Tony Blair believed invading Iraq would 'free up the region', declassified memo shows

The Chilcot Report has been damning of Mr Blair's conduct

George W Bush speaks to the press July 19, 2001 during a joint statement with Tony Blair at Halton Airbase in Buckinghamshire (Getty)

Tony Blair believed that removing Saddam Hussein from power would “free up the region”, a declassified memo shows.

Sir John Chilcot today released his report into the Iraq war after conducting an inquiry which has been running since 2009.

The 2.6 million word report includes a memo entitled “note on Iraq" sent from Mr Blair to George Bush before the conflict.

In it, the Prime Minister tells the US president he “will be with you, whatever”.

The rest of the content of the memo sheds light on Mr Blair’s thinking in the run-up to the invasion, however.

“Getting rid of Saddam is the right thing to do,” it reads.

“He is a potential threat. He could be contained. But containment, as we found with Al Qaeda, is always risky.

“His departure would free up the region. And his regime is probably, with the possible exception of North Korea, the most brutal and inhumane in the world.”

Far from freeing up the region, most of the Middle East has been consumed in civil war, military conflict, and sectarian violence.

The memo

Large swathes of Iraqi territory are now under control of Islamist extremist militant group Isis while nearby Syria is also suffering from a bloody civil war.

In a verbal summary of the report issued on Wednesday morning, Sir John said:

“The questions for the inquiry were whether it was right and necessary to invade Iraq in March 2003 and whether the UK could and should have been better prepared for what followed.

“We have concluded that the UK chose to join the invasion of Iraq before the peaceful options of disarmament had been exhausted. Military action at that time was not a last resort.

“We have also conclude that the judgements about the severity of the threat posed by Iraq’s WMD were presented with a certainty that was not justified.

“Despite explicit warnings the consequences of the invasion were underestimated and the planning for Iraq after Saddam Hussein were wholly inadequate.”