Bollitics The Chilcot inquiry

[Richard]

Can't wait for the Campbellised version to be released, should make an interesting comparison.

Dont think you'll have to wait too long

[Awol]

Jon funny how only you have come to that conclusion

None of the media outlets report it in the same way as you are stating - why is that? Are they all not in possession of the same facts as you?

From the actual document linked above, the Attorney General and chief law adviser to Blair said:

13. My view therefore is that in the absence of a fresh resolution by the Security Council which would at least involve a new determination of a material and flagrant breach, military action would be unlawful. Eeven if there were such a resolution, but one which did not explictly authorise the use of force, it would remain highly debatable whether it legitimised military action - but without it the position is, in my view, clear.

14. The issuing of an ultimatum to Iraq may be helpful in delivering a clear political message to Iraq and ensuring that all possible measures have been taken to ensure Iraqi compliance before force is used. However an ultimatum, whether issued unilaterally or through the Security Council, would not in itself provide a seperate legal basis for the use of force.

Do you get it now Ian, is that clear enough for you, or do you want to talk abut whatever crap the media are feeding people instead so you can avoid addressing the blindingly obvious? It's there in black and **** white, Blair took this country to war against international law and lied to do so, ergo, he is a war criminal.

[bickster]

Jon funny how only you have come to that conclusion

None of the media outlets report it in the same way as you are stating - why is that? Are they all not in possession of the same facts as you?

From the actual document linked above, the Attorney General and chief law adviser to Blair said:

13. My view therefore is that in the absence of a fresh resolution by the Security Council which would at least involve a new determination of a material and flagrant breach, military action would be unlawful. Eeven if there were such a resolution, but one which did not explictly authorise the use of force, it would remain highly debatable whether it legitimised military action - but without it the position is, in my view, clear.

14. The issuing of an ultimatum to Iraq may be helpful in delivering a clear political message to Iraq and ensuring that all possible measures have been taken to ensure Iraqi compliance before force is used. However an ultimatum, whether issued unilaterally or through the Security Council, would not in itself provide a seperate legal basis for the use of force.

Do you get it now Ian, is that clear enough for you, or do you want to talk abut whatever crap the media are feeding people instead so you can avoid addressing the blindingly obvious? It's there in black and **** white, Blair took this country to war against international law and lied to do so, ergo, he is a war criminal.

Agreed and he should be tried for it, but won't be

[drat01]

See the point being made is a fairly simple one lost in the desire by Jon for a public hanging it seems.

The whole thing about this enquiry is that they are looking at the whole set of evidence. Jon has posted an article from one part of it that was followed by numerous other documents and details of conversations. The Right wing media would love to see the type of event that Jon is calling for, but even they realise that there is a whole load more to this and the enquiry has more and more to see, hear, read and deliberate.

If we go down the path of war crimes, are we then going to put on trial the soldiers who committed torture? what about the intelligence people who ran torture schemes? What about the other politicians who agreed to the war? What about the companies now who are making millions out of the rebuild? Basically where do you stop?

There used to be a rule in this country about innocent until proven guilty, it seems for some that rule only applies at certain instances.

EDIT: A quick trawl of the media front pages as they stand on their websites

Guardian (big opponent of the war): Russian spy ring suspect jumps bail

Mail (big supporter but anti Labour): Porsche driving family of benefit cheats

Telegraph (war supporters but very right wing): BBC must tell wages of stars. Note: Their other headline is Blair irritated by Iraq advice

BBC: 600,000 public jobs to go

See where this is going?

[Awol]

See the point being made is a fairly simple one lost in the desire by Jon for a public hanging it seems.

The whole thing about this enquiry is that they are looking at the whole set of evidence.

The point is there wouldn't be any evidence to look at if Blair had followed his legal advice that invading Iraq was unlawful.

Jon has posted an article from one part of it that was followed by numerous other documents and details of conversations.

No I haven't posted an article, I posted the Attorney General's legal advice to the Prime Minister, FFS!!! It's from the horses mouth, not a journo's opinion but the opinion of the highest legal officer in the land. Does that make no impression on your abject apologism for all things Blair whatsoever? Sorry, that's obviously a rhetorical question.

You are right about one thing though, I'd like to see that grinning spiv hung from a lampost for what he's done, god knows he deserves it.

[drat01]

Calm down Jon - its part of the evidence, there were further correspondence it seems from all parties where different points of view were put across. The AG changed his view according to various people who are reporting on this. You have found Blair guilty already, maybe that can be a gvmt saving and we can get rid of chilcot now and save millions, or should we let proper procedures take place rather than look at selective evidence?

This is not "apologism" for Blair as you call it, but I notice that you fail to have the same anger for the other people that I mentioned? Maybe their war "crimes" can be forgotten? The simple facts that again you miss are that you have repeated one tiny bit of evidence in a whole load of other things and found Blair guilty of a hanging offence. Luckily we live in a different society to that.

Maybe at the end of this enquiry the powers that be will take whatever action is needed. The media seem happy to wait

[Gringo]

Ex-MI5 boss says war raised terror threat

The former head of MI5 has said the threat posed by Iraq to the UK was "very limited and containable".

Giving evidence to the Iraq inquiry, Baroness Manningham-Buller said she advised in March 2002 that the ability of Iraqi agents to attack British interests was low.

That assessment "turned out to be right judgement", she said.

But she said the Iraqi invasion "undoubtedly increased" the level of terrorist threat to the UK.

A year after the invasion, she said M15 was "swamped" by leads about terrorist threats to the UK.

"Our involvement in Iraq, for want of a better word, radicalised a whole generation of young people, some of them British citizens who saw our involvement, on top of our involvement in Afghanistan, as being an attack on Islam," she said.

As a result of this, she said M15 was not "surprised" that British citizens were involved in the 7/7 attacks on London.

[drat01]

Duh - so a war raises the terror threat? - of course it does, supporters of the opposition will always look for some kind of revenge. Sometimes the obvious is a headline worthy of writing in bold it would seem

Tomorrow it will be Wednesday - the Sky is blue - Water is wet

There is a lot of that article that Gringo has omitted

raq inquiry: Ex-MI5 boss says war raised terror threat

Baroness Manningham-Buller Baroness Manningham-Buller said the Iraq war "exacerbated" the terrorist threat to the UK

The invasion of Iraq "substantially" increased the terrorist threat to the UK, the former head of MI5 has said.

Giving evidence to the Iraq inquiry, Baroness Manningham-Buller said the action "radicalised" a generation of young people, including UK citizens.

As a result, she said she was not "surprised" that UK nationals were involved in the 7/7 bombings in London.

She said she believed the intelligence on Iraq's threat was not "substantial enough" to justify the action.

She said she had advised officials a year before the war that the threat posed by Iraq to the UK was "very limited" and believed that assessment "turned out to be the right judgement".

Describing the intelligence on Iraq's weapons threat as "fragmentary", she said. "If you are going to go to war, you need to have a pretty high threshold to decide on that."

Baroness Manningham-Buller, head of the domestic intelligence service between 2002 and 2007, said the terrorist threat to the UK from al-Qaeda and other groups "pre-dated" the Iraq invasion and also the 9/11 attacks in the US.

'Terrorist impetus'

However, she said the UK's participation in the March 2003 military action "undoubtedly increased" the level of terrorist threat.

Continue reading the main story

“Start Quote

Our involvement in Iraq radicalised a whole generation of young people, some of them British citizens ”

End Quote Baroness Manningham-Buller Former MI5 chief

A year after the invasion, she said MI5 was "swamped" by leads about terrorist threats to the UK.

"Our involvement in Iraq, for want of a better word, radicalised a whole generation of young people, some of them British citizens who saw our involvement, on top of our involvement in Afghanistan, as being an attack on Islam," she said.

The ex-M15 chief said she shared her concerns that the Iraq invasion would increase the UK's exposure to terrorism with the then home secretary but did not "recall" discussing the matter with the prime minister.

MI5 did not "foresee the degree to which British citizens would become involved" in terrorist activity after 2004, she admitted.

"What Iraq did was produce fresh impetus on people prepared to engage in terrorism," she said. "If you want me to produce evidence, I can do that."

As director general of the domestic security service, Baroness Manningham-Buller was part of the government Joint Intelligence Committee before the war, whose then chairman John Scarlett drew up the controversial dossier on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction in September 2002.

Acting on intelligence

She said the agency was not "directly involved" in the decision to go to war but its officials had attended key meetings focused on intelligence related to Iraq.

She said MI5's responsibility was to collect and analyse intelligence and to "act on it where necessary" to mitigate terrorist threats.

But she stressed it was not her job "to fill in gaps" in the intelligence.

A year before the war, the former M15 chief advised Home Office officials that the direct threat posed by Iraq to the UK was "very limited and containable".

In a newly declassified document, published by the inquiry, Baroness Manningham-Buller told the senior civil servant at the Home Office in March 2002 that there was no evidence that Iraq had any involvement in the 9/11 attacks.

While they were reports of links between the regime of Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda, there was no intelligence to suggest meaningful co-operation between the two.

In that letter, she said the possibility that Iraq might use terrorist tactics in defending its own territory in the event of an invasion could not be ruled out.

But she stressed that Iraqi agents did not have "much capability" to carry out attacks in the UK and her view of this never changed.

[Gringo]

There is a lot of that article that Gringo has omitted

But nothing that changes the point being raised in the article. Succinct and to the point or overlong so that people won't read anyway (see all the comments to Levi's posts).

Duh - so a war raises the terror threat? - of course it does, supporters of the opposition will always look for some kind of revenge.

I thought the point of the war was to reduce the risk to the british people, not increase it. Duh.

Tomorrow it will be Wednesday - the Sky is blue - Water is wet

Yah boo

[drat01]

Succinct and to the point or overlong so that people won't read anyway (see all the comments to Levi's posts).

:-) - but missing some key statements from her.

I thought the point of the war was to reduce the risk to the british people, not increase it. Duh.

Who's to say what the impact on Western security would have been without this? Can you - or anyone - say for certain if you are not in a privileged position of the facts? The fact that she says it has increased - in bold even :-) - is obvious comment (hence the Duh!) - that was always going to be the case - again the question is to what level compared to what it may have been.

Basically she is saying nowt that is not known.

[Gringo]

Succinct and to the point or overlong so that people won't read anyway (see all the comments to Levi's posts).

:-) - but missing some key statements from her.

But nothing that changes the point being raised in the article.

[drat01]

Personally I think were some key points that you missed - hence the bolding

and ahem - "Do not just place a link to an article, paste the article and include a link to the original. "

Note: I agree with your stance that key bits are better and easier reads but that is another subject entirely and those mods are evil dictators who have weapons of mess destruction

[peterms]

...The whole thing about this enquiry is that they are looking at the whole set of evidence...

Sadly not.

Iraq expert Carne Ross claims civil servants are withholding vital documents

I testified last week to the Chilcot inquiry. My experience demonstrates an emerging and dangerous problem with the process. This is not so much a problem with Sir John Chilcot and his panel, but rather with the government bureaucracy – Britain's own "deep state" – that is covering up its mistakes and denying access to critical documents.

There is only one solution to this problem, and it requires decisive action.

After I was invited to testify, I was contacted by the Foreign Office, from which I had resigned after giving testimony to the Butler inquiry in 2004, to offer its support for my appearance. I asked for access to all the documents I had worked on as Britain's Iraq "expert" at the UN Security Council, including intelligence assessments, records of discussions with the US, and the long paper trail on the WMD dossier.

Large files were sent to me to peruse at the UK mission to the UN. However, long hours spent reviewing the files revealed that most of the key documents I had asked for were not there.

In my testimony I had planned to detail how the UK government failed to consider, let alone implement, available alternatives to military action. To support this I had asked for specific records relating to the UK's failure to deal with the so-called Syrian pipeline, through which Iraq illegally exported oil, thereby sustaining the Saddam regime. I was told that specific documents, such as the records of prime minister Tony Blair's visit to Syria, could not be found. This is simply not plausible.

I had also asked for all the Joint Intelligence Committee assessments on Iraq, some of which I helped prepare. Of dozens of these documents, only three were provided to me – 40 minutes before I was due to appear before the Chilcot panel.

Playing by the rules, I had submitted my written testimony to Chilcot before my appearance. In the hours before my appearance, invited to visit the Foreign Office to see further documents (mostly irrelevant), an official repeatedly sought to persuade me to delete references to certain documents in my testimony.

He told me that the Cabinet Office wanted the removal of a critical reference in my evidence to a memo from a senior Foreign Office official to the foreign secretary's special adviser, in which the official pointed out, with mandarin understatement, that the paper sent that week to the Parliamentary Labour Party dramatically – and inaccurately – altered the UK's assessment of Iraq's nuclear threat.

In a clear example of the exaggeration of Iraq's military capabilities, that paper claimed that if Iraq's programmes remained unchecked, it could develop a nuclear device within five years.

The official's memo pointed out that this was not, in fact, the UK assessment: the UK believed that Iraq's nuclear programme had been checked by sanctions.

The paper to the PLP was instead sent by the foreign secretary to "brief" the wider cabinet. This paper was pure overstated propaganda, filled with ludicrous statements like "one teaspoon of anthrax can kill a million people". The paper was soon made public, as part of the campaign to create public hysteria.

The official's memo about the PLP paper contained nothing secret. It relates to a public document, the PLP paper. Yet, of all the references in my testimony, this was the one that the Cabinet Office most wanted removed. I refused. Strikingly, this memo has never been mentioned to the inquiry, including by its author, who testified earlier this year. Neither has the author of the PLP paper been questioned, or the paper itself discussed.

I was repeatedly warned by inquiry staff not to mention any classified material during my testimony. The only problem is that almost every document I ever wrote or read in my work was classified. It was made clear to me, and to journalists attending the hearing, that if I mentioned specific documents the broadcast of my testimony would be cut off. Other forms of retribution (Official Secrets Act prosecution?) hung in the air. It was a form of subtle intimidation.

Meanwhile, my requests to see documents about the infamous Number 10 WMD dossier were ignored, including requests for letters I had written.

This experience and the inquiry's record so far is cause for concern. It is clear from testimonies so far that most witnesses, most of whom went along with the war at the time, are offering a very one-sided account to the panel. A story is being peddled that sanctions on Iraq were collapsing and the allied policy of containment was failing. Thus, the military alternative to deal with the Iraqi threat was more or less unavoidable.

Though there is some truth to this argument, it was not what the Foreign Office, or the government as a whole, believed at the time. The true story is there to be seen in the documents. In memos, submissions to ministers and telegrams, the official view is very clear: while there was concern at the erosion of sanctions, containment had prevented Iraq from rearmament.

When invasion was promoted by Washington, the available alternative – to squeeze Saddam financially by stopping oil exports or seizing the regime's assets, which I and some colleagues had repeatedly advocated, was ignored. Here the documents tell a different but equally clear and appalling story: there is not a single mention of any formal discussion, by ministers or officials, of alternatives to military action. It is hard to pinpoint a graver indictment of the government's failure.

The oral testimonies delivered to the inquiry have not given an accurate picture of what the government really thought. Unfortunately, the panel is neither equipped, nor apparently inclined, to challenge witnesses on the contradictions of their testimonies with this documentary record. This may not be the panel's fault: how can they know which pertinent documents exist?

In these circumstances, it is very worrying that the government machine is still trying to withhold key documents, and silence those of us with detailed knowledge of the policy history – and documents. I have been told too, from secondary sources, that members of the panel have been refused documents they have specifically requested.

There is a clear solution to these problems: break down the continued obstruction by the bureaucracy by releasing the documents – all of them. Only the most secret documents deserve continued protection, and there are very few of these. The vast majority of relevant documents relate to policy discussion inside the government before the war. Though profoundly embarrassing, there is little here that damages national security, except in the hysterical assessment of officials protecting their own reputation. Nick Clegg said a few weeks ago that almost all documents must now be released. He is right.

Carne Ross was the UK's Iraq expert at the UN from 1997 to 2002. He now heads Independent Diplomat, a non-profit diplomatic advisory group.

[drat01]

Just read that Peter - a very interesting statement.

In my testimony I had planned to detail how the UK government failed to consider, let alone implement, available alternatives to military action. To support this I had asked for specific records relating to the UK's failure to deal with the so-called Syrian pipeline, through which Iraq illegally exported oil, thereby sustaining the Saddam regime. I was told that specific documents, such as the records of prime minister Tony Blair's visit to Syria, could not be found. This is simply not plausible.

I had also asked for all the Joint Intelligence Committee assessments on Iraq, some of which I helped prepare. Of dozens of these documents, only three were provided to me – 40 minutes before I was due to appear before the Chilcot panel.

Hmm surely now this prejudices any evidence that he is calling for as he is discussing this in the media?

EDIT: Strike that - it seems that this is a rerun of stories that have been in the public domain for a long time. I wonder if he has a book to sell?

Why also do the cynic in me think that if a lot of these papers did exist in the way that he is claiming they would have been leaked anyway?

[blandy]

Duh - so a war raises the terror threat? - of course it does..

Indeed it did in this case. But Labour and Mr Tony say and said the opposite. They've lied all the way through.

Evidence: What Blair & co. said – and what Manningham-Buller said

False claims of links between al-Qa'ida and Saddam Hussein

Tony Blair claimed on 21 Jan 2003:

"There is some intelligence evidence about loose links between al-Qa'ida and various people in Iraq... It would not be correct to say there is no evidence whatever of linkages between al-Qa'ida and Iraq."

Foreign Office spokesman claimed on 29 Jan 2003:

"We believe that there have been, and still are, some al-Qa'ida operatives in parts of Iraq controlled by Baghdad. It is hard to imagine that they are there without the knowledge and acquiescence of the Iraqi government."

Eliza Manningham-Buller, former head of MI5, yesterday:

"There was no credible intelligence to suggest that connection and that was the judgment, I might say, of the CIA."

Hand-picking flimsy 'intelligence'

Blair, to the Commons 24 Sept 2002:

"It [the intelligence service] concludes that Iraq has chemical and biological weapons, that Saddam has continued to produce them, that he has existing and active military plans for the use of chemical and biological weapons, which could be activated within 45 minutes; and that he is actively trying to acquire nuclear weapons capability..."

Blair, to the Commons 25 Feb 2003:

"The intelligence is clear: He [saddam] continues to believe his WMD programme is essential both for internal repression and for external aggression. The biological agents we believe Iraq can produce include anthrax, botulinum, toxin, aflatoxin and ricin. All eventually result in excruciatingly painful death."

Manningham-Buller, yesterday:

"The nature of intelligence – it is a source of information, it is rarely complete, it needs to be assessed, it is fragmentary... We were asked to put in some low-grade, small intelligence to it [the September 2002 dossier] and we refused because we didn't think it was reliable."

Iraq posed no risk to Britain

Blair, to the Commons 10 April 2002:

"Saddam Hussein is developing weapons of mass destruction, and we cannot leave him doing so unchecked. He is a threat to his own people and to the region and, if allowed to develop these weapons, a threat to us also."

Manningham-Buller, yesterday:

"We regarded the direct threat from Iraq as low... we didn't believe he had the capability to do anything in the UK."

Ministers were told that invading Iraq would increase the threat of terrorism to Britain

Blair, farewell speech at the Labour conference, 26 September 2006:

"This terrorism isn't our fault. We didn't cause it. It's not the consequence of foreign policy."

Manningham-Buller, yesterday:

"It was communicated through the JIC assessments, to which I fed in... I believe they [senior ministers] did read them. If they read them, they can have had no doubt."

The Iraq war made Britain a more dangerous place and allowed al-Qa'ida to gain a hold in Iraq

Blair, 29 Jan 2010:

"If I am asked whether I believe we are safer, more secure, that Iraq is better, that our own security is better, I believe we are. The world is safer as a result."

Manningham-Buller, yesterday:

"Our involvement in Iraq radicalised a generation of young people who saw our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan as an attack on Islam. We [MI5] were pretty well swamped... with intelligence on a broad scale that was pretty well more than we could cope with in terms of plots, leads to plots and things that we needed to pursue.

"We gave Osama bin Laden his Iraqi jihad so that he was able to move into Iraq in a way that he was not before.

what the reality is:

The post-Iraq plots

7/7 bombers - 2005

The bombs detonated on London Underground trains and a bus in July 2005 killed 52 members of the public and injured around 700. Three of the four suicide bombers had been born in Yorkshire; the fourth, born in Jamaica, came to the UK aged five. In his video, one bomber said: "Your democratically elected governments continuously perpetuate atrocities."

London Haymarket/Glasgow Airport attacks – 2007

Bilal Abdulla, a doctor, and Kafeel Ahmed, a PhD engineering student, tried and failed to set off bombs outside a London nightclub on 29 June. The following day they drove a jeep filled with gas canisters into Glasgow Airport. Abdulla's trial heard his involvement was "because of events in Iraq".

Liquid bomb plot – 2006

A terror plot was exposed in which liquid bombs were to be smuggled on to airliners. Many of the men made 'suicide' videos citing British foreign policy. Umar Islam said in his video: "If you think you can go into our land and do what you are doing in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine and... think it will not come back on to your doorstep, you have another think coming."

Former MI5 chief demolishes Blair's defence of the Iraq war - UK Politics, UK - The Independent

[drat01]

That's basically the same story Pete that was out there before. The point I was raising was any action will always prompt a retaliation from those supporting the "enemy". By doing nothing there was always a threat that the terrorism maybe on a grander scale than it is now. This whole bunch of terrorists and what they supposedly support, were gaining more support from various sources and their target was western regimes. This was not for one reason but for many from supposed support of Israel, the first gulf war, sanctions against Iran etc etc.

[Awol]

Just read that Peter - a very interesting statement.

In my testimony I had planned to detail how the UK government failed to consider, let alone implement, available alternatives to military action. To support this I had asked for specific records relating to the UK's failure to deal with the so-called Syrian pipeline, through which Iraq illegally exported oil, thereby sustaining the Saddam regime. I was told that specific documents, such as the records of prime minister Tony Blair's visit to Syria, could not be found. This is simply not plausible.

I had also asked for all the Joint Intelligence Committee assessments on Iraq, some of which I helped prepare. Of dozens of these documents, only three were provided to me – 40 minutes before I was due to appear before the Chilcot panel.

Hmm surely now this prejudices any evidence that he is calling for as he is discussing this in the media?

What, because he is warning the public that the establishment is witholding information that is critical to the inquiry then it prejudices any such information should it subsequently be released?

Pish.

EDIT: Strike that - it seems that this is a rerun of stories that have been in the public domain for a long time. I wonder if he has a book to sell?

Labour 101: When in doubt, smear the man.

Why also do the cynic in me think that if a lot of these papers did exist in the way that he is claiming they would have been leaked anyway?

Dr Kelly?

[peterms]

Why also do the cynic in me think that if a lot of these papers did exist in the way that he is claiming they would have been leaked anyway?

The policy is to pursue leakers aggressively and to be vindictive in dealing with them. Generally, I think people leak the more highly classified things either when as you say they have a book to sell and are feeling out of the reach of the government (Peter Wright, Spycatcher), or else when they feel the degree of wrongdoing they have witnessed is so extreme that they have to take a stand even if they are likely to get caught (Clive Ponting, Belgrano; Sarah Tisdall, cruise missiles; Cathy Massiter, illegal bugging of politicians).

The way these people have been treated has sent a strong message to others that they can expect no mercy if they expose the illegal and immoral activities of the state, and I'm sure that consideration weighs heavily with other potential leakers, as it is intended to.

[drat01]

Oh here comes Jon and his anti-Labour "bollox" (I am assuming that is allowed now to use that as a comment)

What, because he is warning the public that the establishment is witholding information that is critical to the inquiry then it prejudices any such information should it subsequently be released?

Pish.

Read the post will you rather than jumping with your size 12's. The info that this man is talking about he has been saying teh same for quite a while now and a quick google will show how he has said similar and presented evidence previously

Labour 101: When in doubt, smear the man.

Oh dear oh dear oh dear. What a frankly "bollox" little comment. What has this to do with Labour - other than an opportunity for you to spout out your deeply held prejudices? The point is simple, what is his motivation now for the comments? He made similar ones previously and has released a book on the back of them and other views. If his "news" was totally different then maybe there was a point, but no doubt you will see this as some sort of "Labour" "bollox"

Dr Kelly?

and your point is what exactly? Is that the stock answer that you give on any Iraq topic? Is it some sort of Pavlov's dog reply? This chappy is painting a picture via the media, he claims that the "establishment" is holding back documents. The "establishment" long has a record of leaks, all I said was I was surprised that if they did exist in the way that he describes, I would have thought that they would have been "leaked" by now. As a "Tory" supporter you should know very much how documents are leaked as we have seen this happen time after time

[drat01]

Why also do the cynic in me think that if a lot of these papers did exist in the way that he is claiming they would have been leaked anyway?

The policy is to pursue leakers aggressively and to be vindictive in dealing with them. Generally, I think people leak the more highly classified things either when as you say they have a book to sell and are feeling out of the reach of the government (Peter Wright, Spycatcher), or else when they feel the degree of wrongdoing they have witnessed is so extreme that they have to take a stand even if they are likely to get caught (Clive Ponting, Belgrano; Sarah Tisdall, cruise missiles; Cathy Massiter, illegal bugging of politicians).

The way these people have been treated has sent a strong message to others that they can expect no mercy if they expose the illegal and immoral activities of the state, and I'm sure that consideration weighs heavily with other potential leakers, as it is intended to.

Thanks for the reply Peter - I am sure that there is a severity of leaks but with something as contentious as this, I am amazed that more info (if it exists as this chappy is describing) has not made it into the public. That is in no way condoning people who leak documents, because I still maintain that its not their job to decide what is right and what is not for the public domain.