From: Ryan Gill (rmgill@mindspring.com)
Date: Thu Jun 30 2005 - 09:32:19 PDT
At 8:51 AM -0700 6/30/05, chris case wrote:
>I have a thought on the Iraqi WMDs. Why didn't the powers that be decide to
>NOT FIND any?
Its more complicated than that.
1. They had dual use technologies that the UN was actively monitoring, then stopped on the run up to the invasion. Those dual use technologies are missing now. If they weren't the smoking gun, they were the press and dies, not the lock and stock.
2. Iraq had WMD prior to the 1st Gulf War. Sarin, Botulin Toxin, Mustard. They didn't comply with the terms of the cease fire agreement whereby they were supposed to show all their cards. One case in particular involves the VX that they never disclosed until missiles casings were found with VX agent precursors on them. The basic terms of "full final disclosure" were never abided by Saddam.
http://www.nti.org/e_research/profiles/Iraq/Chemical/3883_3896.html
See the April-May and later entries for 1998
3. Iraq so obfuscated the inspection and verification process that any meaningful confirmation was hopelessly clouded. Thus when they adopted a posture for the benefit for their neighbors and their subject peoples (Kurds, Marsh Arabs, Shias) again in 2000 or so that they had Mustard gas again it was hard not to at least give it a credible air.
4. Iraq's continued attempts to circumvent the cease fire agreement by obtaining as much dual use material and firing on Allied aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones pretty much nails the coffin shut on their case in my mind.
9/11 didn't provide a causus belli to me, it just blew away any patience I had for Iraq's BS. If Iraq had been truely complaint, they'd have complied with the ceasefire the momeny 9/11 happened. As it was, he thought he could bluff us by using French economic interest as a lever in the UNSC.
If you make an agreement with a nation you've allowed to surrender on certain conditions and they fail to live up to those conditions of surrender, how long do you give them before you crank up the guns again? 12 Years seems like a generous amount of time if you ask me.
However, 155mm Chem rounds were in fact found. They had not been destroyed, hardly the smoking gun, but it was some scattered spare ammo for the gun they weren't supposed to have. The complexity of the issue is clarified for me by reading the time line presented at NTI.org. It's a group that Ted Turner funds, he's hardly the major warmonger, but rather someone that calls it like he sees it. The diverse sources are good enough for me.
There are separate chronologies for the Iraqi Nuke, Bio and Chem programs and the diverse sources for material and equipment (a lot of it came from Europe) in the 70s and 80s is certainly an eye opener.
http://www.nti.org/e_research/profiles/Iraq/Chemical/3883.html
> I mean, if we REALLY wanted to find some, we could have had
>the SEALs bring them in, then have the Green Berets find them. Simple,
>that's what those guys do. But why didn't we want to ? Whose bread is
>buttered on the 'no wmd' side? One little covert op, and GWB looks great-
>again. So, why not?
That works in movies. Green Berets fight insurgency warfare down with the people. Seals don't waltz into major complexes with hundreds of staff and guards and waltz out. They're not super human. The sheer number of Iraqi Baathist that moved to Syria and the high probability for materials or technologies to have been shipped there certainly raises the question that some of what we were looking for was evacuated out of the country. Iraq flew aircraft to Iran among other places during the first gulf war, perhaps thinking they'd be safe there and they could get them back. It certainly stands to reason that the Baathist in One nation would provide safe harbor for the Iraqi Baathist does it not?
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