The justification given for the war by Tony Blair was that Saddam had stocks of illegal weapons which he was in a position to use or pass on to others who would use them. "Forty five minutes" was the time scale indicated in one of his speeches.

On the basis of that of that misinformation, Blair's government was able to survive a vote in the House of Commons. If he had lost he would have resigned, and the British would not have gone to war.

"Regime change" was always stated by the British government as being a desirable side-effect, never as being a valid legal basis for a war.

No one denies that in 1998 Iraq had not accounted for weapons which it had definitely possessed. The claim of the Iraqi government was that these were destroyed. The inspectors were still investigating this claim when they were forced out by the pre emptive action by the US and UK. It now seems increasingly possible that on this matter at least the Iraqi government may have been telling the truth.