“Given that Iraq had no usable chemical, biological or nuclear weapons that it could deploy and was not about to attack the coalition, then two tests of a just war were not met: war could not be justified.”

Gordon Brown — Former UK Prime Minister

“Propaganda and deception is not, it would appear, the sole preserve of non-western states; it is alive and well in western democracies.”

Piers Robinson (The Guardian — August 2016)

Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown

November 5 2017 — Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown wrote that US intelligence — which challenged the extent of Iraq’s WMD stockpile — was not shared with the UK before it joined the Iraq War. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

RELATED POST: Dilyana Gaytandzhieva: CIA supplies ISIS & al-Qaeda Terrorists in Iraq and Syria [UPDATE]

RELATED POST: Sir John Chilcot: “Tony Blair ‘not straight’ with UK over Iraq”

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Update (November 6 2019) — There is no doubt whatsoever that Tony Blair lied about the Iraqi WMDs, deceived his own government and misled his country.

But this manipulation would have been impossible without the complicity of the UK Mainstream Media.

As Piers Robinson famously wrote in August 2016:

” In our own study of UK media coverage of the 2003 Iraq invasion, Manchester University found that most UK mainstream media performed to reinforce official views rather than to challenge them.

As for the supposedly benign communication activities of our own governments – again, there are ample grounds to challenge the understanding that the “strategic communication” activities of our governments can be understood as free from the kind of manipulative “propaganda” of which the Russian government is accused.

Indeed western governments frequently engage in strategies of manipulation through deception involving exaggeration, omission and misdirection.

This was recently observed quite clearly during the run-up to the Iraq war when intelligence was manipulated in order to mobilise public support for the Iraq invasion.

Moreover, the recent Chilcot report describes how, in the early days after 9/11 “regime-change hawks” in Washington argued that “a coalition put together for one purpose (against international terrorism) could be used to clear up other problems in the region”.

Tony Blair had discussed how phases 1 and 2 of the “war on terror” would require a “dedicated tightly knit propaganda unit”.

One might reasonably conclude from all this evidence that the western public fell foul of a major deceptive propaganda campaign which involved exploiting terrorism threats in order to “clear up other problems” and which was instigated by our own governments and communicated through “our” media.

Propaganda and deception is not, it would appear, the sole preserve of non-western states; it is alive and well in western democracies.”

Well said…

END of UPDATE

In an extract from his memoir, the ex-Labour leader says:

“we were not just misinformed, but misled. I was told they knew where the weapons were,” Mr Brown writes.

“I remember thinking at the time that it was almost as if they could give me the street name and number where they were located.”

“If I am right that somewhere within the American system the truth about Iraq’s lack of weapons was known, then we were not just misinformed but misled on the critical issue.”

A seven-year inquiry into the UK’s involvement in the Iraq War found Saddam Hussein posed “no imminent threat” when the US and UK invaded.

The Chilcot report also concluded that “flawed” intelligence started the war.

Iraq War: Gordon Brown Says UK Misled Over WMDs

REFERENCES

Iraq War: Gordon Brown says UK ‘misled’ over WMDs — BBC NEWS

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Gordon Brown : UK misled over Iraqi WMDs

One Year Ago — Gordon Brown : “UK misled Over Iraqi WMDs”

Two Years Ago — Gordon Brown : “UK Misled Over Iraqi WMDs”