The Dyke Busters! posted by Richard Seymour

Just because Hutton was so obscenely whitewashing on behalf of the government is no excuse for us to start getting lax on the Beeb. The bulk of Gilligan's report was accurate. The Prime Minister patently lied, despite Hutton's obfuscations. So, why is Auntie suddenly rolling over like a good doggy for the government's amusement? The answer could lie in what Richard Sambrook told Geoff Hoon last year...

I Am Satisfied That...

Greg Dyke resigns , but it seems he is only following the orders of the BBC Board . You can look at this in all sorts of ways. For instance, I thought to myself: "So?" Others might be inclined to say something like "Huh?" and "Who gives a shit?"

Let's get back to the real issues. Did Alistair Campbell want intelligence about Saddam Hussein's WMD capacity to be manipulated in favour of the government's story on Iraq, and did he express this wish to John Scarlett? Yes, he did.

What did he do? He defined the terms of the dossier, how information would be presented, what kind of information was required, and to what ends . And what does it mean, for example, when Campbell tells Scarlett that "I'm sure we can make [your dossier] one that complements rather than conflicts with [Whitehouse claims]"? Does it seem possible, or perhaps even likely that Campbell was alluding to a role for him in helping determine what went into the dossier? And when he asked John Scarlett to change the wording of the dossier from the claim that the Iraqi military "may be able to" deploy chemical and biological weapons in forty-five minutes to "are able to", was this above or beneath consciousness? The final dossier reads: "Some of these weapons are deployable within 45 minutes of an order to use them. "

What did David Kelly say he did? David Kelly told Andrew Gilligan that Campbell had pressed for the claim to be included although it was not in the original draft, that it was included against the wishes of weapons experts, and that it was based on the misinterpretation of a single source. The source had said that it took fourty five minutes to set up a missile assembly and this was misinterpreted. He said that the whole dossier was altered a week before publication in order to make it "sexier" and that the 45-minute claim was a classic example of this. He did not say, in precise terms, "that the government probably knew that the 45 minutes claim was wrong or questionable before the dossier was published."

What did Gilligan claim? He said, in respect of the 45-minute claim, that "what I have been told is that the government knew that claim was questionable even before the war, even before they wrote it in their dossier."

Indulge me and read that to yourself aloud. If Gilligan's notes are an accurate recording of his meeting with David Kelly, then this claim is a perfectly reasonable interpretation of that, even if it extrapolates. It is at the very least a fair inference. Lord Hutton's answer to this is that Gilligan's memory must be fucked, and he probably made half of it up. "I am satisfied that Dr Kelly did not say to Mr Gilligan that the Government probably knew or suspected that the 45 minutes claim was wrong before that claim was inserted in the dossier."

Whether this is the literal truth or not, what David Kelly is believed by Hutton to have told Andrew Gilligan remains the core of the controversy. Campbell pressed for a charge to be included in the dossier to make it "sexier" in spite of the protests of weapons experts who knew that it was probably wrong. Is it possible that the government can have defied the protests of weapons experts who maintained such beliefs and not come across the idea that the claim was incorrect? Only by the slenderest of literalisms may Hutton maintain such a position.

Similarly, with Blair's emphatic claim that he had not authorised the naming of Dr David Kelly to the press, let's recall that Sir Kevin Tebbit told the Hutton enquiry that Blair chaired the meeting which led to Kelly's name being released to the press. It gave those who communicated with the press "an authoritative basis on which to proceed" - namely that they should assent to the name if prompted to do so by the press. We don't know if this had anything to do with Campbell noting that it would "fuck Gilligan" were it revealed that Kelly was the source. Shall we just say that Blair was "subconsciously" influenced by the suggestion? No, Hutton would rather we constrained ourselves to his abstemious literalism, allowing that it is possible that Tony Blair "was instrumental in the decision to issue a statement [but that] he was not involving in "any consideration" of drawing up question and answer material ordering government press officers to confirm Dr Kelly's name if it is put to them." Lord Hutton can find no contradiction between this assumption and Tebbit's suggestion that Blair in fact chaired the meeting which gave the press officers their "authoritative basis on which to proceed" with respect to naming Kelly.

How glib Hutton's dismissals of crucial evidence and apparent contradictions, how dilute his justification for those dismissals! How Alistair Campbell's glorious triumphalism cries out for satire, ( "the Prime Minister told the truth, the Government told the truth, I told the truth." ). Not a particle of criticism has been allowed to soil the government, and not a damned word has been said about the substantive issues. An inquiry which was supposed to investigate the circumstances surrounding Dr David Kelly's death has ended as a public trial of one reporter and one report. We had no right to expect any better.

On this basis, the BBC now accepts that many of its key allegations were wrong, and apologises. There's the stinger, and it leads us happily to our conclusion.

The Big Conclusion

There's no point in fawning over Auntie just because she seems to be in a bit of trouble. We know how abusive, indifferent and callow she has been in the past, while exhibiting a craven love of power. There is no chance that the BBC is about to become a qualitatively different organisation. It was the worst performer during the war for antiwar content. It has never had an adversarial relationship with the government. After this round of spouse-beating, we can all look forward to the government crooning "I didn't mean it, baby, you just got out of line" while the Beeb sobs "I know. I'm sorry love. I know you're a good man. You didn't mean no harm." That it has always been a vehicle for MoD propaganda is one of the many things which Richard Sambrook wheeled out in his defense when Ben Bradshaw and Geoff Hoon were harrying him: "At no time in this dispute have I sought to criticise the MoD Press Office with whom we have always enjoyed excellent relations." The truth at last!