TRANSCRIPT

Programme(s) PM Radio 4
Date & time Friday, 18th July 2003 1700
Subject / interviewee Dr David Kelly-Tom Mangold
Prepared by: Eileen Eldridge
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Eddie Mair: The journalist Tom Mangold is someone who's known David Kelly for
some time
Tom Mangold : About five years ago I wrote a book about biological warfare called
Plague Wars and Dave Kelly was recommended to me as the UNSCOM inspector
of inspectors and I made contact with him in New York and we became good
contacts and very good friends
EM : When he first came to wide public attention it was only a few days ago of
course and he was portrayed as this mild mannered, quietly spoken scientist.
That's clearly how he struck you too
TM : Yes I think so He was, he was a man who used words as weapons. He had
a semantic precision that was remarkable and quite infuriating He never used
hyperbole. He didn't exaggerate . He told it the way it was. He was a quiet man, a
very proud man, born in the Rhondda Valley, got out of there, did rather well, coped
with the very worst that the Mukhabarat and the Iraqis could throw at him and
incurred the personal hatred of Saddam Hussein who really wanted him out and got
him out in the end
EM : Did you have a chance in recent weeks to talk to him about his involvement in
this amazing story?
TM: Well we spoke a little bit about it. He was very happy to, to help the BBC. He
spoke to many reporters he wasn t a, an exclusive source by any means He, he
spoke quietly to reporters, he exp ained the complexities of biological warfare to
them and I know we talked about it ourselves, really at a gossip level because I
haven't been doing a story on this He felt that the JIC assessment was a little bit
hyperbolic. He would never have used a, a word as, as vulgar as sexed up . He
thought it was a bit hyperbolic and he really wanted to give perspective to this
report .
EM : I wonder how he came to end up in front of this Committee being grilled, this
man who as you say only ever wanted to help journalists .
TM : Well he'd, he, he, he was one of the most honourable men I knew. He was
incapable of deception or lying and he, he had had an unauthorised meeting with
Gilligan . This weighed on his conscience a little bit and eventually he went to his
line manager and, and said look I ve got to tell you the truth I met Gilligan I'm
probably his main source and you ought to know that .
And he knew what the implications of that were, that he would probably have to
appear in front of the Committee and he did I don't, I'm now guessing, that he
wasn't too happy with his appearance on the Committee and I'm sorry to have
heard members saying that he was chaff and a fall guy and so on That's not the
way you should really speak to Dr Kelly who was a man who has performed
services for Britain and for the United Nations which are beyond belief
EM : You said that, you said earlier if Dave Kelly is dead he's dead because of
something that happened in journalism which means that we all have to look at our
consciences .
TM: Yes. I, I think I introduced him to journalism and journalists and, and even in
my capacity then as an author, but also as a reporter and I think he could not cope
with I guess he couldn't cope with the fire storm that developed after he gave what
he regarded as a routine briefing to, to Gilligan . I don't think he understood what
feeding frenzies were about . He was a man of great dignity, he was a quiet man .
He was at his happiest he used to come over here and we used to, yes we actually
drank cups of tea, or we'd meet in hotels and you'd have a pint of beer and we'd talk
biological warfare for hours. He loved the subject and he liked to help journalists
because this was a complicated story and he wanted to help them and he wanted
the truth to come out
If he's dead he's dead because of something that happened in journalism and
possibly something that happened in the Committee, but I doubt it. And in that
sense I think we have to look at, all of us have to look at our consciences and say
how did we treat this man, did we treat him right and why is he dead
EM : l, 1 just want to clear something up l, I thought you said a moment ago that he
told you he thought he was the main source for Grlligan is that right?
TM : Yes
EM : tsnY it . .
TM : Well he'd, well it, the story's, you know, everything changes so quickly on this
He felt he was Gilligan's major source as I recall it Andrew Gilligan said that the
man he spoke to was an expert on weapons of mass destruction and they met in a
London hotel . Now if that's true that sounds to me like Dave Kelly. There may have
been other sources.
Kelly was very keen to explain not only to Gilligan but to your Ten O'Clock News he
was the, the only source for your Ten O'Clock News on that night. He was keen to
explain that he felt the JIC assessment was a little bit hyperbolic for his tastes and
that it wasn't quite as simple as the assessment appeared lo show .
At the same time he certainly told me he'd never mentioned forty five minutes and
he knew nothing about that. In fact we laughed a lot about the forty five minute
thing because he was explaining to me how long it takes to get anthrax out of the
refrigerator and put it in to the war head and screw it on the missile .
EM: And yet he said to the Committee he didnY think he could have been the main
source
TM : Well I think his famous semantic precision let him down there . Because what
he said to me was that there were parts of the Gilligan transmission that he did not
recognise, but that did not mean he wasn't the main source . I mean maybe there
was a minor source who added material, I've no idea who Gilligan's sources other
than Dave Kelly were. But Kelly was the major, the only source for the Ten O'Clock
News and that briefing differs from in many respects from the briefing that, that
Andrew Gilligan (indistinct)
EM : Just on the, finally on the journalistic ethics of all this then and you're as well
qualified to talk about this as anyone. What should the BBC do now? Should,
should they say whether or not Doctor Kelly was Andrew Gilligan's main source?
TM: I think it's up to the BBC, and, and I only left the BBC a month ago, I think it's
up to the BBC now to tell us the full story It, it should not ever reveal sources, we
should never reveal sources but m the sense Dave Kelly changed the rules of the

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game by revealing himself. So was he Gilligan's main source? Was he Gilligan's
minor source? Did he, was he responsible for the forty five minute claim, was he
not responsible?
The other thing that worries me slightly is that this is being seen now as some kind
of test of BBC journalism . Well I don't think it is that . I think it's a test of Andrew
Gilligan's story and of various other things . And I mean to answer your question in
a long winded way I'd like the BBC now to come out with as much as it could to tell
people like me that I didn't make a mistake in introducing him to my particular trade
and craft. Because whatever else Dave Kelly deserved something better than
happened to him last night
EM : David Kelly's friend Tom Mangold
End