Have they found WMD yet? - Part 2 (MERGED)

Society Pakistan & World Affairs
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Split thread. Continuation of discussion started in this thread -

** Have they found WMD yet? (Part 1)**](http://www.gupistan.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=98957)

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The case for war is blown apart](http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=410484)

Tony Blair stood accused last night of misleading Parliament and the British people over Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction, and his claims that the threat posed by Iraq justified war.

Robin Cook, the former foreign secretary, seized on a “breathtaking” statement by the US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, that Iraq’s weapons may have been destroyed before the war, and anger boiled over among MPs who said the admission undermined the legal and political justification for war.

Mr Blair insisted yesterday he had “absolutely no doubt at all about the existence of weapons of mass destruction”.

But Mr Cook said the Prime Minister’s claims that Saddam could deploy chemical or biological weapons within 45 minutes were patently false. He added that Mr Rumsfeld’s statement “blows an enormous gaping hole in the case for war made on both sides of the Atlantic” and called for MPs to hold an investigation.

Meanwhile, Labour rebels threatened to report Mr Blair to the Speaker of the Commons for the cardinal sin of misleading Parliament - and force him to answer emergency questions in the House.

Mr Rumsfeld ignited the row in a speech in New York, declaring: “It is … possible that they [Iraq] decided that they would destroy them prior to a conflict and I don’t know the answer.”

Speaking in the Commons before the crucial vote on war, Mr Blair told MPs that it was “palpably absurd” to claim that Saddam had destroyed weapons including 10,000 litres of anthrax, up to 6,500 chemical munitions; at least 80 tons of mustard gas, sarin, botulinum toxin and “a host of other biological poisons”.

But Mr Cook said yesterday: "We were told Saddam had weapons ready for use within 45 minutes. It’s now 45 days since the war has finished and we have still not found anything.

"It is plain he did not have that capacity to threaten us, possibly did not have the capacity to threaten even his neighbours, and that is profoundly important. We were, after all, told that those who opposed the resolution that would provide the basis for military action were in the wrong.

“Perhaps we should now admit they were in the right.”

Speaking as he flew into Kuwait before a morale-boosting visit to British troops in Iraq today, Mr Blair said: "Rather than speculating, let’s just wait until we get the full report back from our people who are interviewing the Iraqi scientists.

“We have already found two trailers that both our and the American security services believe were used for the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons.”

He added: “Our priorities in Iraq are less to do with finding weapons of mass destruction, though that is obviously what a team is charged with doing, and they will do it, and more to do with humanitarian and political reconstruction.”

Peter Kilfoyle, the anti-war rebel and former Labour defence minister, said he was prepared to report Mr Blair to the Speaker of the Commons for misleading Parliament. Mr Kilfoyle, whose Commons motion calling on Mr Blair to publish the evidence backing up his claims about Saddam’s arsenal has been signed by 72 MPs, warned: “This will not go away. The Government ought to publish whatever evidence they have for the claims they made.”

Paul Keetch, the Liberal Democrat defence spokesman, said: “No weapons means no threat. Without WMD, the case for war falls apart. It would seem either the intelligence was wrong and we should not rely on it, or, the politicians overplayed the threat. Even British troops who I met in Iraq recently were sceptical about the threat posed by WMD. Their lives were put at risk in order to eliminate this threat - we owe it to our troops to find out if that threat was real.”

But Bernard Jenkin, the shadow Defence Secretary, said: “I think it is too early to rush to any conclusions at this stage; we must wait and see what the outcome actually is of these investigations.”

Ministers have pointed to finds of chemical protection suits and suspected mobile biological weapons laboratories as evidence of Iraq’s chemical and biological capability. But they have also played down the importance of finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Earlier this month, Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, provoked a storm of protest after claiming weapons finds were “not crucially important”.

The Government has quietly watered down its claims, now arguing only that the Iraqi leader had weapons at some time before the war broke out.

Tony Benn, the former Labour minister, told LBC Radio: “I believe the Prime Minister lied to us and lied to us and lied to us. The whole war was built upon falsehood and I think the long-term damage will be to democracy in Britain. If you can’t believe what you are told by ministers, the whole democratic process is put at risk. You can’t be allowed to get away with telling lies for political purposes.”

Alan Simpson, Labour MP for Nottingham South, said MPs “supported war based on a lie”. He said: “If it’s right Iraq destroyed the weapons prior to the war, then it means Iraq complied with the United Nations resolution 1441.”

The former Labour minister Glenda Jackson added: “If the creators of this war are now saying weapons of mass destruction were destroyed before the war began, then all the government ministers who stood on the floor in the House of Commons adamantly speaking of the immediate threat are standing on shaky ground.”

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Looks like Bush’s poodle is in deep trouble. On the other hand what these British Parliamentarians dont understand is that three mobile WMD vehicle were found. Evidence enough that the world was in extreme danger. If they only read the American view on this board they would realise how wrong the whole British Parliament is.

**Inquiry into Saddam arms dossier claims **](http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,5944-695844,00.html)

BRITISH intelligence service claims that Saddam Hussein had a huge stockpile of weapons of mass destruction are to be investigated by a parliamentary inquiry.
No such weapons have been found at sites identified in a government intelligence dossier published last October as a prima facie case for invading Iraq. The dossier provided the material upon which Tony Blair was able to make confident public statements about the danger Saddam posed to British interests and to the security of the Gulf region.

Mr Blair said yesterday he remained “absolutely confident” that the weapons would be found. He told reporters in Kuwait: “I have absolutely no doubt about the existence of weapons of mass destruction.”

Donald Rumsfeld has, however, admitted that it is possible that such weapons may never be recovered. The US Defence Secretary — who was one of the most bullish exponents of the “smoking gun” concept that incontrovertible proof of Saddam’s weapons is there waiting to be found — told a think-tank in New York that they may have been destroyed before the war started. That would explain why Saddam had not used them against coalition forces and why hundreds of military experts had failed to find definite traces of them.

The Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee, chaired by the former Commons Leader Ann Taylor, is expected to announce its inquiry next month when it published its annual report which will list its future programme of work. The weapons dossier, drawn up by the Cabinet Office’s Joint Intelligence Committee, is expected to be at the top of the agenda.

The Joint Intelligence Committee is already re-examining the information that formed the basis of the dossier, although Whitehall officials insisted this did not represent a formal review. Security and intelligence chiefs are sticking by their judgment that Saddam was engaged in a clandestine programme to develop chemical and biological weapons as well as ballistic missiles with a range exceeding the 150km limit set by the UN Security Council after the 1991 Gulf War. The CIA is also reassessing its intelligence.

Whitehall officials expressed surprise yesterday at Mr Rumsfeld’s remarks, particularly as he had previously been so confident that the weapons would be found once American and British Forces crossed into Iraq. He said that people should wait for a full report from coalition Forces who were interviewing Iraqi scientists and experts involved in the weapons programme.

But Robin Cook, who resigned from the Cabinet over the Iraq war, said his remarks did not add up. If Mr Rumsfeld were now saying there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, “the truth is the weapons probably haven’t been there for quite a long time”.

Mr Blair said that only a small number of potential sites had so far been explored (about a third of the sites listed by the Americans). Foreign Office sources said “bits of information” were beginning to emerge, but they admitted: “What we’re not expecting to find is a bunker full of missiles armed with chemical and biological warheads. Saddam was too clever at deception to leave such obvious evidence around.”

White House officials also insisted that coalition forces would unearth banned weapons. Scott McClellan, the deputy spokesman, said: “The President has said this will take time. But this was a regime that not only possessed WMD, but had a willingness to use WMD.”

The CIA claimed yesterday that it had the strongest evidence so far of an illegal biological programme. The agency released evidence gleaned from three vehicles seized in Iraq. It did not prove that they were mobile biological laboratories, but the agency said that their only possible use had been to support an illegal weapons programme. Two of the vehicles were discovered in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul in April and May, and another in Baghdad in April. Intense searches have failed to yield traces of biological agents, but the equipment on board — fermentors, water supply tanks and chillers, air compressors and a system for collecting exhaust gases — pointed to illegal uses, the agency said.

Coalition experts were “unable to identify any legitimate industrial use such as water purification, mobile medical laboratory, vaccine or pharmaceutical production that would justify the effort and expense of a mobile production capability,” it added.

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This is in response to MV and OG’s comments on page 10 of this thread..

MV, I agree with you that the most likely scenario is that the weapons were well hidden in advance. This, however, is not an absolute answer. Remember Powell’s now famous speech at the UN. There he held a small vial exlplaining that.. well, let’s use his words..

This illustration is surrounded by the numbers attached to Saddam’s bio weapon stash. It was to emphasize the enormity of his hoard by explaining that even the smallest fraction of it could prove harmful to our national security and possibly prove fatal.

Now, I have conceded the point that Iraq most likely had some form of WMD in the past decade. I also agree that the most likely reason behind our failure in finding them is Saddam’s success in hiding them. But even if Saddam ordered 8500 liters of anthrax to be hidden.. someone had to hide it. If only one of those people deviated just slightly in his mission and secured 85 dry grams out of the tons for himself…

Powdered anthrax is stable. It can be transported safely in a common ZipLoc sandwich bag. That bag can be taped to the smuggler’s inner thigh as he crosses in an obscure area of the northern border, making his way to a contact in Yerevan. That small amount can be making its way to a mall near you.

That is a small example though. But when compounded by the enormity of the stash and the relative ease of its handling, in the same manner that Powell so eloquently explained to us, the threat is real and it is great.

OG, I agree that Saddam probably restrained himself in order to keep open his option of using global opinion and sympathetic countries against us. But I cannot believe that he destroyed the weapons, especially in hope of raising the sanctions.

If he destroyed the weapons any time in advance of the war, why did he not demonstrate the fact. That is only denying himself what he wants. If he was not yet finished destroying the goods, what does it matter? he could have used a rolling schedule: Destroy them here, show that site to the inspectors while destroying them there, then show that site to the inspectors.. if they ask to see this site early, BS them until it’s ready, you’re good at it. But you have to show it before the USAF is banging on your door with F117s.

There is no scenario that I can imagine that would prompt Saddam to destroy his weapons during the war. Why destroy them when you can just hide them until the French resue you? That way if the French angle doesn’t work you’ve still got weapons as a last resort! If he destroyed them and didn’t have help, he would be gone, forever.

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And just for fun...
[thumb=B]boondocks030529.JPG[/thumb]

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As I have stated before, do not throw 'red herrings' at your conveniences.

I've made my position very clear about US, even though you wouldn't of guessed it with my previous posts and now only hope that the anti-Muslims also make their position very clear. At least be true to yourselves!

The problem here is that most Americans honestly believe that the sun shines out the US's a.. This is where the gullibilty lies. If the country has made a mistake and lied, just admit it rather than trying to make excuses using irrational and illogical reasoning.

The fact remains that the US supplied the the WMD over the years and now cannot find them. When they told him to get rid of them he did, otherwise you'd find them by now.

How many time does it have to be drummed that the attack was never over WMD. IT WAS OIL, REVENGE AND RELIGION.

Please don't make personal insults or your comments will be edited without warning. --- Samarra.

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Just posting some links…everyone is manifestly entitled to agree or disagree, just don’t jump down my throat :o

WMD emphasis was ‘bureaucratic’, BBC, 29 May 2003

Iraq weapons dossier ‘rewritten’, BBC, 29 May 2003

A dossier compiled by the [British] government on Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction was rewritten to make it “sexier”, a senior British official has told the BBC.

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i thought these were an interesting sampling of letters from today’s Guardian (what else?) - the last letter is my favourite:

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Britain and US urged to show arms evidence](Latest news & breaking headlines | The Times and The Sunday Times)

Doubts grow about quality of intelligence that lead to war

**PRESSURE was growing on Tony Blair and President Bush last night to publish the evidence on weapons of mass destruction that they used to justify going to war in Iraq.
Scores of MPs are backing an early day motion demanding that the Government spell out its case after a minister admitted that an important claim about Saddam Hussein’s weapons was based on uncorroborated information.

Congress is also to investigate the Bush Administration’s assertions that Saddam held massive stockpiles of illegal weapons. Coalition Forces have so far found only two suspect lorries in spite of intensive searching for the arsenal, and even the US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has conceded that Saddam might have destroyed any weapons he had before the invasion. **

Further doubts about the rationale for the war and its conduct were raised yesterday when an American team reported that the bunker bombed in an attempt to assassinate Saddam on the first night of the war did not exist. The head of the search operation was quoted as saying: “What they saw were giant holes, no underground facilities, no bodies.”

The questioning of the intelligence used to justify the war came as the Prime Minister admitted to British forces in Iraq that many thought he had been wrong to go to war.

Standing on the terrace of Saddam’s former summer palace in Basra, he lavished praise on the troops of the Seventh Armoured Brigade, saying: “I know there are a lot of disagreements in the country about the wisdom of my decision to order the action, but I can assure you of one thing: there is absolutely no dispute at all about your professionalism and your courage and your dedication.”

Mr Blair made no reference to the elusive weapons, but referred constantly to the liberation of Iraq, adding to the impression that both the British and American Governments had decided to make that, rather than the weapons, the justification for war.

Helping to liberate the Iraqis was a “huge, momentous and mighty act”, he said. “When people look back they will see the war as one of the defining moments of the century,” he said.

In London, however, the concern about the justification for the war was growing and it increased when Adam Ingram, a Defence Minister, said that Mr Blair’s assertion that Saddam would be able to launch biological weapons within 45 minutes had been based on only one source.

Downing Street also faced allegations — which it denied — that it had put pressure on the intelligence services to toughen up their weapons dossier.

**In Washington both Democrats and Republicans were also expressing fears that the main premises on which the war was justified — the weapons and links with al-Qaeda — were based on false or exaggerated intelligence. There were also suggestions that intelligence information may have been manipulated to rally public opinion behind the war. Both the Senate and House of Representatives are to hold hearings to determine whether “the analysis relayed to our policy-makers was accurate and unbiased”.

Jane Harman, the senior Democrat on the House Select Committee on Intelligence, said: “This could be the greatest intelligence hoax of all time. I doubt it, but we have to ask. It was the moral justification for the war. I think the world is owed an accounting.” The House committee has written to George Tenet, the CIA Director, asking him to respond by July 1 on several questions, with a view to holding hearings that month. **

A copy of the letter, seen by The Times, asks Mr Tenet whether the intelligence was of sufficient quantity, quality and reliability, how it was analysed, and whether “any dissenting views were properly weighed”. The Senate Intelligence Committee is also planning similar hearings.

Porter Goss, the House committee’s Republican chairman, told The Times: “My concern is that we did not have enough good intelligence to draw the necessary conclusions that our policy-makers need to be completely confident. Wouldn’t it be nice if we gave them better information to base their judgments on?” The CIA has launched a separate review, which was originally suggested last October, to monitor the intelligence process that led up to the war. The main call for that review came from Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary who was then frustrated by the CIA’s inability to find a “smoking gun” that would justify an invasion.

In an effort to unearth incriminating intelligence against Saddam, Mr Rumsfeld created the Office of Special Plans, a unit inside the Pentagon under the direction of his hawkish deputy Paul Wolfowitz. That became a direct rival not only of the CIA, but the Pentagon’s Defence Intelligence Agency, and its staff relied heavily on information from Ahmed Chalabi, the exiled leader of the Iraqi National Congress and the Washington hawks’ choice as the man to lead a post-Saddam Iraq.

Patrick Lang, a former director of Middle East analysis at the Defence Intelligence Agency, said this month that the Office of Special Plans “started picking out things that supported their thesis and stringing them into arguments that they could use with the President. It’s not intelligence. It’s political propaganda.”

The Pentagon strongly denies that it manipulated evidence or relied too heavily on untested sources. But defence officials concede that Saddam’s illegal weapons may no longer be in Iraq.

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Government blames spies over war](http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=410741)

A senior minister warned yesterday that the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq would constitute “Britain’s biggest ever intelligence failure” and would trigger an overhaul of the security services.

The minister told The Independent that the security services were responsible for Downing Street’s uncompromising stance on Saddam Hussein’s weapons. He spoke after a row erupted between politicians and the intelligence community over the Government’s justification for going to war.

A senior intelligence official also told the BBC that Downing Street had wanted the Government dossier outlining Saddam’s capability “sexed up” and that Downing Street included information against security service advice.

**Meanwhile, Washington dealt another devastating blow to Tony Blair, who was visiting troops in Iraq. Paul Wolfowitz, the US Deputy Defence Secretary, said that disarming Saddam of illegal weapons was nothing more than a “bureaucratic reason” for war.

He told Vanity Fair magazine that members of the divided White House cabinet pushed the issue because it was the only way they could present a united front. **

The row over weapons of mass destruction was fuelled this week when Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, suggested that Saddam might have destroyed his arsenal before the invasion.

While the British minister told The Independent he was confident weapons evidence would still be found in Iraq, he admitted: “If we don’t find any weapons of mass destruction, it will be Britain’s biggest ever intelligence failure. We would have to look at the whole set-up of how we gather intelligence in the future. It would have serious consequences. We saw some of this stuff, but Tony saw it come across his desk virtually every day.”

In another development, Adam Ingram, the Armed Forces minister, admitted that Mr Blair’s claim that Iraq could unleash chemical or biological weapons at 45 minutes’ notice was based on uncorroborated information. The assertion was included in Downing Street’s case for war, entitled: "Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction: the Assessment of the British Government’'.

Robin Cook, the former foreign secretary, reveals in The Independent today that he argued that the dossier was curiously “derivative” when it was discussed by the Cabinet. “There was no hard intelligence of a current weapons programme that would represent a new and compelling threat to our interests,” he writes, adding that Mr Wolfowitz’s comments proved that Britain had been “suckered” into going to war.

Mr Blair faced more embarrassment as MPs demanded a full-scale inquiry into intelligence claims that Downing Street had distorted the dossier, published last September. In the dossier, Mr Blair warned that Saddam was able to launch chemical or biological attacks within 45 minutes.

**BBC Radio 4’s Today programme quoted an unnamed “senior British official” as saying the claim was included against the wishes of intelligence officers, who had been ordered to “sex up” a drier draft version of the document.

The official said: “Most people in intelligence weren’t happy with the dossier because it didn’t reflect the considered view they were putting forward. The classic example was the statement that weapons of mass destruction were ready for use within 45 minutes. That information was not in the original draft. It was included in the dossier against our wishes because it wasn’t reliable. Most things in the dossier were double source but that was single source, and we believe that the source was wrong.” **

Downing Street flatly denied that pressure had been put on officers. Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister’s director of communications and strategy, said in Iraq yesterday: “This is totally false. There is nothing there that was not the work of the intelligence agencies.”

Mr Ingram acknowledged that the 45-minute claim was based on a single source. He said: “That was said on the basis of security source information … it was not corroborated … that was one element within a comprehensive report.”

But he stressed that the security services had supported the report. “The whole world knew what Saddam was up to in terms of weapons of mass destruction. That’s why we prosecuted that war,” he said.

When questioned about the continuing controversy, Mr Blair insisted that he had “absolutely no doubt at all” about the existence of weapons of mass destruction. “And rather than speculating, let’s wait until we get the full report back from our people who are interviewing the Iraqi scientists,” he said. “We have already found two trailers that both our and the American security services believe were used for the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons.”

Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, called for a special MPs’ committee to be set up to investigate claims that the report was amended.

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WMD just a convenient excuse for war, admits Wolfowitz

Now these morons are shamelessly admitting to what we’ve alwayz known…

By David Usborne
30 May 2003

The Bush administration focused on alleged weapons of mass destruction as the primary justification for toppling Saddam Hussein by force because it was politically convenient, a top-level official at the Pentagon has acknowledged.

The extraordinary admission comes in an interview with Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Defence Secretary, in the July issue of the magazine Vanity Fair.

Mr Wolfowitz also discloses that there was one justification that was “almost unnoticed but huge”. That was the prospect of the United States being able to withdraw all of its forces from Saudi Arabia once the threat of Saddam had been removed. Since the taking of Baghdad, Washington has said that it is taking its troops out of the kingdom. “Just lifting that burden from the Saudis is itself going to the door” towards making progress elsewhere in achieving Middle East peace, Mr Wolfowitz said. The presence of the US military in Saudi Arabia has been one of the main grievances of al-Qa’ida and other terrorist groups.

“For bureaucratic reasons we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on,” Mr Wolfowitz tells the magazine.

The comments suggest that, even for the US administration, the logic that was presented for going to war may have been an empty shell. They come to light, moreover, just two days after Mr Wolfowitz’s immediate boss, Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, conceded for the first time that the arms might never be found.

The failure to find a single example of the weapons that London and Washington said were inside Iraq only makes the embarrassment more acute. Voices are increasingly being raised in the US _ and Britain _ demanding an explanation for why nothing has been found.

Most striking is the fact that these latest remarks come from Mr Wolfowitz, recognised widely as the leader of the hawks’ camp in Washington most responsible for urging President George Bush to use military might in Iraq.** The magazine article reveals that Mr Wolfowitz was even pushing Mr Bush to attack Iraq immediately after the 11 September attacks in the US, instead of invading Afghanistan.**

There have long been suspicions that Mr Wolfowitz has essentially been running a shadow administration out of his Pentagon office, ensuring that the right-wing views of himself and his followers find their way into the practice of American foreign policy. He is best known as the author of the policy of first-strike pre-emption in world affairs that was adopted by Mr Bush shortly after the al-Qa’ida attacks.

In asserting that weapons of mass destruction gave a rationale for attacking Iraq that was acceptable to everyone, Mr Wolfowitz was presumably referring in particular to the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell. He was the last senior member of the administration to agree to the push earlier this year to persuade the rest of the world that removing Saddam by force was the only remaining viable option.

The conversion of Mr Powell was on full view in the UN Security Council in February when he made a forceful presentation of evidence that allegedly proved that Saddam was concealing weapons of mass destruction.

Critics of the administration and of the war will now want to know how convinced the Americans really were that the weapons existed in Iraq to the extent that was publicly stated. Questions are also multiplying as to the quality of the intelligence provided to the White House. Was it simply faulty _ given that nothing has been found in Iraq _ or was it influenced by the White House’s fixation on the weapons issue? Or were the intelligence agencies telling the White House what it wanted to hear?

This week, Sam Nunn, a former senator, urged Congress to investigate whether the argument for war in Iraq was based on distorted intelligence. He raised the possibility that Mr Bush’s policy against Saddam had influenced the intelligence that indicated Baghdad had weapons of mass destruction.

This week, the CIA and the other American intelligence agencies have promised to conduct internal reviews of the quality of the material they supplied the administration on what was going on in Iraq. The heat on the White House was only made fiercer by Mr Rumsfeld’s admission that nothing may now be found in Iraq to back up those earlier claims, if only because the Iraqis may have got rid of any evidence before the conflict.

“It is also possible that they decided that they would destroy them prior to a conflict,” the Defence Secretary said.

  • The US military said last night that it had released a suspected Iraqi war criminal by mistake. US Central Command said it was offering a $25,000 (315,000) reward for the capture of Mohammed Jawad An-Neifus, suspected of being involved in the murder of thousands of Iraqi Shia Muslims whose remains were found at a mass grave in Mahawil, southern Iraq, last month.

The alleged mobile weapons laboratories

As scepticism grows over the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, London and Washington are attempting to turn the focus of attention to Iraq’s alleged possession of mobile weapons labs.

A joint CIA and Defence Intelligence Agency report released this week claimed that two trucks found in northern Iraq last month were mobile labs used to develop biological weapons. The trucks were fitted with hi-tech laboratory equipment and the report said the discovery represented the “strongest evidence to date that Iraq was hiding a biowarfare programme”.

The design of the vehicles made them “an ingeniously simple self-contained bioprocessing system”. The report said no other purpose, for example water purification, medical laboratory or vaccine production, would justify such effort and expense.

But critics arenot convinced. No biological agents were found on the trucks and experts point out that, unlike the trucks described by Colin Powell, the Secretary of State, in a speech to the UN Security Council, they were open sided and would therefore have left a trace easy for weapons inspectors to detect. One former UN inspector said that the trucks would have been a very inefficient way to produce anthrax.

Katherine Butler

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=410730

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Scapegoats are always fun.. it’s like watching Jerry Springer. Just remember who is in charge of these ‘spies’, who gives their orders, who controls their oversight, who pays them, and most importantly.. who promotes them.

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Could this lot (Bush and his regime) be tried for treason? Sending American youth to kill and be killed on the basis of information they knew was NOT TRUE, and in fact mainly concocted by themselves. What does US legislation say about this? Do the American people care about national and international laws, rules and regulations? If so what are they waiting for to get rid of this unelected lot, who have hijacked American democracy, freedom of thought (Patriot Act 1 & 2), etc.

“Bush Lied and Soldiers Died
…
In a recent interview with Vanity Fair, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz revealed that weapons of mass destruction were the “diplomatic” reason for the War on Iraq. This statement simultaneously explains why the Bush administration is so horrible at diplomacy, (they don’t even know the definition) and why every country in the world except the U.S. and Israel had public majorities that opposed the war. Legions of foreign intelligence agencies, from China to France to Russia to Germany, reported that Iraq was no threat, had no terrorists, and most importantly had no weapons of mass destruction. Understandably, the leaders of these countries opposed the war, and the citizens protested in the streets.
…
Vice-President Dick Cheney went so far as to say that, “he (Saddam) has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.” Ari Fleischer also promised reporters on multiple occasions that weapons of mass destruction are “what this war is about.” And in an interview with Al Jazeera, Donald Rumsfeld plainly stated that the war, “is about weapons of mass destruction. It is unquestionably about that.”
…
In the greater scheme of things, the War on Iraq was assumed to be part of the much larger “War on Terrorism.” It is disappointing, then, to learn that the U.S. military occupying Iraq has not found any terrorists, weapons for terrorists, money for terrorists, or any possible connection between Al Qaeda and the now dissipated government of Iraq. If the War on Iraq was a remedy for the growing threat of terrorism to the U.S., one could easily conclude our mission was a dismal failure.
…
When considering present circumstances, it appears that the U.S. is, by any logical standard of measurement, losing the War on Terrorism. Just a brief review of events from the world stage should provide even the most credulous American with incontrovertible proof that the world is not a safer place since Mr. Bush took office. The international community, and specifically the Arab world, has never been more candid about their contempt for US policy.
…
Our government, and specifically the Bush administration, bears responsibility for this upheaval, and should begin taking immediate steps to ameliorate the suffering caused by U.S. led military combat.”

http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/060103A.shtml

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**
:k:

Awam ki Awaz, Unfortunately i don’t think US legislation would apply in this case. Dubya can argue a ‘pre-emptive’ point of view - the strength of Iraq-based al Qaeda cells would have increased (potentially increasing terrorist attacks) had the US not invaded Iraq. Or he may justify it as - ‘well, although WMD may not exist in the precise quantities we believed, at least we saved the Iraqis from the clutches of a most awful dictatorship’. Something pathetic along those lines.

Blair: I have secret proof of weapons
Gaby Hinsliff, Nick Paton Walsh, Peter Beaumont, The Observer, 1 June 2003

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Revealed: How Blair used discredited WMD ‘evidence’](http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=411301)

UK intelligence chiefs warned claim that Iraq could activate banned weapons in 45 minutes came from unreliable defector

Tony Blair’s sensational pre-war claim that Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction “could be activated within 45 minutes” was based on information from a single Iraqi defector of dubious reliability, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.

British intelligence sources said the defector, recruited by Ahmed Chalabi’s Iraqi National Congress, told his story to American officials. It was passed on to London as part of regular information-sharing with Washington, but British intelligence chiefs considered the “45 minutes” claim to be unreliable and uncorroborated by any other evidence. How it came to be included as the most dramatic element in the Government’s “intelligence dossier” last September, making the case for war, is now the subject of a furious row in Whitehall and abroad.

The armed forces minister, Adam Ingram, admitted last week that the information had come from a single source. But Downing Street denied a report that the claim made its way into the dossier only after politicians rejected a more cautious draft prepared by the intelligence services and demanded that it be “sexed up”.

Coming in the same week that the United States Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said Iraq might have destroyed its banned weapons before the war, the row has called into question the entire Anglo-American case on WMD. The failure to find such weapons has led to demands in the US and Britain for inquiries into whether the public was misled.

On Wednesday, the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee will meet behind closed doors to examine the Government’s WMD claims, but it is not expected to have full access to the intelligence seen by ministers.

Irritated by the latest row about Iraq’s missing weapons, which has overshadowed his six-day foreign tour, the Prime Minister has promised to bring out another dossier. Mr Blair said that he had seen some of the information obtained from Iraqi scientists now under interrogation, which proved that Saddam Hussein had an arsenal of dangerous weapons.

In an interview in St Petersburg with Sky News, being broadcast today, he said: “What we are going to do is assemble that evidence and present it properly to people. We are not going to give a running commentary on it. There are hundreds, possibly thousands, of potential WMD sites that are still being investigated. We have only just begun.”

The Prime Minister’s official spokesman vehemently denied yesterday that there was or had been any conflict between the Government and the intelligence services over Iraq, and claimed that leaks were probably coming from minor officials who did not have great inside knowledge.

President George Bush went further on Polish television, saying two trailers found laden with equipment in northern Iraq were proof of the existence of WMD. US intelligence agencies claim they were biological weapons production facilities. Mr Bush said: “Those who say we haven’t found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons - they’re wrong. We found them.”

The Prime Minister insisted that the information in the British dossier “is intelligence that comes through our Joint Intelligence Committee”. He said: “It’s not invented by politicians and it’s not invented by our security service. Everything was cleared by the Joint Intelligence Committee, and was their judgement - not my judgement, or another politician’s judgement.”

But one intelligence source said: “The ‘45-minute’ remark was part of the American intelligence input into the dossier. It was being treated cautiously by the British, but it was alighted on by the politicos and blown out of proportion.” Intelligence circles remain confident that evidence of WMD will soon be found.

Controversy reigns over the work of a special unit within the Pentagon, created by Mr Rumsfeld’s deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, which enthusiastically promoted the Iraqi National Congress’s WMD claims over the scepticism of others, notably in the CIA. Yesterday The Guardian said the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, met his American counterpart, Colin Powell, in February to discuss their concerns about the quality of information on Iraq’s banned weapons, and the claims being made by their respective political masters. The Government said the meeting never took place.

Other interesting links exposing the two great liars, Bush and Blair:

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=411300

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=411298

http://argument.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=411201

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The UK papers from all political persuasions are now blasting Blair the liar, and there are now growing calls for a public enquiry into all the WMD lies.

No 10 ‘doctored’ Iraq dossier

Intelligence memo reveals key conclusion dropped

THE government faced fresh embarrassment last night over Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction as confidential Whitehall memos showed a key section of a controversial intelligence dossier was dropped shortly before publication. The papers show that the government’s most senior intelligence officer wrote to Alastair Campbell, the prime minister’s communications director, to confirm he had withdrawn a conclusion to the report only days before it was made public. The move casts doubt on government insistence last week that Downing Street did not interfere with the contents of the dossier. Critics have accused Downing Street of exaggerating claims about Saddam Hussein’s weapons to bolster its case for war against Iraq, including a questionable claim that Baghdad could deploy chemical or biological arms in 45 minutes. MPs last night called on the government to release the original draft of the 50-page intelligence document — including the missing conclusion. “Only if the government agrees to release the undoctored version of the report will we see a full interpretation of the intelligence that was available,” said Patrick Mercer, a Conservative member of the defence select committee. The demands came as Tony Blair claimed yesterday to have new evidence of weapons of mass destruction. Frustrated that questions over Downing Street’s role have dogged his travels to the Gulf and eastern Europe, Blair broke off from the celebrations of St Petersburg’s 300th anniversary to defend his stance. In a television broadcast he said he was aware of fresh information based on the questioning of Iraqi scientists. “I certainly do know some of the stuff that has already been accumulated as a result of interviews . . . What we are going to do is assemble that evidence and present it properly to people,” he said. The dossier, published last September, was drawn up by the joint intelligence committee (JIC) — Britain’s top intelligence body, made up of the heads of MI5, MI6, GCHQ, defence intelligence and senior civil servants.

Documents shown to The Sunday Times last week make clear the final version was published only after extensive consultation between John Scarlett, the JIC chairman, and Campbell. The government’s security co-ordinator, Sir David Omand, and Sir David Manning, the prime minister’s foreign policy adviser, were also involved, along with Blair’s chief of staff, Jonathan Powell. In a memo to Campbell, Scarlett said Blair’s “foreword” had been incorporated within the overall document but “the conclusion has been dropped”. Insiders say the memo was the result of a “deal” over the dossier’s contents after months of bitter disagreement between intelligence chiefs and Blair’s aides. Campbell had attempted to persuade the intelligence services to incorporate hard-hitting conclusions depicting Saddam as an immediate threat and describing his regime’s weapons of mass destruction in simple, unqualified language. The intelligence services were reluctant to agree because, they said, the case against Saddam was not proven. Campbell agreed to drop his demand for toughened-up conclusions provided Scarlett agreed to state in writing that the rest of the report was accurate, including a controversial introduction by Blair, claiming Saddam was a “serious threat to UK national interests”. Scarlett eventually agreed and wrote he was “content” that the text reflected “as fully and accurately as possible” intelligence on Saddam’s weapons. The government’s claims about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction were challenged after the failure by British and US forces to find any after the war. Documents supplied to the Americans by MI6 about Iraqi attempts to buy uranium ore in Niger, west Africa, were shown to be fake. A second dossier produced by Campbell’s office earlier this year — said by officials to have drawn on the latest intelligence — was partly based on a 12-year-old PhD thesis. Last week an unnamed civil servant told Radio 4 that the “45 minutes” statement had been included in the earlier dossier despite opposition from members of the JIC. A junior minister later admitted there had been only one source for the statement, whereas most of the rest of the dossier had been double-sourced.

MPs are increasingly concerned about what they were told before the war with Iraq. Already, parliament’s intelligence and security committee has discussed launching an inquiry into intelligence on Iraq. The internal row over the dossier began after Campbell told foreign journalists it would be released ahead of a summit between Blair and President George Bush in April last year. Downing Street was forced into an embarrassing U-turn over the release of the dossier when a JIC draft failed to match expectations. “It was hedged in careful language and did not convey a picture of Saddam bent on rebuilding his weapons arsenal,” said one source. A strategy for revamping the dossier was hatched by Campbell and Manning. The two discussed the problem on a flight back from Texas in April 2002, after Blair had met Bush at his ranch in Crawford. “Essentially they came back from Crawford and presented Scarlett with a template,” said one source. Scarlett struggled to get agreement from other members of the JIC. But intelligence sources said critical changes were made to the dossier. MI6 had been circumspect about the claim that chemical and biological weapons could be deployable within 45 minutes. But the executive summary of the dossier stated without qualification: “We judge that . . . some of these weapons are deployable within 45 minutes.” A Downing Street spokesman said the revelation of Scarlett’s memo did “not change the the position the prime minister has set out — that the contents of the dossier were drawn up and agreed by the intelligence community and the JIC.”

16

who cares and what difference does it make if they find wmd or not
history remembers only victors no matter how victory comes losers are always bad america dropped a atom bomb killed millions who remembers and what difference does it make?
jo jeeta wohi sikandar

17

The Hunt for WMD

The hunt for Iraqi WMD stands here:

• Claims were made and strongly emphasized prior to the war with much supporting intelligence. It has since been discovered that much of the supporting intelligence was flawed.

• As of today, only two mobile bio-labs were found in Iraq.. but even those are in doubt. It was said several times that WMD may have been discovered, but each time turned out false. “More time is needed.”

• The administrations that earlier pushed the WMD aspect fervently are now playing down that idea in favor of the liberation plan (which received little mention prior to the war).

• Inquiries are beginning into the validity of intelligence material and procedures.

Resources:
In quotes: Reasons for the Iraq war
Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Programs – CIA OCT02

Now.. some recent articles:

Truth and consequences](http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/030609/usnews/9intell.htm)

“I’m not reading this,” he declared. “This is bulls- - -.”
– Colin Powell on intelligence reports

Where are Iraq’s WMDs?](http://www.msnbc.com/news/919753.asp?cp1=1)

“Everyone thinks we’re Tom Cruise. We’re not. We can’t look into every bedroom and listen to every conversation. Hell, we can’t even listen to the new cell phones some of the terrorists are using.”
– George Tenet on the difficulty of finding good intelligence?

Weapons of Mass Disappearance](http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,455767,00.html)

How do take your country to war when it doesn’t really want to go? You could subcontract with another nation, fight on the sly and hope no one notices. But if you need a lot of troops to prevail and you would like to remind everyone in the neighborhood who’s boss anyway, then what you need most is a good reason — something to stir up the folks back home. …

Bush Remarks Confirm Shift in Justifying War](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63017-2003May31.html)

Since last August, Bush and his top lieutenants said it was an absolute certainty that Iraq remained in possession of significant quantities of banned weapons, particularly chemical and biological munitions. But Bush’s remarks Thursday, in an interview on Polish television, made clear the administration had lowered its standards of proof. The president asserted that the discovery in Iraq of two trailers, with laboratory equipment but no pathogens aboard, was tantamount to a discovery of weapons. …

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Good job, Spoon. Nice, organized arrangement of sources.

i found that US News article (re Powell) perhaps most interesting. In a way, one almost feels sorry for him - he set up his own review team (based at the CIA) to assess the validity of the information contained in the first draft that Cheney had developed. Subsequent to Powell’s performance at the Security Council in February, unless i am mistaken there was a mixed (global) reaction - despite the apparent detailed information, not everyone really bought it at that point particularly the Iraq-al Qaeda allegations. The only discovery in Iraq (so far) that vaguely matches anything Powell discussed in his presentation, has been the two labs you mentioned. If there’s any shred of credibility that can be salvaged, it lies in the IAEA having access to those labs and subsequently issuing a report; anything from the British/US admins. at this point doesn’t carry enough legitimacy.

If - as the majority of the world suspected prior to the invasion - no WMD (or even their substantial components) are discovered in Iraq, then another reason will be profferred - mass graves, political repression, Kurds’ plight, “democracy”, etc etc. The point will remain, however, that we were all collectively lied to. Poor Blair entangled himself into this sordid mess. What an absolute shame that two democratic countries went to war on the back of gross misinformation and deceit.

19

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Nadia_H: *
....Poor Blair entangled himself into this sordid mess. What an absolute shame that two democratic countries went to war on the back of gross misinformation and deceit.
[/QUOTE]

May be they were counting too much on world's "Morality" that rest of the world would be tooooo happy to see Iraq "liberated" and ignore/forget the WMDs.

20

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Changez_like: *

*May be they were counting too much on world's "Morality" that rest of the world would be tooooo happy to see Iraq "liberated" and ignore/forget the WMDs.
[/QUOTE]
*

i imagine a few countries (mostly European ones) would have agreed to go for the liberation argument (they might not have been too happy about it, but they would have agreed under pressure, as Poland, Spain and of course the UK did). The issue, of course, is that WMD (and not liberation) was trumped up by the US admin. to represent the predominant reason for engaging in this invasion. Although it is too late, now perhaps it is being realized (by Powell in particular?) that he should have pursued more accuracy in his Council presentation and public remarks. i am sure that Blair, too, privately, must be feeling the heat of taking his country into an invasion based upon information that remains so distorted and inaccurate.
oh well - as you sow, so shall you reap.