Iraq ‘posed no threat to UK’, former spy boss says

Iraq posed no threat to the UK when then prime minister Tony Blair took Britain to war there, former MI5 boss Baroness Manningham-Buller has said.

The one-time security service boss has spoken out about the conflict previously, revealing the reservations she had about the invasion at the time.

But in a new interview, she told the Radio Times: “Iraq did not present a threat to the UK. The service advised it was likely to increase the domestic threat and that it was a distraction from the pursuit of al-Qaeda.”

Lady Manningham-Buller, whose three Reith Lectures begin this week on BBC Radio 4, said it was “for others to decide” whether the war was a mistake.

She also described Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi as “a horror” but appeared torn about military interventions like the current Nato foray into Libya.

“It’s very difficult – do you just stand by and watch people being murdered?” she said.

Asked about Britain’s friendlier approach to Col Gaddafi in the recent past, she replied: “There was a point to cosying up to him, to get him to forfeit his stockpiles of WMD [weapons of mass destruction]. It was the right thing to do.”

Defending MI5 against suggestions that it could have prevented the 7 July terrorist attacks on London, she said: “In intelligence, you can know of someone, without knowing exactly what they are going to do.

“The next time there is an attack, the same could be true – though I hope it won’t be.”

In a warning about future British bombings, she said: “I assume there will be. This isn’t a war you win in a military sense, and you can’t anticipate everything.”

Meanwhile, an independent report on how a hotel worker died while being held in British custody in Iraq is said to clear the army of systematic torture and mistreatment. But the document will criticise the conduct of individual soldiers.

The official findings are due to be released on 8 September.