Iraq War WMD Intelligence Wrong: Former Australian PM
(MENAFN- Nam News Network)
CANBERRA, Jan 1 (NNN-AAP) – Former Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, admitted that, intelligence about weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) that led to the Iraq War was wrong.
Howard today said, it was disappointing that searches failed to detect WMDs in Iraq, but that he still believes the decision to commit Australia to the war was in the national interest.
His comments coincided with the release of previously-sealed cabinet documents from 2004, by the National Archive of Australia (NAA).
Each year on Jan 1, the NAA publicly releases cabinet documents from 20 years prior.
The 2003 documents, which were released belatedly in March, 2024, after some went missing, revealed that Howard's government authorised the deployment of troops to Iraq in Jan, 2003, months before it publicly committed Australia to the war in March of that year.
A 2004 inquiry found that Australian intelligence agencies, failed to accurately judge the extent and nature of Iraq's WMD programmes.
Howard, the second-longest serving prime minister in Australian history, said today that, the decision to join the war was based on U.S. and UK intelligence.
Without a UN resolution authorising the use of force, former U.S. President, George Bush, launched the invasion of Iraq in Mar, 2003, alleging the mission was“to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, to end Saddam Hussein's support for terrorism and to free the Iraqi people,” which, however, turned out either to be false or unfulfilled.– NNN-AAP
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