Leaked papers query UK's Iraq stance

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Leaked British government documents call into question ex-PM Tony Blair's public statements on the buildup to the Iraq war and show plans for the US-led 2003 invasion were being made more than a year earlier.

Britain's Sunday Telegraph published details of private statements made by senior military figures claiming plans were in place months before the March 2003 invasion, but were so badly drafted they left troops poorly equipped and ill-prepared for the conflict.

The documents - transcripts of interviews from an internal defence ministry review of the conflict - disclose that some planning for the Iraq war had begun in February 2002.

Major General Graeme Lamb, then head of Britain's special forces, was quoted as saying he had been "working the war up since early 2002," according to the newspaper.

In July 2002, Blair told lawmakers at a House of Commons committee session that there were no preparations to invade Iraq.

Critics of the war have long insisted that Blair offered President George W Bush an assurance as early as mid-2002 - before British lawmakers voted in 2003 to approve UK involvement - that Britain would join the war.

The leaked documents are likely to be supplied to a public inquiry established by Prime Minister Gordon Brown to scrutinise pre-war intelligence and post-war planning, and which will hold its first evidence sessions later this week.

Brown appointed ex-civil servant John Chilcot to lead the panel, which will call Blair and the current and former heads of Britain's MI6 intelligence agency - John Sawers and John Scarlett - to give testimony in person.

According to the Sunday Telegraph, military leaders used the defence ministry review to criticise government departments over their failure to plan for reconstruction work once Saddam Hussein had been deposed.

"We got absolutely no advice whatsoever. The lack of involvement by the FCO (Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office), the Home Office and the Department for International Development was appalling," the newspaper quoted Brigadier Bill Moore as saying in his statement.

It quoted Lt Col M Dunn as reporting that his soldiers "only had five rounds of ammunition each" when the invasion began, and that troops lacked the correct armour and other equipment.

In another statement, Lt Col John Power said long-distance radios failed in Iraq's heat and claimed planning was so haphazard that military officials mistakenly sent a container of skis along with desert equipment.

The newspaper said the internal review concludes that a swift military victory was won only because Iraq's forces were so poor. "A more capable enemy would probably have punished (our) shortcomings severely," it quotes a document as saying.

Britain's role in the Iraq conflict triggered massive public protests and left 179 British soldiers dead.

The defence ministry declined to comment on Sunday on the leaked documents, but said it "recognises the importance of identifying and learning lessons from operations."

Two previous British studies into the war have been carried out - one cleared the government of blame for the death of David Kelly, a government weapons scientist who killed himself in 2003 after he was exposed as the source of a BBC report that accused Blair's office of "sexing up" pre-war intelligence.

A separate 2004 inquiry - in which Chilcot took part - into intelligence on Iraq also cleared Blair's government, but criticised spy agencies for relying on seriously flawed or unreliable sources.

Findings of the new inquiry will not be published before next summer, meaning conclusions won't be known before Britain's next national election, which must be held by June 2010.

- AP