LONDON—The head of Britain’s Iraq War inquiry released a damning report Wednesday on a conflict he says was mounted on flawed intelligence and executed with “wholly inadequate” planning. But he refrained from saying whether the 2003 invasion was legal, and did not find that Blair and his government knowingly misled Parliament or the British public. Retired civil servant John Chilcot, who oversaw the seven-year inquiry, said “the U.K. chose to join the invasion of Iraq before the peaceful options for disarmament had been exhausted. He said “the people of Iraq have suffered greatly” because of a military intervention “which went badly wrong.”He said says Blair overestimated his ability to influence decisions made by the Americans. Military action at that time was not a last resort.”He said then-Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government presented an assessment of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein’s weapons with “certainty that was not justified.” Military planning for the war and its aftermath were not up to the task, Chilcot said.

Source: thestar July 06, 2016 11:26 UTC