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Edited on Sat Jun-18-05 07:29 AM by HamdenRice
This is a very important question because the DSM was highly classified and its distribution was limited to only the British embassy, the very highest level of MI6 and a few cabinet officials. Indeed, it was written by a foreign policy aid to the Prime Minister and addressed to the British Ambassador to the US and cc'd to MI6. Such memos would not have been distributed downward to lower ranking MI6 or ministry officials, but only upward to cabinet members and perhaps to permanent secretaries. Here was the heading:
SECRET AND STRICTLY PERSONAL - UK EYES ONLY DAVID MANNING From: Matthew Rycroft Date: 23 July 2002 S 195 /02
cc: Defence Secretary, Foreign Secretary, Attorney-General, Sir Richard Wilson, John Scarlett, Francis Richards, CDS, C, Jonathan Powell, Sally Morgan, Alastair Campbell
IRAQ: PRIME MINISTER'S MEETING, 23 JULY
Copy addressees and you met the Prime Minister on 23 July to discuss Iraq.
This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents.
<end quote>
As you can see, it's distribution even within the cabinet was extremely limited.
This raises a potentially explosive issue: namely that some person very high up in the British political establishment is extraordinarily opposed to the Iraq War, and has decided to sabotage the policy and the US-UK gordian knot by leaking the memo.
The only other possibility would be someone within the US intelligence services either opposed to the War or angry at shrub's intelligence bashing. But because this memo was not shared with US intelligence, it could only come from signals intelligence, such as the NSA, as an intercept of British intelligence.
My bet is it is someone listed on the cc list, or a permanent cabinet secretary.
<edited for correction>
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