'Governors should not have accepted Greg Dyke's resignation'

The former Today programme defence correspondent says he never expected the extent of Lord Hutton's criticisms.

The 35-year-old admits making errors in the early morning broadcast at the centre of the row with the government.

But in an article for the Sunday Times, Mr Gilligan insists: "Most of my story was right."

'Fumbling performance'

UN weapons inspector Dr David Kelly apparently committed suicide shortly after being named as the suspected source for Mr Gilligan's report claiming the government "sexed up" a dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

My unique and excruciating misfortune was not to be wrong, but to have my errors made the main focus of a judicial inquiry Andrew Gilligan

In his findings, Lord Hutton criticised Mr Gilligan's reporting, saying that allegations he made against the government were "unfounded".

In his Sunday Times article, Mr Gilligan says he cringes at his "fumbling performance" in his "now famous 6.07 live interview" on the Today programme which sealed his fate.

"My unique and excruciating misfortune was not to be wrong, but to have my errors made the main focus of a judicial inquiry," he wrote.

"But I did not expect that last week would be, as it became, the worst of my life.

"Having gone through Alastair Campbell's artillery barrage, David Kelly's suicide and three appearances in Hutton's witness box, not to mention a war, in 2003, I thought that 2004 could only get better."

'Growing desperation'

While he expected the judge to criticise him for making "several mistakes", he had hoped to receive credit "for owning up to them".

But as he joined 25 senior BBC managers, governors and PR people to read an advance copy of Hutton's report, Mr Gilligan said "a kind of stunned calm fell on the Broadcasting House room".

For the whole of the past eight months, I have kept on telling myself that things could not possibly get worse - but then they always did Andrew Gilligan

"It didn't take long to get through - but we searched in growing desperation for anything that we could take as remotely good news..." he said.

"Not until page 297 did an especially alert member of the BBC legal team manage to locate some mild criticism of the Ministry of Defence."

Mr Gilligan said: "It was somehow deeply strange to be in possession of this nuclear weapon 24 hours before the rest of the world ...

"Like an infantryman who has been in action too much, I can no longer quite calibrate the scale of the incoming fire."

Following statements in the Commons by both the prime minister and Opposition leader, plus mild quarrelling with the judge by Dr Kelly's family, "it was then ... I realised how much trouble we were in".

"For the whole of the past eight months, I have kept on telling myself that things could not possibly get worse - but then they always did."

'Flabbergasted'

Mr Gilligan said Gavyn Davies's resignation as BBC chairman "somehow contributed" to the seriousness of the situation.

He asked: "Why did an organisation which did, after all, have 24 hours to prepare a response to Hutton look so flabbergasted?"

Only a handful of governors were cleared to see the report in advance, meaning it may have come as "a shock" to the others, he said.

His decision to quit was "inevitable" once BBC director general Greg Dyke resigned, which, he adds, the governors "should not have accepted".

Mr Gilligan concludes by saying two "flawed sentences" from his early morning report started a "chain of error ... that is a burden I will always have to bear".