Former prime minister John Howard says no intelligence was improperly included in a UK dossier used to justify the Iraq war.

A seven-year UK inquiry into the invasion and unsuccessful search for weapons of mass destruction found the threat posed by dictator Saddam Hussein was overplayed, intelligence was flawed and the legal basis for the war was unsatisfactory.

"One of the most important conclusions ... was the (UK) Joint Intelligence Committee accepted ownership of the dossier and agreed its content. There was no evidence that intelligence was improperly included in the dossier or that Number 10 (Downing Street) improperly influenced the text," Mr Howard told reporters in Sydney on Thursday.

Asked whether Australia needed a similar inquiry, Mr Howard said: "We've had a number of inquiries already."

Mr Howard said it should be borne in mind that Saddam Hussein had a long-term goal to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction program, once the threat of sanctions disappeared.

"Yes, it was subsequently discovered there were no stockpiles, but with equal conviction it has to be remembered that the intelligence advice of both the United Kingdom and the United States, and of course that advice greatly informed the views of our own intelligence agencies ... was that there were stockpiles," he said.

"In the years that have gone by there's been this constant claim that we went to war based on a lie.

"There was no lie. There were errors in intelligence but there was no lie."

Mr Howard said he was happy to be accountable for what occurred.

"When you're dealing with intelligence it's very, very hard to find a situation where advice is beyond doubt," he said.

"Sometimes if you wait for advice that is beyond doubt you can end up with very disastrous consequences."

He said he regretted the loss of life in military conflict.

"But I believed that the decision to go into Iraq was justified at the time and I don't resile from that because I thought it was the right decision," Mr Howard said.

Asked whether he should offer an apology to military families, Mr Howard said: "Obviously I am sorry for the wounds or injuries that anybody suffered. That applies no matter whether a military conflict is a matter of controversy or not.

"But if you're saying to me do I apologise for the decision that I took, the core decision? Well, I defend that decision. Of course I defend it. I don't retreat from it.

"I don't believe, based on the information available to me, that it was the wrong decision. I really don't."

The former Liberal leader said he did not share the view that the current Middle East conflict was the direct consequence of the 2003 war.

He said Iraq had entered into a period of "relative stability" after the US troop surge, where elections could be conducted.

"There is a view, which I think has a lot of merit that if the process or the aftermath of the surge had been reinforced by a greater continuing Western, particularly American presence, the situation would have been a lot more stable," Mr Howard said.