Just finished watching it and it reminded me of a chat I had with an FCO type up in Baghdad in summer 03. Even then when I had been in country for no more than a couple of months I could tell (from my lowly position) that what plan they had was going south at a rapid rate of knots. Whilst Blair and Bush will never go on trial for war crimes, from that programme alone, any half decent lawyer should be able to get a conviction for criminal negligence - I believe the definition runs alon the lines of:
"careless, inattentive, neglectful, willfully blind, or in the case of gross negligence what would have been reckless in any other defendant"
Surely going into a war with only weeks of preparation for the aftermath falls within the boundaries of that description? Or if you wanted to be generous, casting my mind back to IOT I doubt Bush or Blair would have passed (without a recourse at least!) - wasn't appreciation of the problem and effective intelligence to come up with a workable plan part of the assessment?
Well I think they failed on both counts. If you came up with a plan along the lines that they did for Iraq for a problem at Staff College, or even a lead on IOT, you'd be failed on the spot. Instead it's us that have been failed by them.