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Iraq – Its Infrastructure of Concealment, Deception and Intimidation[1] (more commonly known as theIraq Dossier, theFebruary Dossier[2] or theDodgy Dossier) was a 2003 briefing document for theBritish prime ministerTony Blair'sLabour Party government. It was issued to journalists on 3 February 2003 byAlastair Campbell, Blair'sDirector of Communications and Strategy, and concernedIraq and weapons of mass destruction. Along with the earlierSeptember Dossier, these documents were ultimately used by the British government to justify its involvement in theinvasion of Iraq in 2003.
The termDodgy Dossier was first coined by online polemical magazineSpiked in relation to theSeptember Dossier.[3] The term was later employed byChannel 4 News when its reporter, Julian Rush,[4][5] was made aware ofGlen Rangwala's discovery[6] that much of the work in theIraq Dossier had beenplagiarised from variousunattributed sources including a thesis produced by a student atCalifornia State University. The most notable source was an article by then graduate studentIbrahim al-Marashi, entitledIraq's Security and Intelligence Network: A Guide and Analysis.[7] When the Dossier was released, al-Marashi was working as a research associate at theCenter for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), a research center of theMonterey Institute of International Studies.[8]
Whole sections of Marashi's writings on "Saddam's Special Security Organisation" were repeated verbatim includingtypographical errors, while certain amendments were made to strengthen the tone of the alleged findings (e.g., "monitoring foreign embassies in Iraq" became "spying on foreign embassies in Iraq", and "aiding opposition groups in hostile regimes" became "supporting terrorist organisations in hostile regimes").
In its opening paragraph the briefing document claimed that it drew "upon a number of sources, including intelligence material". Before the document's release it had been praised by Tony Blair andUnited States Secretary of StateColin Powell as further intelligence and quality research.[9] The day afterChannel 4'sexposé, Blair's office issued a statement admitting that a mistake was made in not crediting its sources, but did not concede that the quality of the document's text was affected.
The claims contained in theSeptember and 'Iraq' Dossiers were called into question whenweapons of mass destruction (WMD) were not found in Iraq, and the dossiers were encompassed byHouse of CommonsForeign Affairs Select Committee inquiry. The Committee subsequently reported that the sources should have been credited, and that the dossier should have been checked by ministers before being released. The dossier had only been reviewed by a group ofcivil servants operating underAlastair Campbell. The committee stated that the publication was "almost wholly counter-productive" and in the event only served to undermine the credibility of the government's case.
The controversy over theIraq Dossier was mentioned frequently in the government's conflict with theBBC over the claim in the September Dossier that Iraq could deploy biological weapons within 45 minutes of an order to do so, and the controversy surrounding the death of Dr.David Kelly.Andrew Gilligan, the BBC journalist who wrote a report which claimed that the September Dossier had been deliberately exaggerated, stated before theHutton Inquiry that recalling the February Dossier had led him to file his report based on his interview with Dr. Kelly without seeking confirmation from other sources. Whether or not the September Dossier was inconsistent with the original intelligence, it was altered in ways that made it inconsistent with itself.[10]
The dossier became a point of amusement in British politics. During onePrime Minister's Questions,Michael Howard (thenleader of the Opposition), informed Blair, "I have got a great big dossier on his past and I haven't even had to sex it up."[11] The term "Dodgy Dossier" was used again in January 2017, in reference to the "Steele dossier" on a supposedsex scandal involving US PresidentDonald Trump.[12][13]
{{cite book}}:|website= ignored (help) From pages 35–42 of"The Decision to go to War in Iraq: Ninth Report of Session 2002–03"Archived 2008-08-07 at theWayback Machine (PDF).In 2004, I was short-listed for an RTS Award for my exclusive report that exposed the government's "dodgy dossier" on Iraq, plagiarised from a PhD student's thesis.
Private investigators are unhappy about the "dodgy dossier" on Donald Trump
PDF version of the February dossier at theWayback Machine (archived April 4, 2003) (document was removed from number10.gov.uk website)
Other versions of the dossier are available, such as:
Other links:
