The spat between old soldiers and Alastair Campbell over the purpose of the Iraq dossier has brought the first post-BBC-employment comment from former Today editor, Kevin Marsh. Kevin was at the helm when the famous Andrew Gilligan early morning two-way reported sources saying the dossier had been "sexed-up". It was this element of the reporting that ended the BBC careers of Gilligan, Greg Dyke and Gavyn Davies; and, probably, was the reason that Dr David Kelly lost his anonymity as a source, and ended his life.
Kevin tells the Independent "The thing that rankles with me a little bit is that I thought at the time when Andrew Gilligan came with the story was that it wasn't just broadly correct, it was 100 per cent correct".
Kevin left the BBC in March, from his role as Editor of the College of Journalism (another by-product of the whole affair inside the BBC) and is now writing his side of the story in book form for publication next year. His thesis ? "that a great clash between New Labour and the BBC was inevitable from the day that Campbell was recruited".
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In your post you say "Dr Kelly ... ended his life". Of course it was Lord Hutton who officially declared that Dr Kelly committed suicide but he didn't take evidence under oath, couldn't subpoena witnesses and had no jury. The evidence presented wasn't remotely near good enough to prove suicide beyond all reasonable doubt nor was there real evidence to show Dr Kelly's intention to kill himself.
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