Inspector faults US, UK in Iraq war buildup

At a London hearing, Blix said those who were “100 percent certain there were weapons of mass destruction’’ in Iraq turned out to have “less than zero percent knowledge’’ of where the purported hidden caches would be found.

Though Blix previously has made similar criticisms of the case for war, his testimony built on evidence already offered to the British panel of a US administration inevitably marching to conflict.

“When we reported that we did not find any weapons of mass destruction, they should have realized, I think, both in London and in Washington, that their sources were poor,’’ Blix said. “Their sources were looking for weapons, not necessarily weapons of mass destruction. They should have been more critical of that.’’

Blix told the panel, set up by the British government to examine the case for the war and errors in planning for postconflict reconstruction, that he had warned Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain in a February 2003 meeting — as well as US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during separate talks — that Hussein might have no weapons of mass destruction. He said he told Rice and Blair his “belief, faith in intelligence had been weakened.’’