The "Dodgy Dossier"

By Cernig

Worth a read, the New Statesman's Chris Ames writes in the Guardian that it is looking increasingly likely that a claim that Saddam could launch a WMD attack with only 45 minutes notice - a key claim which appeared in what is often called the "dodgy dossier" intelligence assessment which helped convince UK lawmakers to back Blair and Bush over the Iraq invasion - was inserted into the intelligence assessment by a press secretary to help "sex up" the document and was never part of the UK intelligence community's opinion.

The piece is long and involved but worth a read, especially since UK intel is so often claimed by the US rightwing to "prove" that "everyone though Iraq had WMD".

It also contains what I consider to be "comment of the week".

When presented with a smoking gun, New Labour say 'while we appreciate that the object before us may superficially resemble a smoking gun, it is in fact an entirely non-offensive metallic projectile launch system that happens to be emitting particulate matter at this particular moment in time. It's outrageous to suggest that anyone in the government may have any responsibility for the fact that such particulate matter is to be found in the vicinity of this projectile launch system, this is just an attempt by our opponents to divert attention from the real issue, which is blah blah blah blah blah.'

And between them, the great British media and the great British public will say "that's outrageous, what a bunch of crooks, oh look, Celebrity Strictly Crochet is on ITV!"

You see? Americans and Brits aren't all that different.