Just kidding

[Insp. Clue!So?]

Personally, I think it is high treason to lead a nation off to war under false pretenses.

Is the penalty for Treason still hanging? Just curious...

From: http://billmon.org.v.sabren.com/archives/000172.html

What a Tangled Web We Weave . . .
. . . when first we practice to deceive!


Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.
--Dick Cheney
August 26, 2002

Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons.
--George W. Bush
September 12, 2002

If he declares he has none, then we will know that Saddam Hussein is once again misleading the world.
--Ari Fleischer
December 2, 2002

We know for a fact that there are weapons there.
--Ari Fleischer
January 9, 2003

Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent.
--George W. Bush
January 28, 2003

We know that Saddam Hussein is determined to keep his weapons of mass destruction, is determined to make more.
--Colin Powell
February 5, 2003

We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons the dictator tells us he does not have.
--George Bush
February 8, 2003

So has the strategic decision been made to disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction by the leadership in Baghdad? I think our judgment has to be clearly not.
--Colin Powell
March 8, 2003

Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.
--George Bush
March 17, 2003

Well, there is no question that we have evidence and information that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical particularly . . . all this will be made clear in the course of the operation, for whatever
duration it takes.
--Ari Fleisher
March 21, 2003

There is no doubt that the regime of Saddam Hussein possesses weapons of mass destruction. As this operation continues, those weapons will be identified, found, along with the people who have produced them and who
guard them.
--Gen. Tommy Franks
March 22, 2003

I have no doubt we're going to find big stores of weapons of mass destruction.
--Defense Policy Board member Kenneth Adelman
March 23, 2003

One of our top objectives is to find and destroy the WMD. There are a number of sites.
--Pentagon Spokeswoman Victoria Clark
March 22, 2003

We know where they are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.
--Donald Rumsfeld
March 30, 2003

Obviously the administration intends to publicize all the weapons of mass destruction U.S. forces find -- and there will be plenty.
--Neocon scholar Robert Kagan
April 9, 2003

I think you have always heard, and you continue to hear from officials, a measure of high confidence that, indeed, the weapons of mass destruction will be found.
--Ari Fleischer
April 10, 2003

We are learning more as we interrogate or have discussions with Iraqi scientists and people within the Iraqi structure, that perhaps he destroyed some, perhaps he dispersed some. And so we will find them.
--George Bush
April 24, 2003

There are people who in large measure have information that we need . . . so that we can track down the weapons of mass destruction in that country.
--Donald Rumsfeld
April 25, 2003

We'll find them. It'll be a matter of time to do so.
--George Bush
May 3, 2003

I am confident that we will find evidence that makes it clear he had weapons of mass destruction.
--Colin Powell
May 4, 2003

I never believed that we'd just tumble over weapons of mass destruction in that country.
--Donald Rumsfeld
May 4, 2003

I'm not surprised if we begin to uncover the weapons program of Saddam Hussein -- because he had a weapons program.
--George W. Bush
May 6, 2003

U.S. officials never expected that "we were going to open garages and find" weapons of mass destruction.
--Condoleeza Rice
May 12, 2003

I just don't know whether it was all destroyed years ago -- I mean, there's no question that there were chemical weapons years ago -- whether they were destroyed right before the war, (or) whether they're still hidden.
--Maj. Gen. David Petraeus, Commander 101st Airborne
May 13, 2003

Before the war, there's no doubt in my mind that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical. I expected them to be found. I still expect them to be found.
--Gen. Michael Hagee, Commandant of the Marine Corps
May 21, 2003


Given time, given the number of prisoners now that we're interrogating, I'm confident that we're going to find weapons of mass destruction.
--Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff
May 26, 2003

They may have had time to destroy them, and I don't know the answer.
--Donald Rumsfeld
May 27, 2003

For bureaucratic reasons, we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction (as justification for invading Iraq) because it was the one reason everyone could agree on.
--Paul Wolfowitz
May 28, 2003

[Jimbo]

"Personally, I think it is high treason to lead a nation off to war under false pretenses."

You certainly have pretty low standards and quite an imagination if you think declaring war on Iraq was treasonous. If anything it was the exact opposite. Below is the constitutional definition of treason:

"Whereas it is essential to the preservation of liberty to define precisely and exclusively what shall constitute the crime of Treason, it is therefore ordained, declared & established, that if a man do levy war agst. the U.S. within their territories, or be adherent to the enemies of the U. S. within the said territories, giving them aid and comfort within their territories or elsewhere, and thereof be provably attainted of open deed by the People of his condition, he shall be adjudged guilty of Treason."

So it seems it might have been treason not to go to war with Iraq.

[John Cole]

I love the last statement. In other words, for bureaucratic reasons, we may have just as well invaded Iraq for its bad architecture.

John

[MMMMMM]

The guy had weapons of mass destruction, but he suddenly turned into a saint and unilaterally destroyed them all after kicking out the U.N. inspectors. All the Iraqi exiles are of course lying. The mobile labs recently found were for civilian research purposes, and the trailer trucks just found with self-contained germ lab production facilities were really used to develop highly nutritious formula for animals in the Baghdad Zoo.

There were many good reasons to invade Iraq, and casualties were probably the lowest of any war in modern history, and even the Iraqi people are glad to be rid of Saddam--but those who engineered this good deed committed treason. And since we haven't yet found the proverbial smoking gun, time's up!-- so we can safely assume there isn't one.

[Chris Alger]

“the threats posed by Iraq are very serious and rapidly growing. If nothing is actively done, soon organized terrorists will possess biological wmd along with the means to deliver them on our soil (and much of this will be courtesy of Iraq). Containing Iraq is a great idea but Saddam is developing and producing these weapons even as inspections are going on.”
MMMMMM, from "This is naive" (http://www.twoplustwo.com/forums/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Board=exchange&Number=205910 &Forum=exchange&Words=wmd&Match=Entire%20Phrase&Se archpage=18&Limit=25&Old=allposts&Main=205406&Sear ch=true#Post205910) 2/6/3

Why don't you (1) admit that you didn't have a clue about Iraqi WMD or (2) tell us all where they're at?

[nicky g]

The weapons inspectors were never kicked out; they withdrew in 1998 after concluding Iraq was not cooperatin fully. This was after the spying scandal when the UN admitted that some of the insspectors had been passing their findings on to US and Israeli intelligence.

All but one of the high profile defectors said that the weapons programme was stopped in the mid-90s.

[MMMMMM]

I already posted where they likely are: buried in the Bekaa valley 100 meters deep under freshly planted groves. Syria needs to turn over the GPS coordinates of the exact spot.

[MMMMMM]

It's hard for me to believe that anyone could believe that Saddam, on his own, renounced WMD programs. It would be sort of like Castro suddenly deciding to become a free-speech activist.

Besides, numerous reports from Iraqi exiles conflict with that claim. I've seen many reports or quotes from exiles saying he has WMD; none saying the opposite.

[Chris Alger]

If you can tell that the groves are "freshly planted," then why don't you provide the exact location?

[nicky g]

Clearly we get our news from different sources. But anyway: There's a difference between "exiles" and defectors. Chalabi and his friends go on about WMD programmes, but they hadn't been in Iraq for decades. One scientist, whose name i forget, said that Saddam was tring to build a nuclear bomb, continuing the programmes etc. He wrote a book about it called Saddam's bomb-maker or some such - I think you've mentioned him before. All other defectors I've heard about said the programme was shut down in 1995 or thereabouts, including Saddam's son-in-law when he defected to Jordan.

[nicky g]

Here are a few quotes from you, some regarding defectors and some regarding scientists the US has interviewed in Iraq. The scientist I referred to was is named Hamza. I was wrong that he was the only prominent defector claiming that the weapons programme continued after 1998 - so did an engineer called al-Haideiri. Hamza stopped working on the weapons programme in 1990 and left Ira in 1994, so his "intelligence" on developments after them is hardly reliable.

Guardian May 29 (http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,966056,00.html)


"For the past few weeks US officials have been questioning several prominent Iraqi scientists alleged to have been involved in secret weapons programmes, including Rihab Taha, known as Dr Germ and Huda Ammash. But according to one US intelligence source "they're all saying everything had been destroyed".

The Iraqi detainees have reportedly told their interrogators that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were disposed of, not just before the war as Mr Rumsfeld implied, but several years earlier. "


Observer piece (http://www.observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,953497,00.html)
"Other selective use of intelligence occurred. Much was made of the OSP's body of Iraqi defectors, but they chose which defectors they wanted to listen to. Kamil's terrifying description of Iraq's capabilities in the early 1990s and its efforts to conceal its arsenal was touted as killer proof. The fact that Kamil also told his interrogators the weapons had later been ordered destroyed was suppressed.

Other defectors may have had their own agendas. Kamil described one, Dr Khidhir Hamza, as a 'professional liar' - but told US intelligence what it wanted to hear and said Iraq was close to building a nuclear bomb. No one now believes that. But Hamza has now returned to Iraq as part of a Pentagon team to rebuild the country, in charge of atomic energy. Kamil also returned to Iraq - but when Saddam was in power. He was executed. "

http://www.observer.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,668867,00.html (http://Piece on Hamza)

"Among the most prominent and controversial public sources of information on Iraq's ambitions for weapons of mass destruction has been Dr Khidir Hamza, the self-described former head of Iraq's nuclear weapons programme, who defected in 1994. According to his supporters - Woolsey and his friends among them - Hamza was 'Saddam's bombmaker', the mastermind of his country's nuclear programme, who fled from Iraq to reveal to the world the scope of Saddam's nuclear ambitions and was widely feted by senior figures of all political persuasions in US foreign policy circles.

What is accepted without question is that until 1990, when he retired from the Iraqi nuclear programme, the US-educated theoretical nuclear physicist was a senior managerial administrator in Saddam's secret bombmaking programme, which included six months in 1987 spent in charge of the programme.

What troubles his former supporters - now his fiercest critics - is not the valuable information he was able to give. Rather, it is about claims he has subsequently made about programmes and technical issues of which, they believe, he has no direct knowledge. These, they say, are claims driven by a desire to persuade the US that military intervention is the best course.

Among his most questionable allegations, they say, are those which have been taken up most forcefully by the US hawks. It is Hamza who insists how close Iraq was to assembling a viable nuclear bomb. It is Hamza who has claimed Iraq was near to building a viable 'radiation weapon'.

It is Hamza who was prominent on US television speculating that Iraq had assisted Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda in their attacks on 11 September and the later anthrax attacks on the US.

One of Hamza's sternest critics is Scott Ritter, the former UN weapons inspector and US Marine intelligence officer, who recently switched from being an anti-Saddam hawk to joining the anti-invasion voices after he visited Iraq to make a film. Ritter describes Hamza simply as a 'fraud' who has consistently lied about his importance in Iraq's nuclear programme and his own knowledge of it.

Then there is David Albright, Hamza's former mentor in the US and himself a former nuclear inspector involved in assessing the scope of Iraq's nuclear ambitions.

'If Hamza has become a monster,' he told The Observer last week, 'I partly blame myself. He had good information on what he knew about, but where we fell out was that I was concerned he was telling me stuff he had read elsewhere, including stuff he could have read in Time magazine. He was not one of the technical experts on the programme, but I found he was a bright man who picked up things very quickly.'

One of the problems, says Albright, was that Hamza was given access in the US to Iraq's own declaration of what its nuclear programme comprised. This was provided in the mid-Nineties after another high-level defector disclosed the scope of the Iraqi programme. Hamza, says Albright, was recycling this as his own first-hand knowledge.

'His book is full of technical inaccuracies and there is no doubt he exaggerated his importance. For instance he has a section about the biological weapons programme which he had no knowledge of or access to,' says Albright.

Albright believes that Hamza's unreliability can be dated to 1998 when the Clinton administration published its Iraq Liberation Bill, voting funds to depose Saddam. 'From that point on he felt US military action was the only course. He told me he wanted to get a gun himself and go back and fight with his sons. These days he travels with people with a very heavy agenda.'

Ritter - whom critics accuse of having become an Iraqi apologist after recent visits to Iraq - believes that Hamza is not alone among defectors sponsored by the INC in singing for his supper.

'In over seven years as a weapons inspector I chased down countless so-called intelligence sources and defector stories saying what Iraq was doing. Most were completely baseless. It is in the nature of the intelligence business that there is an awful lot of crap,' Ritter said.

'The biggest problem you get with defectors is that they often have legitimate tit-bits that are squeezed out in their debriefings. They feel under pressure to say more. So they read up what others have claimed and develop it, saying a cousin or a friend visited such and such a plant and saw such and such a thing, and you end up with a circle of falsehood.' "

[MMMMMM]

Among lots and lots and lots of other freshly planted groves.

You guys give all the benefit of the doubt to the worst people in the entire world--I can't understand why.

[MMMMMM]

Of course the most prominent Baath Party members, who have recently been captured or surrendered, will for the most part tow the Party line.


I'm also really getting sick of how so many "liberals" stand up for despots and tyrants. Look at all the Hollywooders who worship Castro. Oliver Stone said the 8 hours he spent with Castro "were the most important hours of my life." It's simply revolting.

Why can't you guys assume despots are guilty until proven innocent, instead of the other way around--especially considering their horrible past behaviors? It's really the only way to deal with despots, because they either are guilty or would be guilty if they got the chance, and the chance they are guilty far outweighs the chance they aren't. You guys apparently don't have understand of the Mind Of The Despot. They really don't think the way andyfox would if he were in their shoes.

As for the WMD, give it time, give it time. How many times do we need to say this? And what of the tractor trailers just found?

Here's my opinion of Scott Ritter:

http://www.strangecosmos.com/view.adp?picture_id=6281

[Chris Alger]

I'm not giving anyone the benefit of a doubt. Where, for example, is your proof that Iraq managed to transport WMD across Syria, into Lebanon, and bury them in the Bekaa Valley, and then cover them up with freshly planted groves of -- jsut what, exactly? -- all without being detected by US, Lebanese and Isreali surveillance? How were able to discern this when the most sophisticated intelligence services in the region were not?

[nicky g]

"Of course the most prominent Baath Party members, who have recently been captured or surrendered, will for the most part tow the Party line."

That may be true of those captured - though I have no idea if they were senior Baathists or not. I don't see why it would be true of a defector who was later assassinated by Saddam.

I'd be interested to know why you think people pay attention to Hamza's opinions on what happended post-1998 when he left in 1994, and why the only prominent defector who claims the weapons programme kept running after 1998 and could actually know this is a close associate of the INC. Such a programme would have involved hundreds of people. Why is their no independent confirmation of what he says from within Iraq now?


"As for the WMD, give it time, give it time. How many times do we need to say this? And what of the tractor trailers just found?"

How much time does it take? Bush, Rumsfeld and Blair said they knew where the WMDs were being stored, yet now it turns out they aren't there. They've found noone in Iraq to support their claims. It's not about giving Saddam the benefit of the doubt - his atrocities are well-documented (no thanks to the UK and the US who ignored them at the time) - it's about basing going to war, for God's sake, on real evidence and not hearsay and far-fetched speculation.

I don't see what Castro has to do with it. I am certianly no fan of him, thogh I think the attention his regime receives is out of all proportion to how repressive it is, when you think of the easy ride Egypt gets, or the willingness of the US to deal with Saudi Arabia, or various Latin American dictators in the 70s and 80s. He is a trillion times better than the US-backed regime he toppled, though that's no excuse for staying in power till now.

[MMMMMM]

Intelligence services did report that shortly before the war, suspicious movements were taking place involving trucks and convoys from Iraq to Syria.

No proof on my part, but I've read this in several places, so I think there is a reasonable chance it is true. It also fits with Saddam's known love for WMD's and his history of efforts to preserve them as much as possible at any cost.

Here are two articles from one source; sorry, I don't save links to all articles I read.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=482

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=471

[andyfox]

Forget about Scott Ritter; what do you know about Hotbabe67?

Seems to me she LG. Does she PG?

/forums/images/icons/smile.gif

[MMMMMM]

Well if Saddam managed to move his WMD's to Syria to be secretly buried, it might take quite a bit more time. So far the two mobile labs and more importantly the two trailers are the best evidence, and it's evidence that cannot be lightly dismissed. As for finding most of the WMD which are likely now in Syria/Lebanon, it might take another regime change to do that if Assad does not cooperate.

Let's realize that Saddam had ample warning and time before the war to do whatever he wanted with his WMD components. Does it make sense to presume he would not have taken extraordinary steps to preserve them prior to the war?

[nicky g]

"Does it make sense to presume he would not have taken extraordinary steps to preserve them prior to the war? "

Yes. What possible use are they to him now, buried in Lebanon, while he is powerless and on the run? Why did he want them in the first place if he was not going to use them when his regime was faced with annihalation?

[adios]

The US would suffer a major embarassment if a "smoking gun" is not uncovered. The mobile "weapons labs" don't cut the mustard. We'll see what happens regarding this issue but at some point the Bush administration will have to own up if no "smoking gun" is discovered. My suspicion is that the administration relied on some bad intelligence information and analysis and heads ought to roll if that's the case IMO.

[andyfox]

I have no doubt a smoking gun will either be found or "found" before the 2004 election campaign heats up.

[Chris Alger]

Figures. Your sole source is a propaganda website run by two reporters out of Jerusalem apartment funnelling disinformation from Israeli intelligence (Debka claims numerous “intelligence” contacts).

Debka was responsible for howlers like (1) Tariq Aziz was captured on the first day of the Iraq invasion, a claim Debka asserted had been “confirmed” by UK intelligence; (2) Iraq launched a secret war with infantry and air support against Jordan during the summer of 2001; (3) there are “an estimated 30 to 50 suicide killers … waiting inside the U.S. for their orders to strike” – reported on Sept. 14, 2001; (4) Osama bin Laden heads “a well-drilled, dedicated Islamic legion of at least 110,000 zealots;” etc.

Can’t you tell when your leg is being pulled? None of the two articles you cite relies on any verifiable source, and none of the spectacular, highly-detailed facts in them have been confirmed or, as far as I can tell, independently reported by any responsible outlet.

You know it has to be nonsense when a website purports to be “objective” and “dispationate” writes the following about an alleged WMD site at al-Qaim. Notice the joinder of pointlessly specific details (“12-14 meters high”) with utterly ambivalent substance (“surface indications” of “nuclear, chemical or biological materials,” describing a fertilizer plant). The scare-mongering italics are mine (from Al Qaim Clings to Its WMD Secrets (http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=464), 4/13/3):

“Some information about the sinister tools of death that are believed cached in remote al Qaim up against the Syrian border might lead to a better appreciation of the peril . However, Israeli officials are keeping what is known or suspected strictly to themselves.

Drawing on its intelligence sources, DEBKAfile lifts a few of the veils shrouding this remote corner of Iraq and the difficulties of its exploration. Aerial photos over al Qaim in northwestern Iraq have revealed a cluster of long, hangar-like structures with large steel doors some 12-14 meters high and 15-20 meters wide, the size of sheds housing heavy fire trucks. In frequent passes overhead, spy satellites and reconnaissance aircraft have picked up surface indications of the hidden presence of nuclear, chemical or biological materials . They have not ruled out al Hussein surface to surface missiles being held ready there to deliver unconventional warheads. Some of the Scuds fired against Israel in 1991 were launched here. Signs of chemical emissions have been detected in the deep canyons riddling the Al Qaim region, most of them concealed from overhead view by overhanging cliffs. More impenetrable hiding places are to be found along the Euphrates river banks, which are densely overgrown thanks to the rapids splashing down from the mountains.

Coalition forces have refrained from going straight in to Al Qaim to establish once and for all what weapons are hidden there for several reasons. Its installations are the most heavily guarded in Iraq – more even than Saddam Hussein’s own bunker fortresses in Tikrit. The brigade of especially trained, crack Special Republican Guards loyalists guarding al Qaim have proved impervious to tempting coalition offers to surrender, preferring to defend the site with their lives.

The coalition command has tried limited air and ground assault, including even what is termed unconventional warfare direct-action missions”, but until this weekend made little progress.

Unlike other parts of Iraq, where resistance quickly melted away, the defenders of al Qaim have put up a professional, tenacious and dedicated fight. Military sources told DEBKAfile that had coalition forces confronted this quality of combat in the rest of Iraq, they would still be pinned down at Nasiriya in the south after three weeks of fighting. The Iraqi defenders are making skilful use of al Qaim’s daunting topographical features which make it impassable for heavy tanks. The attacking force is therefore obliged to fight in this Tora Bora-like redoubt from canyon to canyon, hilltop to hilltop, bush to bush.
. . .
The Americans are not using their heavy air and missile power to hit the hangar-like structures until they know for sure what they contain. If what they suspect is true, an American bombardment could serve Saddam’s purpose even better than launching his own missiles. American bombs plus al Qaim’s variable wind currents could release dangerous substances into the air over American troop concentrations in Iraq, as well as Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, and even Turkey, Lebanon and Syria, without Iraqi having to send a single missile.

Al Qaim and its horrific secrets look like Saddam’s last card, or the first on the deck of 55 leaders handed out to American troops. There is no knowing if he will play this ace, activating WMD when American forces are within a pace of laying hands on him or his sons, or have managed to penetrate al Qaim’s mysterious structures . As to the nuclear radiation detected at al Qaim, the Iraqis are known to have extracted uranium for their nuclear weapons program in the 1980s. More recently, satellite photographs suggested Iraq may have rebuilt a uranium extraction facility there, possibly under the big hangars or at the bottom of the canyons. For all these reasons, coalition forces are tackling their task in.”

Pretty scary, until you do the reality check: prior to this report, the IAEA had unrestricted access to Qaim and inspected every building in the complex, a publicly-available fact that Debka doesn’t bother to mention.

From the IAEA's website (http://216.239.51.100/custom?q=cache:_eI4MQdPXdoJ:www.iaea.or.at/worldatom/Press/Focus/IaeaIraq/chrono_dec_ii.html+al+qaim&hl=en&start=35&ie=UTF-8 ):

[On Dec. 11, 2002] Another [IAEA] team finished a two-day inspection of the Al Qaim Chemical and Al Qaim Cement facilities located near the Syrian border in western Iraq. Al Qaim was frequently visited by the IAEA prior to 1998 and its processes at that time were well understood. This inspection covered all buildings on this large complex site and included appropriate sampling of raw materials, ore and concentrates. Al Qaim was a producer of uranium "yellow cake" prior to 1991. The uranium extraction plant was destroyed in 1991 and the site has been under IAEA monitoring ever since.

In its full report to the Security Council on March 20, 2003, a month before the Debka article, the IAEA reiterated: “Between November 2002 and 17 March 2003, Iraqi authorities provided access to all facilities requested by the IAEA, including presidential compounds, private residences and new sites, without conditions or delay. . . . Iraq's nuclear material production capabilities have been systematically explored by the IAEA. While the indigenous phosphate mine has continued to be exploited and the Al Qaim phosphate plant has continued to produce fertilizer, no indication was found of the revival of any facilities destroyed in 1991 that had been related to uranium concentration or conversion.”

In fact, by the time the Debka piece ran, US troops had already finished a preliminary on-the-ground inspection of al-Qaim and “came up empty.” Dow Jones, 4/11/3. When the area was finally secured, only two “suspicious barrels” could be located, neither of which contained any trace of banned agents.

And the troops committed to “fighting to the death?” They surrendered. So much for the “sinister tools of death.”

[MMMMMM]

As I said, it's not the only source I read that said that Iraqi WMD are buried in the Bekaa valley. And numerous newspaper accounts said that Iraq had been moving trucks to Syria just prior to the war. So even if it's not certain that Iraqi WMD are buried in Bekaa--or even if it is entirely false--that does not mean that Syria did not take secret delivery of Iraqi WMD.

I also find it rather amazing that so many people are more inclined to believe Saddam when he says he doesn't have WMD than our government when it says he does. Granted either, or both, sides could be telling incomplete truths in some way, but which side is more credible overall? Saddam only lied, deceived, stalled etc. for a dozen years on the issue of WMD. So he might as well be telling the truth now when he says Iraq has none, eh? In fact he probably is because the most vital components of his WMD were probably shipped out just prior to the war in the hopes that Saddam could bog down the USA long enough for public opinion to force a retreat.

[Chris Alger]

"So even if it's not certain that Iraqi WMD are buried in Bekaa--or even if it is entirely false--that does not mean that Syria did not take secret delivery of Iraqi WMD."

You started out by asserting that Iraqi WMD are "likely" -- your word -- buried in the Bekaa Valley, and now you claim that (1) trucks were seen going from Iraq to Syria (as they have to circumvent sanctions for years), therefore (2) the negative of Syria "to have taken delivery" has not been disproven; therefore (3) Syria probably has Iraqi WMD. Perfectly absurd, and yet another example where you equate possilbility with probability to manufacture facts from thin air that you need to support your preconceptions.

I note that the US government has not officially asserted that Iraqi WMD are probably in Syria, or filed any kind of formal complaint against Syria, undermining your argument about needing to take the official position at face value.

"I also find it rather amazing that so many people are more inclined to believe Saddam when he says he doesn't have WMD than our government when it says he does."

If Bush said the earth was flat, and Saddam denied this, you'd make the same hysterical argument.

Thanks to the war traitors, Americans almost have to presume their government is lying. So many Americans blindly accept official assertions regarding foreign enemies, regardless of the evidence and credibility and history of fabrication, that the our government has a blank check to undertake all manner of lying, It's another example where the cult of right wing war-worship has subverted the notion of official accountability, the proper working of democracy and good government in general.

[MMMMMM]

"...,It's another example where the cult of right wing war-worship has subverted the notion of official accountability, the proper working of democracy and good government in general."

Well if so, then let it be a warning to all despots that their time is coming regardless of whether their transgressions are fully proven or not.

[ACPlayer]

True.

Hopefully Bush will not be president in 2004.