The UK government in general and Prime Minster Tony Blair in particular have been subjected to far more public, political, and judicial criticism of the decision to go to war in Iraq than their US counterparts. Even before the war, a significant minority of the British public and many leading politicians were against the conflict and rejected the primary justification for the war: Iraq?s possession of weapons of mass destruction. The majority of opponents believed that even if Saddam did have these weapons, he still did not represent a threat to the West and that whatever threat did exist could have been contained through sanctions and other political measures. A few even rejected the claim that he possessed WMDs at all. This groundswell of opinion culminated in a massive protest march of nearly a million people strong in London shortly before the war began. Such substantial pre-war opposition created the conditions for the numerous problems that the Prime Minster has faced since combat operations ended in March 2003.

In spite of this sizable opposition, which included senior members of his own party, the Prime Minster was eventually able to make the case for war to the majority of a skeptical British public. He achieved this considerable feat because of the well-argued case made by both Britain and the United States that Saddam did indeed posses WMD and that he did, or at least soon would, represent a significant threat to British national interests. The solid foundation of this case for many members of the public, and apparently for the Prime Minister himself, was the genuinely-held belief that the UK and US did possess irrefutable intelligence evidence of Saddam?s continued possession of at least chemical and biological weapons. Arguably, however, it was the Coalition claim, again based on what appeared to be solid intelligence, that Saddam had the capability to use these weapons with little or no notice that swayed many voters and politicians. The most obvious example of this ?evidence? was the now infamous 45-minute claim within the discredited British government ?intelligence? dossier published in September 2002.