In one case, Chilcot finds, British only became suspicious of source when tipoff proved similar to The Rock movie scenario

The British secret service only became suspicious about the value of a covert source when a description of a supposed chemical weapons device proved remarkably similar to one in the Hollywood movie The Rock, according to the Chilcot report.

But the damage had already been done and the source’s claims about Saddam Hussein pushing ahead with production of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) had already become part of the case for war.



The incident is just one of a series of blunders described by the Chilcot report committed by Britain’s overseas spy agency, the Secret Intelligence Service, also known as MI6, in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Chilcot describes the intelligence findings as flawed, one piece of bad information piled on top of another.

In the incident that refers to the movie The Rock, the report describes a source providing details about spherical glass containers allegedly filled with chemical weapons at an establishment in Iraq.

MI6 at the time defended the authenticity of the source and the material, according to the Chilcot report. “However, it drew attention to the fact that the source’s description of the device and its spherical glass contents was remarkably similar to the fictional chemical weapon portrayed in the film The Rock,” the report says.

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In the 1996 movie, Nicolas Cage, playing an FBI chemical warfare specialist, joins Sean Connery, playing a former British spy, to prevent chemical weapons being launched against San Francisco.

The similarity between the movie and the source’s alleged device had been noted when the MI6 report was first circulated on 11 and 23 September 2002, well before the Iraq invasion in March 2003.

But this and other bogus claims were not formally withdrawn by MI6 until 29 July 2003, four months after the invasion, Chilcot reports.

In a devastating finding, Chilcot said: “SIS did not inform No 10 or others that the source who had provided the reporting issued on 11 and 23 September 2002 about production of chemical and biological agent had been lying to SIS.”

False allegations that Saddam could attack UK targets within “45 minutes” were not withdrawn until 28 September 2004. Bogus information by a source known as Curve Ball that also fed into the case for war was not withdrawn until the following day, 29 September 2004.



The faulty intelligence from MI6 was compounded by Tony Blair who hardened up the information when he wrote the foreword to the so-called “dodgy dossier” in September 2002. Chilcot concluded that Blair presented the assessments of the spy agencies to parliament with a “certainty” not justified by available intelligence.

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Chilcot blames the intelligence community not just for passing on bogus information in the first place but failing to correct the prime minister when he toughened up the so-called intelligence. Chilcot says the intelligence community worked from the start on the misguided assumption that Saddam had WMDs, saying it was “ingrained” in their thinking.

The intelligence agencies had a serious blind spot. “At no stage was the proposition that Iraq might no longer have chemical, biological or nuclear weapons or programmes identified and examined by either JIC [the Joint Intelligence Committee, the umbrella organisation representing all the intelligence agencies] or the policy community.”

The report says “the flaws in the construct and the intelligence were exposed after the conflict”.



In the foreword to the dossier presented to the public in September 2002 preparing the case for war, Blair said he believed the intelligence had “established beyond doubt” that Saddam had continued to produce WMDs.

But the Chilcot report concludes: “The assessed intelligence had not established beyond doubt that Saddam Hussein had continued to produce chemical and biological weapons.”

The intelligence community assessed it would take Saddam four to five years to acquire enough fissile material to build a nuclear weapon, but the Blair dossier claimed that it could achieve this within a year or two. The intelligence community assessment was that as long as sanctions against Iraq imposed in the early 1990s remained in place, it could not achieve a nuclear weapons capability.

Chilcot, in his televised statement, singled out for criticism Sir John Scarlett, the chair of JIC. But the then MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove, head of the spy agency from 1999 to 2004, is also criticised throughout the report, taking the rap for MI6’s faulty intelligence.

Other mistaken information from MI6 included the claim that Iraq had been trying to buy uranium from Niger to help build a nuclear weapon.

Although Blair’s head of press, Alastair Campbell, has often been identified with the “dodgy dossier” making the case for war, Chilcot places the burden of responsibility on Blair, who authored the foreword to the dossier, and Scarlett for failing to ensure that the assessments of the intelligence community were properly reflected.

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“The JIC itself should have made that position clear because of its ownership of the dossier, which was intended to inform a highly controversial policy debate, carried with it the responsibility to ensure that the JIC’s integrity was protected,” the Chilcot report says.

The report concludes that No 10 expected Scarlett to raise any concerns he had about the dodgy dossier.

The report reveals that Dearlove was selective about who received his reports, with access to one denied to the heads of GCHQ and the Ministry of Defence’s deputy chief of defence intelligence.

Chilcot said that an MI6 report on WMDs “should have been shown to the relevant weapons experts in the Ministry of Defence’s intelligence staff, some of whom were sceptical about Saddam having WMDs”.

The intelligence services got some assessments correct but these were largely ignored by Blair. These assessments included the belief that while Saddam had the potential to proliferate WMDs to Islamist terrorists, he was unlikely to do so.

The JIC also “assessed that Iraq was likely to mount a terrorist attack only in response to military action and if the existence of the regime was threatened”.