July 31, 2003
A DIFFERENT VIEW ON THE WMD HUNT....Yesterday the Washington Post reported that we were making no progress on finding either WMD or WMD programs. Today, presumably based on different sources, CNN takes a somewhat more optimistic view: [David]
Kay and Maj. Gen. Keith Dayton, the head of the Pentagon's Iraq Survey
Groups, met for three hours behind closed doors with members of the
Senate Armed Services Committee....Kay and Dayton were due to also brief
the Senate Intelligence Committee Thursday afternoon....Sources told
CNN the men were to make the following points:
No confirmed chemical or biological material is in hand.
Although they have tested suspect material, "there is nothing you could
take to court," said one source.
More leads have emerged since the deaths of Saddam's sons, Uday and Qusay Hussein.
The conclusion that Iraq had an "active WMD program"
is based on recent interrogations of Iraqi regime officials, as well as
documents that the United States has seized. Those documents, the
sources said, show that Iraq had plans to destroy weapons stockpiles
quickly; shift dual-use plants from weapons to commercial production as
part of a deception effort; and reconstitute its weapons if it had to
destroy them in the face of inspections or a U.S. attack.
Offering one example, one official said a document was
found a few weeks ago that detailed how a dual-use commercial chemical
plant might operate. The document specified in detail how equipment
should be shifted to weapons production.
So who's right? Stay tuned.
Posted by Kevin Drum at July 31, 2003 12:15 PM
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Just how far can the goalposts be moved on this issue? Did we go to
war because of the threat of WMD plans, or because of actual WMDs? I'm
sorry, but shouldn't we be spending a wee bit more time following up on
the Saudi money trail to Al Qaeda?
Offering one example, one official said a document was found a few
weeks ago that detailed how a dual-use commercial chemical plant might
operate.
C'mon. A document? Might operate?
This is the kind of garbage they are going to trot out to get words
like 'leads','WMD','plans' into the news so people continue to believe
the company line? If I look at the balance in my checking account now, I
might have a million dollars. But I wouldn't bet on it...
It'd be nice if they gave dates on those documents.
I won't be terribly impressed if they all date from the mid-90s.
I don't think they're directly contradictory. From yesterday's post:
No matter the circumstances, all of the scientists interviewed
have denied that Hussein had reconstituted his nuclear weapons program
or developed and hidden chemical or biological weapons since United
Nations inspectors left in 1998. Several key Iraqi officials questioned
the significance of evidence cited by the Bush administration to suggest
that Hussein was stepping up efforts to develop new weapons of mass
destruction programs.
So they (the Iraqis) denied that he restarted the nuclear weapons program (who really believed that in the first place, anyway?), and denied that he had developed biological or chemical weapons since '98. But didn't deny the existence of bio/chem programs, just downplayed the "significance of evidence", whatever that means.
The conclusion that Iraq had an "active WMD program"
is based on recent interrogations of Iraqi regime officials, as well as
documents that the United States has seized.
Wait, Wait I know 12 years-ago it got buried under a rosebush, right?
--Did they found the mother-load of documents but have to the scrape
the mildew and fugus off for having been in a damp celler down by river
for some time now????
You know that if they had destroyed any WMD recently what would
tangible evidence left—anthrax spores alone can live up to 2 to 3 years
in the dirt. Bush didn't shit about what Iraq had.
oops that should be:
You know that if they had destroyed any WMD recently there would
tangible evidence left—anthrax spores alone can live up to 2 to 3 years
in the dirt. Bush didn't know shit about what Iraq had in the way of WMD
to be going off telling Americans in his SOTU speech that Iraq have
TONS of anything except maybe documents.
It'd be nice if they gave dates on those documents.
I don't know that I would trust a date without some chemical or
bio-weapon evidence. This is why the Bushies really need to let the UN
inspectors back into Iraq because doesn't Bush already have one
fraudulent Niger yellowcake document he tried to pass off at the UN?
See Digby's recent post on Chalabi, then re-read anything anyone says about "documents".
This far into the occupation, if they find a small quantity of any
WMD, people will probably think that it was planted there (by US of
course).
If they find anything, it better be in the vicinity of 8500 liters of
anthrax or 550 artillery shells with mustard or 30,000 empty munitions
or enough precursors to increase the stockpile to 500 tons of chemical
agents. And lets not forget the mushroom cloud.
If you think you know best, it is time to put your money where your mouth is...
On Tradesports.com you can buy a contract which would pay 100 in case WMDs are found in Iraq before the end of September.
The last Transaction has been settled at 20.
So they (the Iraqis) denied that he restarted the nuclear weapons
program (who really believed that in the first place, anyway?), and
denied that he had developed biological or chemical weapons since '98.
But didn't deny the existence of bio/chem programs, just downplayed the
"significance of evidence", whatever that means.
Quite a few people, evidently, believe that Saddam was working on
nukes in the runup to the war. Bush cited "evidence" to that effect,
and one of the most common pro-war blurbs was "we don't want the
evidence of Saddam's programs to be a mushroom cloud over [pick your
favorite city], now do we?"
As far as denial of biological/chemical weapons programs, how exactly
would you define a "weapons program" if it wasn't producing weapons and
it wasn't working on developing them?
Er, that should be "quite a few people, evidently, believed that Saddam was working on nukes..."
I doubt many people believe that now (with the possible exception of Bush, of course).
"More leads have emerged since the deaths of Saddam's sons, Uday and Qusay Hussein."
They have their utterly unsupported statement, here's mine: this is PR.
I will say that the LONG delay in producing any documents or WMD
militates against my theory that we were just going to bus some stuff in
there. I haven't yet resolved that anomaly, but I'll be unusually
curious when they turn up their barrels of WMD and mounds of
incriminating documents. I have, for example, finally accepted that the
rose bush centrifuge wasn't planted (so to speak). But I watch this
admin with a jaundiced eye, like the rest of the planet.
Regarding nuclear weapons, Bush, Cheney, et al didn't just "believe" that Saddam had restarted his nuclear weapons program.
They "knew."
Cheney said it to the VFW in August, 2002, Cheney said it on tv in
March just before the war started, and Bush said it several times in
between.
One centrifuge is meaningless. To enrich uranium one must have a
"cascade facility" which contains THOUSANDS of centrifuges to produce
enough enriched uranium to produce even a enough fuel for one bomb.
Currently Iran is building a facility which will house tens of thousands
of these machines with each unit requiring roughly a square meter of
floor space. The facility is roughly 180,000 square meters in size.
Producing bomb grade uranium is a herculean task that even the North
Koreans as motivated as they are haven't pulled off hence their switch
to enriching Plutonium instead.
One centrifuge is most assuredly meaningless. The fact that they
haven't found any others, and that the scientist dug it up instead of
leading the GIs there, shouted "planted" at me when it first showed up:
if they buried an entire program under rose bushes, where are the
thousands of other parts? The story was patent poppycock. But I read a
soundbite from the guy where he said claims of anything post-1992 was
rubbish, more or less, which persuaded me he was on the level.
Going back over my reasons, I'm starting to think it was a deliciously crude plant again. On about a 6th-Grade level.
pages of mass destruction, now is it? sheesh. just when you think the
administration's claims can't get ludicrously more pathetic, they pull
another one out of their hat.
or asses.
Actually, it sounds like a "Bookmobile of Mass Destruction" (BMS)
More evidence of Bush Administration deceit:
"Doubts mount on Powell's evidence to UN"
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059478557785
"Do not use 45-minute claim, CIA told No 10"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1009493,00.html
Did we go to war because of the threat of WMD plans, or because of actual WMDs?
Among other things, because of the threat posed by the potential for
use of WMD. The fact that we could not then, and can not now, discern
the precise state of the WMD program is of less importance than the more
general point: this is a regime that wanted WMD, had shown the ability
in the past to develop WMD, and had shown the willingness in the past
to use WMD, as well as the willingness to work with terrorists and to do
things (like attempting to assassinate a former president) that would
not strike most of us as rational behavior. The decision to go to war
was based, at least in part, on the ideas that (1) as a matter of
security, we could not afford to give Saddam's regime the benefit of the
doubt and (2) as a matter of the UN resolutions, we were not required
to; it was his burden to affirmatively demonstrate the disposal of past
WMD stocks, which he did not do.
Any facility capable of producing organophosphate-based pesticides
(very common, low tech chemistry) is capable of producing
organophosphate-based nerve agents. There's not a lot of difference
chemically between roach spray and nerve gas. Any facility with
fermentation tanks (beer anyone?) is capable of producing
bacteriological agents. If the administration is now touting such dual
use capable facilities, their standards have truly hit rock bottom. If
the Bushies had truly believed Saddam had a powerful arsenal, we would
not have invaded just as we've not invaded North Korea. It was Saddam's
very weakness that made him a target of the neocons, not his strength.
Crank, you, of course, could support the war for any reason you
wanted, but the core reason that george bush used to make the case for
war was that Iraq had a dangerous and growing arsenal, including, we
knew, a reconstituted nuclear weapons program.
As is becoming clear to an increasing number of people, "selling"
this kind of war on this kind of exaggeration was foolish in the short
run and quite dangerous in the long run in terms of damage to US
credibility.
We can already state with certainty that there was no reconstituted nuclear weapons program.
Even reading the posting Kevin posted as favorably as possible to the
administration's case, it still suggests nothing near the level of
threat that the admin portrayed. It could, in fact, mean what
increasingly seems the likeliest explanation: there was no active
program at all, only a willingness and a bare bones infrastructure to
reinvigorate a program at some time.
The arguments you make may or may not have passed muster with the
American people and the Congress last fall, but they have very little to
do with the arguments that were actually made.
"The conclusion that Iraq had an 'active WMD program' is based on
recent interrogations of Iraqi regime officials, as well as documents
that the United States has seized. Those documents, the sources said,
show that Iraq had plans to destroy weapons stockpiles quickly..."
Is this supposed to imply that the reason we haven't found the
weapons is that Iraq in fact carried out those plans and destroyed their
stockpiles before or during the invasion?
If so, why haven't the Iraqi officials (the ones who are now cooperating) told us what was destroyed and where?
Ya know, the point the Bush posse made was that Saddam had these
weapons and we knew how many and where they were. We had to go in to
take them out.
Well, where are they?
Kevin, believe the Pincus story in the Washington Post which was
based on CIA sources that were commenting on interviews with senior and
midlevel Iraqi officials and scientists. Notice that the CNN story has
no concrete evidence and is just more smoke blowing. I suspect the
source for the CNN story was David Kay himself, who before the war was
an utter propagandist for extreme WMD claims and now has been rewarded
with an official position.
Let's have a hypothetical:
Suppose, just for supposin', that the fabulously disciplined Bush
administration is sitting on a huge pile of absolutely incontrovertible
evidence of WMD and is saving it.
Suppose there are two reasons, one being to scrape together every single
piece of stuff out there so as to leave liberals with nothing to
dispute, and the other reason for delay is to pop the whole thing out
during the Democrat primary, or some other strategically-timed period.
Fair? Unfair? Dirty pool?
Presume the whole thing is absolutely solid.
Then what?
Well, Richard, I'd think first you'd condemn that, but it's hard to
be sure. Second, they'd want to make damn sure that no-one could prove
they'd been sitting on the stuff, since that coming out could lose them
20% in the polls overnight. One problem is that if they find stuff now, a
great chunk of the world will think that anyway.
Hey, an actual answer from me! But it's a serious question. You're now welcome to turn this into anything that appeals to you.
An ironic title for the following report, to say the least:
Weapons of Mass Confusion - (NY Times)
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/01/international/worldspecial3/01CND-GORDON.html?hp
CAMP DOHA, Kuwait, Aug. 1 - There is a bold and entirely plausible
theory that may account for the mystery over Iraq's missing weapons of
mass destruction.
(wait for it....)
Saddam Hussein, the theory holds, ordered the destruction of his
weapon stocks well before the war to deprive the United States of a
rationale to attack his regime and to hasten the eventual lifting of the
United Nations sanctions. But the Iraqi dictator retained the
scientists and technical capacity to resume the production of chemical
and biological weapons and eventually develop nuclear arms.
(besides the obvious rationalization going on here, is there any way
that Iraq could divest itself of said capacity? is war justified if
not?)
Mr. Hussein's calculation was that he could restart his weapons
programs once the international community lost interest in Iraq and
became absorbed with other crises. That would enable him to pursue his
dream of making Iraq the dominant power in the Persian Gulf region and
make it easier for him to deter enemies at home and abroad.
(note the assumption that's slid under the door here about Hussein's
'calculation' and the holes for the new goalpost location being dug)
"This is the leading theory," said Gary Samore, director of studies
at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies and a
former nonproliferation expert on the National Security Council under
President Bill Clinton.
(this is the latest attempt to deflect judgment on the subject, along with more suggestions today about revelations to come)
American intelligence experts are still in Iraq trying to determine
the status of Mr. Hussein's weapons programs, so it is premature to be
too categorical about what they will find. What the theory offers,
however, is a new way to make sense of the testimony of captured Iraqi
officials who claim that weapons stocks were eliminated, Mr. Hussein's
pattern of grudging and partial cooperation with United Nations weapons
inspectors and his longstanding ambitions in the region.
If true, it means that the Iraqi threat was less immediate than the
administration asserted but more worrisome than the critics now suggest.
And it means the decision to use military force to pre-empt that threat
was not an urgent necessity but a judgment call, one that can be
justified as the surest way to put an end to Iraq's designs but still
one about which ardent defenders of the United States' security can
disagree.
(spot the excluded middle yet? hint: it involves inspectors)
It is already clear that much of the recent debate over Iraq's
weapons programs has been too simplistic. In recent months, the
discussion of Iraq's intentions seems to have oscillated from one
extreme to another. Iraq was described by hawks before the war as a
nation that was an imminent threat to the United States, bristling with
chemical and biological weapons, or C.B.W., as intelligence agencies
call them. Now the administration's critics seem to suggest that the
absence of weapons stocks means that the Saddam Hussein regime had
somehow abandoned its goal to be an assertive regional power. ...
(which critics have said this? note the use of the weasel words 'seem to suggest' also, but enough for now)
John, why would I condemn sitting on the evidence?
Letting it out as it comes would presume the liberals were acting in good faith.
Silly.
Letting it out as it comes would give the liberals endless opportunities to misrepresent it.
And since the evidence exists--hypothetically speaking--the war is
justified if WMD is the justfication and whether it is hidden in order
to prevent the liberals from misrepresenting it in its details which
they would surely do is only a political issue. Sharp practice, to be
sure. But nothing to do with the war.
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It is never a mistake to say good-bye.
Fashion exists for women with no taste, etiquette for people with no breeding.
Inertia is not limited to matter.
Ethics is not necessarily the handmaiden of theology.
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