I don't think the administration was lying. If they were lying, they would know this came back to hurt them. That being said, there is still plenty of time, and I still believe we will uncover WMD. It is true, though, that the administration did not base this solely on the existence of current WMD. They said Saddam had dealt with terrorists, and that Saddam was in the process of building WMD. I think we will find plenty of evidence that he had plans for a nuclear bomb (much like North Korea).
terrorist 9/11 nada nada nada..... 9/11 --> saddam... any relations ?? big no WMD--> saddam ... any relations ?? none yet.. my guess would be no OBL --> saddam ... any relations ??? another big time no... OBL --> fundamentalist saddam --> secular ...... relations ?? again absolute zero oil --> saddam... he "has" tons of em
More palatable than the "time out of mind(s)" that we are experiencing now. Or maybe double-secret probation. Let's all take the A-Train.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/24/1050777345965.html Where are they? Hunt for WMD draws a blank April 24 2003, 2:25 PM American forces are changing their search strategy after coming up empty at most of the top suspected weapons sites in Iraq, officials said today. And the White House appeared to be trying to scale back expectations that weapons of mass destruction will be found. Troops have searched more than 80 sites that pre-war US intelligence judged the most likely hiding places for chemical and biological weapons as well as evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program, Defence Department officials said on condition of anonymity. There are more than 1,000 suspected sites but 100 or so were the searchers' top priority. Some analysis is pending on some substances found. But finding no stockpiles of chemical or biological agents after more than a month into the campaign, teams are now setting aside the search list and deciding where to go more on the basis of new information from Iraqis, three defence officials said today. We did have several hundred sites that we had some history of intelligence on that we were going to exploit," said Lt Gen David McKiernan, commander of land forces in Iraq. "This regime over the last decade has been pretty good at hiding material and moving it around, so it was no surprise to any of us that many of these sites that we've already exploited have not necessarily turned up the material." Two other officials said that in recent days officials have realised the list is of questionable value because of the ability of the Iraqis to destroy or remove weapons and equipment. The sites in Iraq searched for chemical and biological weapons have included mosques, homes, factories and government ministries. In some cases, teams arrived to find buildings completely empty - swept of any evidence, one official said. One search team also interviewed an Iraqi scientist last week who said some weapons were moved to Syria and others were destroyed before the war. His account has not yet been verified. . . . Is the New York Times breaking the news—or flacking for the military? http://slate.msn.com/id/2081905/ On Monday, Press Box fastballed a couple of bricks at New York Times reporter Judith Miller for the rococo—and somewhat creepy—sourcing behind her Page One scoop about the search for unconventional weapons ("Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, an Iraqi Scientist Is Said To Assert," April 21). The story chronicles the exploits of Mobile Exploitation Team Alpha—a U.S. military team searching for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq—and a scientist who alleges that he worked on Iraqi chemical weapons programs. The scientist, say Miller's military sources, led them to chemical precursors used to manufacture biological and chemical weapons. This scientist claims that Iraq destroyed unconventional weapons and equipment before the war and sent other "unconventional weapons and technology to Syria." He also maintains that in the years before the war, Iraq had shifted its R & D to making illegal weapons that can't be detected easily. Quite a story. But Miller provides no independent confirmation for any of her blockbuster findings, though she described her news as "the most important discovery to date in the hunt for illegal weapons." Furthermore, the deal she made with her sources prevented her from interviewing the scientist or even visiting his home. Her military handlers asked that she not identify the scientist or name the uncovered chemicals, that she hold her story for three days, and that she let the military check it prior to publication. . . . Also, if we offered more than the 1 million suggested ( that seemed to work for Al Qaeda turn coats ), you'd think someone would come up with something.
I think the more important point of that article was that if we really thought Iraqis were going to provide the information to find these WMD, and wanted to find them ASAP to keep them out of the hands of terrorists, we would be offering rewards, not relying on the *goodness* of their hearts for them to reveal them to us.
To me, this is a pretty simple equation: If they have 'em ( and I really thought they probably did) they weren't insane enough to use them, even when directly attacked, and the fact that we STILL haven't found them refutes treeman's proposed ( SH's guys listened to our pre-war threats, and only tried to kill us with conventional weapons while we were killing them with conventional weapons...cause if they had, whoo boy! Would we have...er...killed them.) explanation, as well as the We disabled their ability to deploy them argument. If we knew where they were to diasble, and/or we knew the guys who refused to use em, we'd have them by now. Also, if they were IN ANY WAY tactically accessible, they could not be buried so deep we have not found them after being there for a month. Either way, I see absolutely no reason that we had to intervene in the UN system which at worst was making the Iraqis hide their WMD so deeply that they couldn't use them...and invade a country, cost innocent lives, and ruin our international relationships because of the imminent threat of Sadaam's WMD. I hnestly don't see how this is even being disputed anymore.
What's also horrible about this is the appearence if not fact that the administration lied to the UN, lied to the U.S. public, and the world at large in order to go to war. I'll still hold out for the possibility that we find WMD, and then it would only be a great exaggeration and misrepresentation of the evidence by the Bush Administration(based on the arguments presented by MacBeth). To further MacBeth's arguments it looks like according to the intel provided by the U.S. and Britain that the Iraqis were supposed to be able to get to their WMD in 45 minutes, and not have them hidden away so far that they can't be found. Either way I hate it, and it's another strike against the reputation of our intelligence services. These are excerpts from an article found on BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2971907.stm Both the United States and UK issued dossiers last autumn making a series of accusations against Iraq. Not only have no mass weapons systems been found (one has to add a "yet" here), but there were major flaws in the documents which will put in doubt any assessment of programmes elsewhere - in North Korea, Iran and Syria, for example. Dr Blix mentioned technical flaws in the dossiers, especially a failure (in this case it was a failure by the British) to realise that documents alleging an Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger were forgeries. There has also been the non-appearance of 1.4 tons of VX nerve agent, 20,000 chemical capable artillery shells, 25,000 litres of anthrax, 12-20 Scud missiles, mobile biological warfare laboratories and chemical and biological weapons "deployable within 45 minutes", all of which Iraq was alleged to have had. When you destroy your credibility it's really hard to get people to believe you the next time.
I am right here. Why should I reply to what is basically an op/ed piece in the Washington Post that I think defies common sense? We will find WMD. pssssstt, check the riverbed!
Another explanation is our intelligence services really stink. They came up with some good info, and a lot more bad info. At least the North Koreans made it easy for us, they reportedly said at the talks today we have nuclear weapons, now what are you going to do about it?] edit begins OK, a guy at Jane's officially says our intelligence services stink: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2971907.stm Can we trust the intelligence services? By Paul Reynolds BBC News Online world affairs correspondent The accusation by the chief United Nations weapons inspector Hans Blix that the case against Iraq was "shaky" raises the question as to whether the US and British intelligence services can be trusted over one of the major issues of our day - the spread of weapons of mass destruction. Both the United States and UK issued dossiers last autumn making a series of accusations against Iraq. Not only have no mass weapons systems been found (one has to add a "yet" here), but there were major flaws in the documents which will put in doubt any assessment of programmes elsewhere - in North Korea, Iran and Syria, for example. Although many intelligence professionals prefer to keep any review of what went wrong (and right) private and in-house, some experts are speaking out. One of the fiercest critics is Alex Standish, editor of Jane's Intelligence Digest. He said: "The bottom line is that the intelligence services have not covered themselves with glory." Where are the weapons? Dr Blix mentioned technical flaws in the dossiers, especially a failure (in this case it was a failure by the British) to realise that documents alleging an Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger were forgeries. There has been a dereliction of duty Alex Standish Jane's Intelligence Digest There has also been the non-appearance of 1.4 tons of VX nerve agent, 20,000 chemical capable artillery shells, 25,000 litres of anthrax, 12-20 Scud missiles, mobile biological warfare laboratories and chemical and biological weapons "deployable within 45 minutes", all of which Iraq was alleged to have had. And perhaps more fundamentally there are allegations that the impetus for publishing the dossiers and interpreting the evidence in the most prejudicial way possible was not intelligence-led but political. Mr Standish said the charges against Iraq were "politically driven." . . .
What would change the subject away from the lack of WMD evidence and shift the focus of the world? Tension with North Korea. Thats quite a powerful arguement, any comment on the other posted articles? In what ways does it defy common sense? Actually I would be curious to know what your definition of common sense is johnheath.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32198-2003Apr24.html N. Korea Claims to Have Nuclear Weapons, U.S. Officials Say By Glenn Kessler Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, April 24, 2003; 3:54 PM North Korean negotiators told U.S. officials in Beijing that the communist nation has nuclear weapons and threatened to export them or conduct a "physical demonstration," U.S. officials said today. . . . I'm waiting for this "physical demonstration" with bated breath.
I can't imagine N. Korea wasting one of nukes as a demonstration, they can't have more than 2 or 3. I wonder where they would test or demonstrate the thing the country isn't that large. Hopefully it won't be Seoul or the DMZ. Obviously this is more rhetoric from N. Korea, but sooner or later they are going to talk themselves into a war.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/jan-june03/search_04-22.html . . . Well, now it becomes rather clearer, I think, that what the Iraqis were intending was to kind of distribute dual-use equipment at various ammunition and weapons storage places throughout the country, so that no inspector or even soldier would ever be able to find that smoking gun. You could find a little bit of the program. You would find a program very much, these days, in the research and development stages. . . . Ah yes. A regime that couldn't shoot straight is able to hide WMD so effectively that no one could find a clue unless an insider gave away its secrets. That destroyed tons of WMD . . . before the second gulf war as far as we can tell. http://slate.msn.com/id/2081942/ . . . Miller Time ... The NYT's Judith Miller continues her remarkable run of opaque dispatches from her travels with a chemical and bio-weapons hunting team. Today's report, which (hallelujah) is stuffed by the Times, says that the team has now come across a warehouse "filled with chemicals where Iraqi scientists are suspected of having tested unconventional agents on dogs." Of course, as Miller points out (uncharacteristically), the chemicals can have both military and civilian uses. Nor was there was any "immediate way to verify the claim" about the dogs. Maybe that's because the hunting team still has Miller billeted, apparently happily, in some sort of sensory-deprivation tank: "This reporter was not permitted to visit the warehouse but heard descriptions of it from Americans who went to the site." Miller's reports might end up being spot-on. But the problem with such thinly sourced, credulous, speculation is that they might not. One of Miller's pieces earlier this week said an "Iraqi scientist" (who Miller has seen, now infamously, only at a distance and never interviewed) alleged that Saddam was sharing weapons with al-Qaida. Defense officials quoted in a recent Associated Press dispatch said they were "highly skeptical" of that claim. . . . You know it's bad when the Defense Department is repudiating your data on WMD...
There are no WMD. There never were. It was all just a ploy to steal Iraq's oil. uhgh. slime. running. down. chin. Two weeks. The war has been over for two weeks (well, officially it's not even over yet), and everyone here just expects the WMD to come leaping out at US troops in Baghdad. In a country roughly the size of Texas; an underground bunker the size of a two bedroom apartment could hold enough sarin to kill 10 million people; yes, there's just no excuse for us not finding them. They must have never existed, so it *must* be just a ploy to steal the oil... You know what? I'm starting to think that Saddam was just a fake, too. Just a Wag the Dog invention made up by the oil companies and the neocons. I mean, we haven't found him yet either, so by our logic here he never existed either... Oh sh*t. This has got to be the biggest conspiracy in history... I'm calling Oliver Stone. We've got to make a movie about this. BTW MacBeth - my "proposed explanation" about the commanders refusing orders was based on the fact that we know that they refused other orders - we know for a fact that they did. That theory was, however, only one of several distinct possibilities that I've laid out. Personally, I'm starting to think that Saddam disappeared after the first couple of days, in which case there were no such orders given, and that they did not intend to use them unless they had no choice; with Saddam gone the commanders would have had the choice not to use them, with no fear of reprisal by Saddam. Just my belief here. But point is, there are a number of possibilities that I've laid out that explain what we've seen, all of them more probable than "there were never any WMD".
How convenient that your theories are "distinct possibilities" but the fact that there haven't been any WMD found despite the top Iraqi scientist being in custody for two weeks is an off the wall conspiracy theory. If the CIA is so clueless that it's having to search an area the size of Texas then it's clear this administration has completely lied about what it knew.
The idea that they disobeyed orders or that Saddam wasn't there to issue the orders to use the WMD assumes they were at least distributed or these commanders knew where they were and how to get at them. All the Iraqi troops encountered, killed or captured, and not a one of them could lead us to the WMD they were disobeying orders not to use, or chose not to use. But it appears they don't know where they are either. Again I still say that they may be out there, and more time is needed to find them. But as was pointed out by others, the inspectors wanted more time and Bush wasn't willing to give it to them, so why should Bush critics give the U.S. more time to find them.
i'm willing to give more time IF they let the UN inspectors help out. If they dont like Blix then he doesnt have to go but at least take some people who know where to look. The UN doesnt have to be in charge of the search but why start from scratch when there are people who have been doing this for years? It just seems like now that we have control, finding the WMD doesn't seem like a priority for the DOD. They are already looking ahead. it's like OJ saying he's busy looking for the real killers then doing nothing.
