Prime Minister Tony Blair was warned by top government officials, including his foreign secretary, a year before invading Iraq that chaos could follow the war, the Daily Telegraph says.
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw sent a letter in March 2002 marked "secret and personal" to Blair, seen by the paper, warning no one had prepared for what could happen afterwards.
"There seems to be a larger hole in this (what would happen afterward) than anything," Saturday's Telegraph quoted Straw as saying.
"No one has satisfactorily answered how there can be any certainty that the replacement regime will be any better. Iraq has no history of democracy so no one has this habit or experience."
Downing Street on Saturday said it would not comment on the leaked documents but, added the government "firmly believes that Iraq is a better place for the removal of Saddam Hussein".
If found to be true, however, the leak is a damaging blow for Blair and shows the depth of opposition in his government to joining the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.
The paper said senior ministerial advisers warned in a "Secret UK Eyes Only" paper that success would only be achieved if the United States and others committed to "nation building for many years".
"The greater investment of Western forces, the greater our control over Iraq's future, but the greater the cost and the longer we would need to stay," it said.
Blair built a case for war on the basis that Baghdad possessed banned weapons of mass destruction, although no biological or chemical weapons have been found following Saddam's overthrow.
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw sent a letter in March 2002 marked "secret and personal" to Blair, seen by the paper, warning no one had prepared for what could happen afterwards.
"There seems to be a larger hole in this (what would happen afterward) than anything," Saturday's Telegraph quoted Straw as saying.
"No one has satisfactorily answered how there can be any certainty that the replacement regime will be any better. Iraq has no history of democracy so no one has this habit or experience."
Downing Street on Saturday said it would not comment on the leaked documents but, added the government "firmly believes that Iraq is a better place for the removal of Saddam Hussein".
If found to be true, however, the leak is a damaging blow for Blair and shows the depth of opposition in his government to joining the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.
The paper said senior ministerial advisers warned in a "Secret UK Eyes Only" paper that success would only be achieved if the United States and others committed to "nation building for many years".
"The greater investment of Western forces, the greater our control over Iraq's future, but the greater the cost and the longer we would need to stay," it said.
Blair built a case for war on the basis that Baghdad possessed banned weapons of mass destruction, although no biological or chemical weapons have been found following Saddam's overthrow.
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