The row over the probe into the suicide of Iraq arms expert Dr David Kelly which cleared the British government of any wrongdoing merely intensified public cynicism, reports Alistair Alexander from London "A clear win, not a messy draw," that was how Tony Blair's former Spokesman Alastair Campbell described the British government's battle with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) before Dr David Kelly, the internationally- respected Iraq weapons expert, took his life last July. The verdict delivered by judge Lord Brian Hutton on Dr Kelly's mysterious suicide has given the government such an emphatic win over the BBC that it has fuelled an unprecedented backlash against both the Hutton report and the British government. The Hutton Inquiry was set up after the death of Dr Kelly to investigate two key points: whether the government had "sexed-up" its Iraq dossier as BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan had claimed, and whether the government's response to the allegation had driven the then unnamed source of the report, Dr Kelly, to suicide. On both the creation of the September dossier and also the manner in which Dr Kelly was treated, the inquiry's hearings over last summer dissected the machinations at the highest levels of British government in extraordinary -- and shocking -- detail. Hundreds of e-mails and other documents were published on the inquiry's Web site revealing concerted pressure by senior government officials on intelligence officers to strengthen the case for war. And despite repeated official denials, it did indeed become clear that Tony Blair was intimately involved in the strategy of surreptitiously naming Dr Kelly to the media in the government's frantic efforts to rebut the BBC report. Small wonder then, that for the last few months, the forensic shadow of Lord Hutton has been looming over the government while the high court judge was preparing his final report. But none, not even in government, was prepared for Lord Hutton's verdict. The report almost completely exonerated the government of any wrongdoing, while holding the BBC entirely responsible for the tragedy. Of course whitewashes have a long and distinguished history in British judicial inquiries. But never before in living memory has a judicial inquiry's final report been so at odds with the inquiry's hearings. In short, in the legal sense, it was a perverse judgement; vital evidence brought before the inquiry appears to have been wilfully disregarded. Take the original BBC report for example. The allegation referred to the headline-grabbing claim that Iraq could launch WMDs within 45 minutes of the order being given. Gilligan reported that a "senior intelligence source" had revealed to him that the claim was manufactured by the government itself -- despite the scepticism with which the intelligence community regarded it. Gilligan's account was corroborated by two other BBC journalists who independently spoken to his source -- the late Dr Kelly. Yet, while Lord Hutton conceded that the intelligence official apparently in charge of the dossier might have been "subconsciously" influenced by pressure from Downing Street to embellish the case for war (though dozens of e- mails revealed at the inquiry suggested that it was far from a subconscious influence), Gilligan's claims were "unfounded". Indeed, Lord Hutton was unsparing in his criticism of Gilligan. For his part, Gilligan had admitted to the inquiry that he couldn't establish that Dr Kelly had told him that. Reporting is an inexact science, it seems. In this regard, Gilligan was disastrously inexact. "False accusations of fact impugning the integrity of others, including politicians, should not be made by the media," was Lord Hutton's view. Yet in his hearings it was made clear that while Gilligan was wrong to ascribe that view to Dr Kelly, Gilligan's report was substantially correct. The head of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, Sir Richard Dearlove and the Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon both admitted they knew the claim referred to battlefield weapons as opposed to ballistic missiles, as stated in the dossier. On the naming of Dr Kelly, Lord Hutton concluded that the government had devised a strategy for naming Dr Kelly to the media so that he would be forced to deny Gilligan's allegations. But Lord Hutton regarded that strategy as neither "duplicitous" nor "underhand". A curious conclusion when the strategy consisted of encouraging journalists to guess the identity with a series of increasingly obvious clues -- a strategy, in other words, based on the ancient political principle of plausible deniability. Lord Hutton's conclusion that the BBC had essentially fabricated its allegations against the government's dossier seemed almost surreal in a week when former head of the Iraq Survey Group David Kay bluntly declared that Iraq's weapons didn't exist. But that has not stopped government ministers strutting before TV cameras, visibly consumed with triumphalism and lecturing the BBC about its despicable lies. Meanwhile, the severity of the Hutton Report has thrown the BBC into a crisis of cataclysmic proportion. BBC Chairman Gavyn Davies wasted little time in resigning, while its popular Director-General and Editor-in-Chief Greg Dyke was effectively sacked the day after. Gilligan resigned shortly after that. With the government keen to exact its revenge, many in the BBC fear the purge will continue. With the corporation emasculated, many fear for its much-vaunted independence. But the Hutton Report has clearly appalled the British public, who overwhelmingly trusted the BBC over the government throughout this sorry affair. To be sure, Gilligan made a critical error; an error compounded by senior executives who rushed to defend him without bothering to check his story. But clearly, the reason why the government reacted so angrily to Gilligan's report is not because it was wrong, but because it was largely right. After all, if the report really was unfounded they could have easily offered evidence to refute the allegations. Instead they resorted to using brute political force to cow the BBC into a retraction and then into smoking out the source -- Dr David Kelly -- through intolerable media pressure. So did the government exert undue influence on Lord Hutton, as many suspect? Probably not. The British judicial system has existed for centuries. Over that time it has finely honed its instinct for self-preservation. Lord Hutton would surely be minded -- subconsciously or otherwise -- that it is not the job of High Court judges to get rid of elected governments. The fact that Lord Hutton took minimal risks with his final report reflects the chronic weakness of the Labour government -- any criticism could have been politically fatal for Tony Blair. It is becoming increasingly clear that the casualties of the Kelly affair go far beyond the death of a scientist. In the process of defending itself three great institutions of the British state have been severely damaged: the BBC has been humiliated, the House of Commons was shown to be in the pocket of Downing Street, and the integrity of the judiciary has been disastrously undermined. Through sheer political power the government has managed to impose its own version of events, regardless of the reality. But, in doing so, it is also ripping apart the fabric of British public life.
