publication was an interesting week. Was that a fair
9 comment in the sense there was a lot of work to be done?
10 A. I would think it is looking here from today. I think
11 again we have to set this in the context that we were
12 dealing with many issues and this was but one of many
13 issues and we should not forget that we have armed
14 forces deployed to many other parts of the world, so
15 certainly my remit covered more than just the dossier.
16 Yes, it was an interesting week, but many of the
17 weeks -- most of the weeks I spent as Chief of Defence
18 Intelligence were interesting.
19 Q. Can I continue with the statement:
20 "Now you told us about this earlier on the programme
21 Andy, and we've had a statement from 10 Downing Street
22 that say's it's not true, and let me just quote what
23 they said to you. 'Not one word of the dossier was not
24 entirely the work of the intelligence agencies.'"
25 Then he comments on the English.

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1 "I think we know what they mean. Are you
2 suggesting, let's be very about this, that it was not
3 the work of the intelligence agencies?
4 "Mr Gilligan: No, the information which I'm told was
5 dubious did come from the agencies, but they were
6 unhappy about it, because they didn't think it should
7 have been in there."
8 Was that right?
9 A. It was wrong. If there was any part that was not the
10 intelligence, that was the foreword. The rest of the<