July 28, 2003
A debate is raging in Great Britain over who is at fault in the death of David Kelly.
The controversy began when BBC defense correspondent, Andrew Gilligan, reported that the British government had "sexed up" intelligence reports regarding the actual threat that Saddam Hussein posed with weapons of mass destruction. Specific reference by Gilligan was made to the fact that intelligence erroneously showed that Saddam had the capabilities to launch a WMD attack within 45 minutes. Gilligan then accused British Prime Minister Tony Blair of deliberately misleading the public to justify the country’s entry into the war with Iraq.
The BBC quite properly refused to name its source for the story, but stated that the information had come from one of the "senior officials in charge of drawing up the dossier" on Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction. The source was also described as a "senior and credible source in the intelligence services."
Any government official who provides information of the type that the source provided, without prior authorization, is guilty of an offence under the British Official Secrets Act. Blair and his Minister of Defense, Geoff Hoon, launched an investigation into who leaked the information to the BBC. The investigation quickly focused on Dr. David Kelly, a microbiologist who was a former U.N. weapons inspector and had made many visits to Iraq. Kelly was forced to testify before a parliamentary foreign affairs select committee, as was Andrew Gilligan. Two days after he testified, Kelly left his home for a walk in the woods, taking painkillers and a knife with him. He slit his left wrist and bled to death.
After Kelly’s death, the BBC and Gilligan admitted that he was in fact their source. The anti-war and anti-American media, including the BBC, wasted no time in going after the government, with one reporter going so far as to ask the Prime Minister if he felt that he had blood on his hands.
But a lot of things didn’t add up. When Kelly testified before the select committee, he told them that although he had unauthorized conversations with Gilligan and other members of the news media, he did not say what Gilligan had reported that the source had told him. But in addition to what David Kelly had said, there was objective evidence that he was not the source. Kelly was not, and had never been, one of those "senior officials in charge of drawing up the dossier" as the BBC had claimed its source was. Nor was Kelly a member of the intelligence services that the BBC had reported that their source was.
Gilligan had also been required to testify before the committee who accused the reporter of changing his story. Andrew Gilligan has since gone on "gardening leave" (as Yogi Berra would probably say--only in America). And the debate continues.
The media in Great Britain have taken sides on who is at fault, depending upon their views as to whether or not Britain should have gone to war against Iraq. Those opposed to the war blame the government for essentially trying to find out who committed an offence against the Official Secrets Act by leaking unauthorized material. These media outlets don’t seem to be too concerned that Kelly was not a senior intelligence official, as the BBC insisted that their source was. The David Kelly story is a lesson in classic media bias.
The airing of Gilligan’s initial story and its aftermath, which culminated in David Kelly’s death, is part of a growing trend in the mainstream media. Much like the Toronto Star in their series about the Toronto police and racial profiling, and the New York Times fiasco regarding the fictitious reporting by Jayson Blair, the BBC has gone from reporting the news to being a central part of the story.
The continuing saga of the "sexed up" information, and the death of David Kelly, make an interesting study into the behaviour of the media.