Andrew Gilligan admits his language in one report "wasn't perfect"

[Nie Trink Wasser]

uh oh !




http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=1514&u=/afp/20030812/wl_mideast_afp/britain_iraq_inquiry_030812160629&printer=1

Kelly reportedly replied: "No it was real information, but it was unreliable. It was in the dossier against our wishes".


The reporter said he then tried to confirm Kelly's information with two senior government contacts. "Neither of them could confirm or deny it," said Gilligan, adding that one had told him to "keep digging".


Gilligan believed both contacts would be in a position to know if the dossier had been transformed.


However, the journalist admitted that his language in one report "wasn't perfect", referring to his use of the word "wrong" in connection with the 45-minute claim. The word "wrong" was later changed to "questionable".

[Dancing David]

Well, since the British are even more beloved of outrageous reporting it wouldn't suprise me. So is he saying that the dossier wasn't doctored or that he exagerated the claim that the dossier is exagerating intelligence?

[Nie Trink Wasser]

Originally posted by Dancing David
Well, since the British are even more beloved of outrageous reporting it wouldn't suprise me. So is he saying that the dossier wasn't doctored or that he exagerated the claim that the dossier is exagerating intelligence?


his report that the 45-minute claim was "wrong" is a fabrication of the truth.

For drama's sake.

[Crossbow]

The story is one of those strange cases where everyone is admitting they were wrong about some details, but they were essentially honest and that the real problem is the fault of the other side which was more incorrect than they were.

The news reporter in question, admits that the language in his report "wasn't perfect", however he has good notes to show that the substance of his report was valid.

Whereas the government officials say that there Iraq report had some serious errors (such as the 45 minute deployment of chemical weapons), but they also say many other parts of this report were double-checked and as such, they were considered valid.

At the same time, a UK government analyst committed suicide after it was revealed that he was secretly talking to the media about problems with the Iraq intelligence analysis, so now everyone is looking to place the blame of his death on someone else. The media seems to think that it is the government's fault for so skewing the Iraq threat that an unjustified war resulted, and the analyst felt responsible for it which it why he committed suicide. While the government wants to blame the media for secretly meeting with him and getting him to talk, which is illegal and the pressure of future legal proceedings drove him to suicide.

Go figure!

[Jon_in_london]

Originally posted by Nie Trink Wasser



his report that the 45-minute claim was "wrong" is a fabrication of the truth.

For drama's sake.



No, that the 45 minute claim was wrong is blatantly obvious.

The question really is how it got into the dossier..
Was it the JIS or was it Campbell?

[Lothian]

He confesses that it was wrong to state that there had been no 45 min claim until it was been inserted by Alistair Campbell he has confessed as much many times before. But as Jon implied only a few British government ministers still claim that Iraq could have launched an attack in 45 mins.

The claim that it was given undue prominence in the ‘sexing up’ of the report gilligan stands by. So far several witnesses have stated that Dr Kelly was not the only person in the intelligence service to question the inclusion.

While the inquiry is in its early stages the score is

BBC - lots of points Government – 1.
Trust NTW to pick up on the one. :rolleyes:

You don't have to believe me however. Straight from the horse's mouth (http://www.the-hutton-inquiry.org.uk/)

[Jon_in_london]

Lets see...who to trust...

The BBC with 150ish years of world renowned excellence.

or

Tony Bliar's government.....

Mmmmmm tough one... just cant make up my mind....

[Nie Trink Wasser]

Originally posted by Jon_in_london
Lets see...who to trust...

The BBC with 150ish years of world renowned excellence.





:roll:

[Mr Manifesto]

Originally posted by Jon_in_london
Lets see...who to trust...

The BBC with 150ish years of world renowned excellence.

or

Tony Bliar's government.....

Mmmmmm tough one... just cant make up my mind....

But both Tony and Cherie have big cheeky school-child grins. How can you even think about not trusting them?

[Mr Manifesto]

NES- what, no examples?

[Nie Trink Wasser]

The once-venerable BBC has fallen upon hard times. The international news organization, which once enjoyed a worldwide reputation as the gold standard of impartial broadcasting, has become an outpost of the Left. Since the Sixties, the radical Left has become embedded in the BBC, transforming it into a kingdom of its own. Its efforts are lavishly supported by the mandatory £116 annual “license” fees of 20 million households. You see, for the pleasure of watching TV, or listening to the radio, in Britain, there is a £116 ($174) ‘license fee,’ which goes solely to support the BBC. It matters not whether you ever watch the BBC or listen to it – and certainly not whether you agree with its Euro-socialist outlook. The BBC’s argument in favor of the mandatory license fee was that it kept the BBC from relying on commercial dollars, and thus freed the BBC not to pander to advertisers. Whether British seniors on social security, lower income people, young people – and millions of other wage earners wouldn’t prefer to save the £116 p.a. license fee and endure some pandering to commercial (as opposed to political) interests was never on the table. If there’s a television in your house, you are legally obliged, under legal penalty, to pay for the upkeep of the BBC.



. . . Even if the BBC is sowing the seeds of dissension within your ranks. During the Iraqi war, the military personnel and sailors on board the HMS Ark Royal, Britain’s largest aircraft carrier, became so depressed by the BBC’s coverage, they petitioned the ship’s captain to cancel the BBC and replace it with CNN. Anyone who depended, during the war, on the BBC alone for coverage would have been astounded at the news that the Coalition won. Nor is the BBC merely declining among veterans and their families. Its most important radio station, Radio Four, which caters to an educated, middle class audience, has lost 339,000 disaffected listeners since March. That is one-third-of-a-million license payers who gave up on BBC radio’s defeatist coverage, which their mandatory fees financed. In addition to being an avid supporter of the United Nations, the BBC lavishes unwarranted favorable coverage upon Amnesty International. (Amnesty has expressed dainty reservations about the killing of Uday and Qusay.)

Val MacQueen

[crackmonkey]

Off the top of my head I can think of one grossly inaccurate BBC report.
"I'm here at Baghdad airport, and there are no US troops here whatsoever" - Gilligan from a spot a few miles away from the airport, a few minutes after US troops begin setting up camp inside the Baghdad airport.

[Lothian]

I am sure there are other inaccurate reports. But the Hutton inquiry is about the death of Dr Jones, a Walter Mitty character according to the prime ministers press office. The most senior expert in the country concerning WMD’s in Iraq according to the MOD. He was responsible for a great deal of the Governments report. He allegedly claimed however it was ‘sexed up’ to support the case for war. Can we stick to that topic. If you want to slag off the BBC I will more than happily side with you in another thread.

[fsol]

http://www.cf.ac.uk/news/02-03/030708.html

The BBC was anti-war?


Editted to add:

http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=9231

If the BBC was anti-war in it's coverage.

. . Even if the BBC is sowing the seeds of dissension within your ranks. During the Iraqi war, the military personnel and sailors on board the HMS Ark Royal, Britain’s largest aircraft carrier, became so depressed by the BBC’s coverage, they petitioned the ship’s captain to cancel the BBC and replace it with CNN. Anyone who depended, during the war, on the BBC alone for coverage would have been astounded at the news that the Coalition won._ Nor is the BBC merely declining among veterans and their families. Its most important radio station, Radio Four, which caters to an educated, middle class audience, has lost 339,000 disaffected listeners since March.__ That is one-third-of-a-million license payers who gave up on BBC radio’s defeatist coverage, which their mandatory fees financed._ In addition to being an avid supporter of the United Nations, the BBC lavishes unwarranted favorable coverage upon Amnesty International. (Amnesty has expressed dainty reservations about the killing of Uday and Qusay.)_

How does Val reconcile that view with this?

Since Blair’s Labour Party came to power six years ago, the job of Chairman of the Board of Governors has gone to Labour apparachik and party contributor Gavyn Davis._ The job of Director-General has gone to another Labour contributor, Greg Dyke._ The chief political editor, Andrew Marr, had previously been a well-known Labour-supporting opinion columnist._ All three were parachuted into the corporation just after Labour won the election…so much for its formerly impeccable reputation for neutrality.__ The BBC is now regarded, even by many Britons, as the propaganda arm of No 10 Downing St.

It's not even as if the contradiction comes from two seperate articles.

So the BBC is the propaganda arm of the British Government who obviously wanted to stoke up anti-war feelings amongst the electorate. To what end exactly? It certainly goes against evrything else the Government was doing at the time.

[Lothian]

Originally posted by fsol

So the BBC is the propaganda arm of the British Government who obviously wanted to stoke up anti-war feelings amongst the electorate. To what end exactly? It certainly goes against evrything else the Government was doing at the time. I doubt N.T.W. could spell BBC let along make any informed comment about its establishment.

[Nie Trink Wasser]

Originally posted by fsol
http://www.cf.ac.uk/news/02-03/030708.html

The BBC was anti-war?


Editted to add:

http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=9231

It's not even as if the contradiction comes from two seperate articles.

So the BBC is the propaganda arm of the British Government who obviously wanted to stoke up anti-war feelings amongst the electorate. To what end exactly? It certainly goes against evrything else the Government was doing at the time.

the notion of the bbc being the propaganda arm of the government is wishful thinking for leftists who like to snort and dance.

the bbc is the british version of America's pbs. Except the bbc is en vogue in america too, simply because it's european.

government propaganda my arse.

[fsol]

I was merely quoting *your* source. Is your source not reliable?

[Lothian]

Originally posted by Nie Trink Wasser


the notion of the bbc being the propaganda arm of the government is wishful thinking for leftists who like to snort and dance.

Quite right NTW. The BBC being a puppet of the Government is claim normally made by the Tories, what a bunch of raving commies they are.

[Nie Trink Wasser]

Originally posted by fsol
I was merely quoting *your* source. Is your source not reliable?


are you saying that the BBC is supportive of Blair and Bush ?


if many Britons consider it an arm of the government, then the bbc and the government sure as hell are working hard to make life hard for themselves.

[Nie Trink Wasser]

Originally posted by Lothian
Quite right NTW. The BBC being a puppet of the Government is claim normally made by the Tories, what a bunch of raving commies they are.

don't pull that "commie" pandering crap with me.

I said they were a leftist media outlet and they are.

why is it so hard to just admit the leanings of the bbc ?

it's not a shocking or earth shattering revelation.

[fsol]

if many Britons consider it an arm of the government, then the bbc and the government sure as hell are working hard to make life hard for themselves.

Well now that's what I said.



are you saying that the BBC is supportive of Blair and Bush ?

No, I asked you a question about your source. One that you haven't answered.

[Lothian]

Originally posted by Nie Trink Wasser


don't pull that "commie" pandering crap with me.

I said they were a leftist media outlet and they are.

why is it so hard to just admit the leanings of the bbc ?

it's not a shocking or earth shattering revelation. no you said the notion of the bbc being the propaganda arm of the government is wishful thinking for leftists who like to snort and dance. This suggests that the leftists wish the BBC to be the governments Propaganda arm. Do you know if the UKgovernment is Left, Right Conservative, Democrat, Republican. Likewise The BBC, where do they fit in What is their closest political position? What is leftist ? Does that mean independent ? Can you evidence them being leftist. Is it all the BBC? Just the TV arm ? what about the National Radio stations, Local ones? their Childrens stations. World Service? Tell me where you think they lean?

[E.J.Armstrong]

originally posted by Nie Trink Wasser
I said they were a leftist media outlet and they are.
Well that startlingly obvious logical statement convinces me with its undoubted rightness.

Most governments eventually dislike the BBC because of its independence of thought. Thatcher didn't like it but then she was not of this earth. Wilson criticised it and Blair is not a happy bunny. I also wonder who is responsible for all those govenment baiting comedies on the BBC. Not the BBC obviously as Nie Trink Wasser must be correct - after all he says so.
government propaganda my arse.
Wow. Anglo saxon logic. However I don't think the USA is completely au fait with the sentiment you have expressed so pithily. I'll try and translate it.

What NTW is actually trying to say is - 'apologies to my many american friends but my grasp of the english language is such that I feel expletives are necessary to convey the full rigour and logic of my argument. In this particular example the righteouness of my contentions is articulated and established beyond contradiction by the earthy British equivalent of your more delicate expression - ass.

Nuff sayed. '

[Mike B.]

Originally posted by E.J.Armstrong

Thatcher didn't like it but then she was not of this earth.


Well she did win three general elections.

(Yes I know you don't have to get 50% of the vote.)

But there was a substantial part of the UK that supported her at one time or another.

[Mr Manifesto]

Originally posted by Mike B.


Well she did win three general elections.

(Yes I know you don't have to get 50% of the vote.)

But there was a substantial part of the UK that supported her at one time or another.

When you're only given two choices in an election, one not particularly different to the other, it makes more sense that someone would get in power again and again purely because that person would be the devil that is known.

[E.J.Armstrong]

originally posted by Mike BWell she did win three general elections.

(Yes I know you don't have to get 50% of the vote.)

But there was a substantial part of the UK that supported her at one time or another..
I think that just proves it is possible to not be of this earth and win three general elections in the UK, particularly when you initiate wars in the Falklands. She withdrew the only naval vessel regularly patrolling those waters and the Argentianians mistakenly believed this was the invitation they had been waiting for. She then engaged in unnecessary battles for sound bites such as Goose Green which army commanders in the field considered unnecessary and sank the General Belgrano when it was sailing away from the Faklands and outside the no go area, leading to the loss of around three hundred lives.

She became widely despised in the UK after such things as field testing unacceptable poll taxes in far off places such as Scotland, but that is not of itself a barrier to election in the UK when Middle England was getting tax cuts at the expense of the poorly paid. She removed the minimum wage because apparently the poor were not getting a low enough wage in her opinion and 50pence per hour was more appropriate. Neil Kinnock warned us not to get ill in her world if she was re-elected and he was right. If you get sick in call centres now you can get thrown out of your job very easily. That is Thatcher's legacy. Blair doesn't seem to find it a problem however and a measure of his position is the praise Thatcher has bestowed upon him.

Her legacy of botched and dangerous privatisations is still with us as we still try to put right eighteen years of abandonment of our infrastructure such as schools, transport, hospitals and manufacturing industries with limited success. IMHO she did more than anyone else to destroy the sense of community in these islands and once said there is no such thing as society. She epitomised the me, me, me, culture and her name will live in infamy with many over here. Undoubtedly those whose tax burden went down and who didn't have to pay their workers a living wage loved her but you can't build a community of fairness by helping primarily one part of your electorate. Even today the fat cat culture is rampant with directors being paid for failure in Thatcher style excess at boardroom level.

She turned the poor of this country into a flexible workforce by which she meant people doing lowly paid work who wouldn't complain and who could be sacked at a moments notice often with minimal terms and conditions and often by American companies such as Compaq and Motorola etc in this area although Far Eastern companies and our own telecommunications chiefs - usually of foreign origin are doing a sterling job of dismantling the rest of our once proud companies through incompetence and design. Luckily the EU is acting as a better and better barrier to this modern exploitation of the ordinary people.

In short when our manufacturing jobs and our apprenticeships were gradually destroyed by Thatcher we developed a low wage call centre economy in some areas which is already being exported to an even more lowly paid economy, namely India, as we speak.

In the end it was her own party that kicked her out as the embarassment factor got too big for even their assortment of soap merchants to bear. We have been very happy that she spent so much time with you and we look forwards with anticipation to the Honourable Member for Texas West - Tony Blair ' NeoCon' joining her very soon.

[Shane Costello]

Originally posted by Mr. Manifesto:
When you're only given two choices in an election, one not particularly different to the other, it makes more sense that someone would get in power again and again purely because that person would be the devil that is known.

Ha Ha Ha, this is the most priceless piece of political analysis ever! :roll:

I think Neill Kinnock, Michael Foot et al would be delighted to hear that their electoral platforms were "not particularly different" to Maggies!

[Mike B.]

Originally posted by E.J.Armstrong

I think that just proves it is possible to not be of this earth and win three general elections in the UK, particularly when you initiate wars in the Falklands. She withdrew the only naval vessel regularly patrolling those waters and the Argentianians mistakenly believed this was the invitation they had been waiting for. She then engaged in unnecessary battles for sound bites such as Goose Green which army commanders in the field considered unnecessary and sank the General Belgrano when it was sailing away from the Faklands and outside the no go area, leading to the loss of around three hundred lives.

She became widely despised in the UK after such things as field testing unacceptable poll taxes in far off places such as Scotland, but that is not of itself a barrier to election in the UK when Middle England was getting tax cuts at the expense of the poorly paid. She removed the minimum wage because apparently the poor were not getting a low enough wage in her opinion and 50pence per hour was more appropriate. Neil Kinnock warned us not to get ill in her world if she was re-elected and he was right. If you get sick in call centres now you can get thrown out of your job very easily. That is Thatcher's legacy. Blair doesn't seem to find it a problem however and a measure of his position is the praise Thatcher has bestowed upon him.

Her legacy of botched and dangerous privatisations is still with us as we still try to put right eighteen years of abandonment of our infrastructure such as schools, transport, hospitals and manufacturing industries with limited success. IMHO she did more than anyone else to destroy the sense of community in these islands and once said there is no such thing as society. She epitomised the me, me, me, culture and her name will live in infamy with many over here. Undoubtedly those whose tax burden went down and who didn't have to pay their workers a living wage loved her but you can't build a community of fairness by helping primarily one part of your electorate. Even today the fat cat culture is rampant with directors being paid for failure in Thatcher style excess at boardroom level.

She turned the poor of this country into a flexible workforce by which she meant people doing lowly paid work who wouldn't complain and who could be sacked at a moments notice often with minimal terms and conditions and often by American companies such as Compaq and Motorola etc in this area although Far Eastern companies and our own telecommunications chiefs - usually of foreign origin are doing a sterling job of dismantling the rest of our once proud companies through incompetence and design. Luckily the EU is acting as a better and better barrier to this modern exploitation of the ordinary people.

In short when our manufacturing jobs and our apprenticeships were gradually destroyed by Thatcher we developed a low wage call centre economy in some areas which is already being exported to an even more lowly paid economy, namely India, as we speak.

In the end it was her own party that kicked her out as the embarassment factor got too big for even their assortment of soap merchants to bear. We have been very happy that she spent so much time with you and we look forwards with anticipation to the Honourable Member for Texas West - Tony Blair ' NeoCon' joining her very soon.

She did inheret an ailing economy, didn't she?
Problems with unions and such?

My point is not that Thatcher was always right. However, she must not have been completely out of the mainstream of UK politics and thus "of this world."

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Mike B.


She did inheret an ailing economy, didn't she?
Problems with unions and such?

My point is not that Thatcher was always right. However, she must not have been completely out of the mainstream of UK politics and thus "of this world."

Every government inherits an ailing economy (allegedly). And we do like our leaders to have a certain "otherworldliness"... speaking of whom:
Dossier does "nothing to demonstrate a threat, let alone an imminent threat from Saddam" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3161719.stm)
Campbell claims "Them bigger boys made me do it!" (http://politics.guardian.co.uk/kelly/story/0,13747,1021814,00.html)
Campbell finds reports based on single anonymous uncorroborated source incredible (except when it comes to government dossiers) (http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,3605,1019955,00.html)

[NightG1]

Originally posted by Nie Trink Wasser
Val McQueen
Um.... FrontpageMag vs BBC. Which one to believe. Hmmmm...:rolleyes:

[E.J.Armstrong]

She did inheret an ailing economy, didn't she?
Problems with unions and such?

My point is not that Thatcher was always right. However, she must not have been completely out of the mainstream of UK politics and thus "of this world."

She will be judged on what she actually achieved and that included devastating much of our infrastructure through a particularly nasty pathological ideology. She presided over a boom and bust economy with enormous unemplyment and was a hypocrite of an impressive kind, getting elected on one occasion by going to war after, de facto, inviting an invasion of the Falklands. She also benefited electorally by the self induced fragmentation of her opponents. She appealled primarily to middle England which received disproportionate benefits through her removing the minimum wage, a regressive taxation regime including a reduction in the top level of tax amongst many others.

She has left many despicable legacies and when her party eventually realised she was not all there at the end they found the courage to remove her, if not her stains on British society.

[The Don]

....but in Baroness Thatcher's defence....

In pursuing her policies in a focused (or if you prefer rabid) way in favour of her own personal ideology, she enabled large chunks of the UK economy to move boldly into the second half of the twentieth century.

This move reduced the reliance of the UK economy on outmoded industries (mining, steelmaking) and fundamentally restructured the workforce into a much more flexible one.

Unfortunately, much of this was at tremendous cost to those involved particularly those skilled workers who found themselves having to retrain in middle life and to those workers whose rights were undermined.

Personally I would have hated to have gone through that process whilst in the working population but was glad that it had happened once I did so.

The other great loser in the process was our nation's infrastructure, but the underinvestment both pre and post dated her premiership.

Her downfall in my opinion was that the 70% of the things that went right persuaded her that the remaining 30% of her actions were also right. She dogmatically followed her own lead towards the end.

[RPG Advocate]

The news reporter in question, admits that the language in his report "wasn't perfect", however he has good notes to show that the substance of his report was valid.

Actually, a report in this week's The Economist seems to suggest that Mr. Gilligan didn't keep very good notes at all.

[Mr. Gilligan] took no pen to his meeting with Mr. Kelly at the Charing Cross Hotel on May 22nd, and neither wrote notes during it nor recorded the conversation. Instead, he tapped out bits of Mr. Kelly's comments onto his personal organizer, later wrote out a longer transcrpit and then lost the transcript. He did not bother to check his explosive story with Downing Street to get its reaction

Above quoted from "BBC on Trial" - The Economist Volume 368 Number 8337, August 16, 2003 pp 48-49.

However, there seems to be no dispute that the 45-minute claim was included in the dossier over the objections of the intelligence service. Arguing over whether the right word should be "wrong" or "questionable" seems to be semantic nitpicking at best. When you're dealing with claims that could start a war, the operative word should be "verified".

[E.J.Armstrong]

originally posted by The Don
In pursuing her policies in a focused (or if you prefer rabid) way in favour of her own personal ideology, she enabled large chunks of the UK economy to move boldly into the second half of the twentieth century.

I guess we differ on what the words 'move forwards' mean. The UK has in many ways moved towards becoming a service economy with a large workforce that can be removed at a moments notice and in many cases currently is.

One of the primary problems over the decades with the British economy has been British management - particularly their military us and them approach to staff relations. Thatcher was always asking if people were 'one of us' and taking away the minimum wage stands as a testament to the typical Thatcher contempt for a major group of those who weren't - namely the poor.