Bernard Ingham: The report we won't hear and the answers we don't know

We are issuing this interim report because we do not believe there is any more of substance to discover on the reasons for going to war with Iraq, the preparations for the campaign or the subsequent chaos into which Iraq collapsed.

We have also grown weary of interviewing slippery politicians whose main objective is brazenly to avoid answering our questions.

It seems unlikely we shall learn more to the nation's advantage from the present Prime Minister whose main role as Chancellor was to fund the campaign. This report has inevitably had to be prepared against the background of the present Government's well-established method of conducting business. Its distinguishing features have been:

n Tight central control of government through No 10 Downing Street.

n A "presidential" approach to decision-making, downgrading the role of the Cabinet.

n An informal way of policymaking – famously described as "sofa government".

n The dominance of political advisers to the exclusion of more

considered and independent Civil Service advice.

n A pre-occupation with manipulation of the media.

We have assessed all the evidence we have heard against this well-documented modus operandi and asked ourselves whether in that light it rings true or stretches credibility.

Although the intelligence was never conclusive, we understand why the Prime Minister of the time (Tony Blair) feared Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. We suspect that many people across the world are surprised they do not seem to have existed.

This does not excuse Ministers or officials who ought to have resisted undoubted attempts to "sex up" and distort the threat presented by Iraq. This has done great damage to trust in the government machine, the body politic and Britain's reputation across the world.

We can again understand the frustrations of politicians grappling with a major Islamic terrorist threat to the world that Saddam Hussein was able repeatedly to defy UN resolutions. This advertised the systematic weakness of the UN.

But the evidence for a connection between al-Qaida and Saddam is vanishingly small. It is, therefore, a long and unacceptable step from there to join an invasion of Iraq in the face of the unanimous advice from the Foreign Office's battery of international lawyers that it would be unlawful.

This brings us to the heart of the present Government's method of decision making. It seems to us that a decision to remove Saddam Hussein was taken long before "regime change" was acknowledged. Whether this was out of a genuine British judgment the world would be better off without the dictator or a somewhat uncritical bowing to US political will is unclear – like so much of this piece.

But we are bound to give weight to evidence that suggests that the policymaking process was inadequate in that the "awkward squad" tended to be kept on the periphery. We do not think that the Defence Secretary (Geoff Hoon), Overseas Development Secretary (Clare Short) or the Attorney General (Lord Goldsmith) were "in the loop" as we would have expected them to be in a well-conducted government.

It is tragically clear that the planning process had, not surprisingly, been inadequate to the task presented by the removal of Saddam Hussein. The failure partly arises from unfortunate decisions taken by our American allies, though these serve to underline the UK's junior partnership in the war coalition.

We shall not in this report comment on the adequacy or otherwise of support for our Armed Forces who were put in a very dangerous situation.

Nor is it our function to lay personal blame. Many people will have to live with themselves and the consequences of this fateful campaign. Instead, we are anxious to point the way forward for government, which has much to learn from a war and occupation that after seven years have yet to be crowned with success.

We recognise that General Hindsight is infallible. But, taking

everything into account, we are satisfied that the Iraq campaign is a classic example of how not to conduct affairs of state in an

international crisis, leading to preparation for and the conduct of war and the handling of its aftermath.

We do not believe that, with this extensively probed example in the history books – we are the third major inquiry into it – there can be any excuse for a repetition. After Iraq, British democracy is in urgent need of extensive repair if the old, tried system of collective governance is to be restored.