More than six years after the US-led invasion, inquiry chairman John Chilcot said no-one was "on trial" in the year-long probe but promised not to shy away from criticism as he seeks to learn lessons from the conflict.

The highlight of the public inquiry will be an appearance by then prime minister Blair, who is due to give evidence in January.

The first day of hearings was dominated by testimony from top civil servants who told how some in the US administration were already considering toppling Saddam Hussein's Iraqi regime two years before the 2003 invasion.

However, they said Britain distanced itself from these "voices" and said they remained sidelined even within the United States until after the September 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington.

"No-one is on trial here. We cannot determine guilt or innocence. Only a court can do that," Chilcot said in his opening remarks.

"But I make a commitment here that once we get to our final report, we will not shy away from making criticisms, either of institutions or processes or individuals, where they are truly warranted."

Chilcot's five-member inquiry committee has already met with families of the 179 British troops who died in Iraq, some of whom attended Tuesday's session.

"I just want the truth," Rose Gentle, whose son Gordon died in Iraq in 2004, told AFP afterwards, adding: "I've never had any answers. I've never been told anything. Why we went in, whether it was legal."

Gentle, who wears a picture of her son in a gold heart around her neck, said she would return when Blair gives evidence. "If mistakes were made, he's the one that's got to live with it," she said.

A small group of protesters gathered outside the inquiry venue in central London, wearing masks of Blair, former US president George W. Bush and current British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and with fake blood on their hands.

Anti-war campaigners want a ruling on the legality of the conflict, which took place without explicit approval from the UN Security Council.

Inside, there seemed to be little public interest. In contrast to the one million people who marched against the invasion on one day in 2003 -- only about half of the seats in the public gallery were filled.

They heard senior civil servants outline how Iraq was considered a threat in 2001 because of a "clear impression" that it intended to "acquire WMD (weapons of mass destruction) capability."

Iraq's suspected possession of such weapons was the main justification for the invasion in March 2003, but they were never found.

The officials described "voices" in Washington talking about deposing Hussein as early as 2001, but insisted US and British policy was focused on containing the Iraqi leader's ambitions through sanctions and a no-fly zone.

William Patey, head of the Middle East department at the Foreign Office in 2001, said he ordered a memo in late 2001 detailing "all the options" for Iraq. It included regime change, but he said this was quickly dismissed.

He added: "We were aware of these drum beats from Washington and internally we discussed it. Our policy was to stay away from that end of the spectrum."

Peter Ricketts, who chaired Britain's top intelligence committee in 2000-2001, said: "I was certainly not aware of anyone in the British government promoting or supporting active measures for regime change."

Thinking in Washington shifted after the September 11 attacks, said Simon Webb, then policy director at the Ministry of Defence, "to say that we cannot afford to wait for these threats to materialise."

Britain also changed the way it viewed WMD proliferation and counter-terrorism but Ricketts said: "We still had our focus on the weapons inspector route and the sanctions-type route."

The inquiry, the third official probe into the war, is looking at all elements of British involvement in Iraq between 2001 and 2009 when nearly all its troops withdrew.

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