British Prime Minister Brown Admits Misinformation on Defense Spending to War Inquiry

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown admitted Wednesday that he gave incorrect evidence to the official U.K. inquiry into the Iraq war, regarding the U.K.'s defense spending.

Brown told Sir John Chilcot's panel on March 5 that the defense budget rose "in real terms every year."

But at his weekly grilling before parliament's lower house Brown said this statement was wrong, and that he was writing to Chilcot to correct the mistake.

Brown told British lawmakers Wednesday, "Because of operational fluctuations in the way the money is spent, expenditure has risen in cash terms every year, in real terms it is 12 percent higher, but I do accept that in one or two years defense expenditure did not rise in real terms."

Earlier this month, Brown told the inquiry that the Treasury agreed spending with the MoD for 2002, 2004 and 2007.

"The Iraqi expenditure was being met, but at the same time the defense budget was rising in real terms every year," he told the panel.

Repeating his claim, he told them, "The spending review of 2004 gave the Ministry of Defence a rising level of real spending, moving from 1.2 percent to 1.4 percent in real terms each year."

Brown's evidence sparked condemnation from senior military figures. Lord Boyce - who was the head of the military at the time of the 2003 Iraq invasion - called him "disingenuous" and insisted the MoD was starved of funds.

"There may have been a 1.5 percent increase in the defense budget but the MoD was starved of funds," Boyce told The Times of London.

Boyce's predecessor Lord Guthrie accused Brown of costing soldiers their lives by failing to fund the army properly.