Support NeoGAF

[Tommie Hu$tle]

By John Diamond, USA TODAY

Saddam destroyed weapons in 1991, report says

WASHINGTON — Iraq destroyed virtually all its chemical and biological munitions in 1991, a dozen years before President Bush ordered U.S. troops to invade based largely on the alleged threat posed by those weapons, according to an extensive report being presented to senators at this hour.
The report is being presented this afternoon to a Senate committee by chief U.S. arms inspector Charles Duelfer. It says Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein believed in the deterrent power conferred by weapons of mass destruction but ordered them destroyed in an effort to end sanctions imposed on his country after the Persian Gulf War in 1991. The key findings of the report were described Tuesday by a high-level administration official who has been briefed on its contents.

The report is based on extensive interviews with senior officials in Saddam's regime and interrogation of the ousted dictator. The official said the report shows that Iraq planned to revive its banned weapons programs once United Nations sanctions were lifted. But by dating the destruction of Iraqi weapons to 1991, the Duelfer report raises new questions about how U.S. intelligence agencies and the Bush administration were so far off the mark in their assessment of the Iraqi threat.

The administration official spoke on condition of anonymity because the White House wants to brief Congress before discussing the report's details with the media. Duelfer is to testify today before the Senate Armed Services Committee on his 1,500-page report.

The basic conclusion of the report — that Iraq had no stockpiles of chemical or biological weapons and a moribund nuclear weapons development effort — strengthens the preliminary findings of Duelfer's predecessor, David Kay, and undercuts the main Bush administration argument for war. A weapons inspection team that at one point included 1,500 members conducting field searches, document examinations and interrogations did uncover evidence that Iraq wanted to develop improved missiles. But none of the Scud missiles the Bush administration alleged Saddam was hoarding has been found.

The search began during the U.S. and coalition invasion in March and April 2003. U.S. troops have uncovered a handful of decaying mustard gas shells but no evidence of weapons stockpiles or production capability, such as the mobile biological weapons trailers cited by Secretary of State Colin Powell in a prewar presentation to the U.N. Security Council. The failure to find proof of the Bush administration's prewar allegations has become a thorny campaign issue for the Bush White House, particularly as insurgent violence has intensified in Iraq.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan declined to discuss the report in detail before the congressional testimony. But McClellan told reporters Tuesday that although no stockpiles of chemical or biological weapons were found, the report paints a damning picture of Saddam's clandestine efforts to prepare to revive his weapons programs as soon as possible.

The report concludes that "Saddam Hussein had the intent and the capability, that he was pursuing an aggressive strategy to bring down the sanctions" by appearing to comply with the weapons ban while engaging in "illegal financing procurement schemes," McClellan said.

The high-level administration official said the Duelfer report shows that Saddam approved an effort to use front companies to conceal Iraqi plans to purchase illegal weapons components, including rocket engines from Poland. Under questioning, Saddam did not directly admit to defying U.N. sanctions but made clear that he believes Iraq's chemical arsenal helped him avoid disaster in the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s and helped persuade the first President Bush not to order coalition troops to march to Baghdad after Iraq was forced out of Kuwait in 1991, the official said.

U.N. inspectors, and later U.S. intelligence, noted Iraq's public destruction of banned weapons after the Gulf War but maintained that Iraq hid an illegal stockpile and retained the ability to build more. Iraq repeatedly denied it had retained any of its weapons of mass destruction but may have encouraged uncertainty to avoid appearing weak to hostile neighbors such as Iran.

Spin give me more spin!

 

[bishoptl]

Here's some more spin for ya.

Dr Saleh said it would be "very surprising" if press leaks that the survey group had found no WMDs turned out to be true.

"We know Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. We know he used weapons of mass destruction," Dr Saleh said, adding that in his view Saddam Hussein was himself a weapon of mass destruction.

:lol

 

[sc0la]

Spin give me more spin!

Heh, because of MAF I was listening to Aimee Mann when I read that and at the same exact second the lyrics went "what ever you can throw in, wash rinse and spin, till its spun away"

I love chance.

 

[RiZ III]

Owned. But then this was obvious a looong time ago.

 

[alejob]

So basicaly Saddam wanted WMDs to protect himself from a US invation(and Iran) and the US and the US invades Iraq to get the WMDs. Sounds like a circle(loop) of death.

 

[duderon]

CNSOWNED

 

[MIMIC]

Apparently, that CNS story was complete and utter bullshit.

 

[Jim Bowie]

I've never even heard of CNS before... apparently you can add "news service" to anything and people will buy it.

 

[Tommie Hu$tle]

Well CNS was the first site to break out the CBS fake doc story.

 

[Tommie Hu$tle]

This is on the front page of CNN

This looks like the biggest onwed pic ever created.

 

[Drinky Crow]

CNS only had the scoop on Rathergate because they troll the Free Republic forums. For every 1000 idiot freepers blathering on in a world of denial, one actually makes a point. Unsurprisngly, that's roughly the ratio of bullshit articles to valid content on CNS.

 

[DarienA]

What a perfect week for this stuff to be coming out.... man I hope some of those folks light Bush' ass up in the debate this Friday with their questions.

 

[Ripclawe]

The IGS report is a lot more in depth than what you want to believe that everyone lied.

http://cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/index.html

or surprisingly BBC plays it somewhat straight

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3722144.stm

and I was shocked when NBC news actually lead with the UN oil for food scandal that ties into all of this. Its a lot more complex than " BUSH LIED, PEOPLE DIED!!! " nonsense.


Of course, if nothing was there since 91, what the hell was the U.N. and America bombing and talking about with chemical and nuke weaponery in the late 90's?

 

[DarienA]

The IGS report is a lot more in depth than what you want to believe that everyone lied.

http://cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/index.html

or surprisingly BBC plays it somewhat straight

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3722144.stm

and I was shocked when NBC news actually lead with the UN oil for food scandal that ties into all of this. Its a lot more complex than " BUSH LIED, PEOPLE DIED!!! " nonsense.

Is it? Wasn't part of the display of truth having Powell do a song and dance presentation where we were shown satellite photos of said WMD locations?

As well where do you draw the line? Saddam WANTED to get WMD's... Saddam MIGHT have built WMD's at some point in the future.... So? Saddam also might have wanted to take a shit for all we know but we don't know exactly what was going to happen.

 

[Ripclawe]

As well where do you draw the line? Saddam WANTED to get WMD's... Saddam MIGHT have built WMD's at some point in the future.... So?.

We draw the line at the fact he broke UN resolutions, he wasn't fortcoming about his programs even with his own generals much less the world, he was actively funding the way to get around sanctions to get WMD's and the people who could make them at a moment's notice. The onus was on him to prove everyone wrong. He did not.

from the report.

Saddam asked in 1999 how long it would take to build a production line for CW [chemical weapons] agents, accordingto the former Minister of Military Industrialization. Huwaysh investigated and responded that experts could readily prepare a production line for mustard, which could be produced within six months. VX and Sarin production was more complicated and would take longer. Huwaysh relayed this answer to Saddam, who never requested follow-up information. An Iraqi CW expert separately estimated Iraq would require only a few days to start producing mustard—if it was prepared to sacrifice the production equipment.
Imad Husayn ‘Ali Al ‘Ani, closely tied to Iraq’s VX program, alleged that Saddam had been looking for chemical weapons scientists in 2000 to begin production in a second location, according to reporting.

At a minimum, he was a threat and needed to be taken out, based on the intelligence known by several countries, he needed to be taken out. See a threat, take it out by any means necessary. This is also, why I am not in a panic over Iran or North Korea, both of them know there are consequences to their actions. NK would have to deal with SK, Japan, Russia, China, and America. Iran knows that Israel could take them out, thats all bluster.

Saddam was more interested in being the modern day Saladin, looking at Iran and possibly Syria as rivals. He needed to be taken out.

 

[Tommie Hu$tle]

We draw the line at the fact he broke UN resolutions, he wasn't fortcoming about his programs even with his own generals much less the world, he was actively funding the way to get around sanctions to get WMD's and the people who could make them at a moment's notice. The onus was on him to prove everyone wrong. He did not.

I'm thinking since there was nothing that the Brits or the US could find as "imminent" threat worthy he kinda did prove everyone wrong (or at least every first world intellegence service).


We didn't go to war for possible or potential threats we went to war because our govenment claimed he was an imminent threat. Unless imminent to you means 10 to 15 years from now our resouces have been used poorly and diverted from the real threat that was in Tora Bora.

 

[DarienA]

We draw the line at the fact he broke UN resolutions, he wasn't fortcoming about his programs even with his own generals much less the world, he was actively funding the way to get around sanctions to get WMD's and the people who could make them at a moment's notice. The onus was on him to prove everyone wrong. He did not.

Did he defy the UN? Yeah of course... then again who wouldn't the UN is pretty much the very definition of a paper organization. As for the food for oil schemes, the bribes, etc... yup again he's wrong he's a dictator... but it takes two to tango in those situations. But none of this changes the point that he had no WMD's pretty much the main reason the current administration gave the US public as to why we had to go to IRaq.

Huwaysh relayed this answer to Saddam, who never requested follow-up information.

So he asked for information but never followed up on it. Doesn't seem to be more than a query there.

At a minimum, he was a threat and needed to be taken out, based on the intelligence known by several countries, he needed to be taken out. See a threat, take it out by any means necessary. This is also, why I am not in a panic over Iran or North Korea, both of them know there are consequences to their actions. NK would have to deal with SK, Japan, Russia, China, and America. Iran knows that Israel could take them out, thats all bluster.

Saddam was more interested in being the modern day Saladin, looking at Iran and possibly Syria as rivals. He needed to be taken out.

Saddam who had no WMD's, and had thought he should somehow try to acquired/develop WMD's but hadn't made any real steps towards developing them was a threat.

I don't see it. I'm trying to be open about this, but I simply don't see it.

The US public was told that Iraq was a current threat, the US public was told that Iraq had WMD's... the US public was indirectly lead to believe by the current administration that there may have been ties between Iraq and 9/11..... false, false, and false.

 

[Incognito]

:lol @ ripclawe

all i can do is laugh.

he says "see a threat, take care of threat" in regards to iraq. yet, for iran, he says israel can take care of them.

so, israel wouldn't be able to handle a country with NO WMD'S??

:lol :lol

what threat did iraq pose? mean words?

 

[Dilbert]

At a minimum, he was a threat and needed to be taken out, based on the intelligence known by several countries, he needed to be taken out. See a threat, take it out by any means necessary. This is also, why I am not in a panic over Iran or North Korea, both of them know there are consequences to their actions. NK would have to deal with SK, Japan, Russia, China, and America. Iran knows that Israel could take them out, thats all bluster.

Saddam was more interested in being the modern day Saladin, looking at Iran and possibly Syria as rivals. He needed to be taken out.

You are one paranoid piece of work. Jesus. You said "needed to be taken out" three times in two paragraphs...as if merely repeating it would make it true.

So Iran and North Korea are not a threat to us because their neighbors would contain them...but Iraq somehow requires immediate action by the United States to contain? Do you really expect me to believe that Iraq has no neighbors and no expected consequences to aggressive action? Even while there were daily UN patrols over the country watching every move?

 

[PartlyCloudlike]

At a minimum, he was a threat and needed to be taken out, based on the intelligence known by several countries, he needed to be taken out. See a threat, take it out by any means necessary. This is also, why I am not in a panic over Iran or North Korea, both of them know there are consequences to their actions. NK would have to deal with SK, Japan, Russia, China, and America. Iran knows that Israel could take them out, thats all bluster.
QUOTE]

There haven't been consequences for the actions of Iran or North Korea for their pursuit and development of nuclear weapons. Are you saying that soon we will going after these two countries? If not, then it clearly shows the US was selectively determining who was a bigger threat based on factors other than nuclear threat and WMD which I hasten to add were the main arguments for going to war with Iraq. I'm also being open about this. It destroys this administrations credibility when there were no WMD's found, no nuclear weapons, and no link to 9/11. These were the main arguments for going to war. You say the consequences are clear to those countries. Have they stopped or shown any sign they plan on ceasing their nuclear weapons programs? No. And nothing you've said changes the reality that there were no WMD, no nuclear weapons program, and no connection to 9/11. Those were the reasons I initially supported the war and the administration. But when the administration lost those arguments convincingly, then it's time to lose this administration.

 

[Keio]

he needed to be taken out. See a threat, take it out by any means necessary.

Now even if what you say is (and it's not) true, the whole process of "taking out" Saddam might have been handled in a way that didn't lead to US being committed in a long, ugly guerrilla war, Iraq being in ruins, hatred of US on the rise, respect at an all time low etc.

And of course, the administration might have skipped all the lies they spewed out on the subject so they wouldn't appear as incompetent as they now do. If they now say that WMD don't matter, why did they make it such a big deal before the invasion?