- Aug 8, 2001
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On the other hand you could argue that no good evidence exists that Saddam showed an immediate desire to kill us, but when a country is so clearly in violation of UN mandates, specifically ones that are designed to protect the security of the world's nations, what are we supposed to do: ask nicely and hope that Saddam would destroy the weapons?
Obviously we are having trouble finding the weapons now, but there's a real possibility that Saddam secretly shipped them off to other countries during the most recent UN inspection. (Do you wonder why the inspectors had such a hard time searching every location they wanted to search?)
Please comment, and give reputable facts.
The Bush Administration would have known about these stockpiles, and remember that the primary reason for going to war was Saddam's failure to provide proof that he had destroyed these weapons.Saddam's Forgotten WMD Confession
The elite media continues to insist that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction when the U.S. attacked in March, citing the scant evidence of any actual weapons finds by U.S. arms inspector David Kay.
But if it's true that Saddam Hussein was actually innocent on the WMD charge, then why did he confess in 1998 that his country had amassed huge stockpiles of highly toxic weaponized poisons - along with the delivery systems to take them beyond Iraq's borders.
That's right - lost in the debate over why U.S. weapons inspectors have yet to uncover the Iraqi version of the Manhattan Project is this salient factoid: Not only did Saddam's regime admit to possessing thousands of tons of lethal chemical and biological agents - Baghdad gave a detailed inventory of their WMD arsenal to the United Nations.
This week's Weekly Standard revisits Baghdad's 1998 WMD mea culpa - complete with a laundry list of the frightening weapons that the press continues to suggest were a figment of the Bush administration's imagination.
Just before Iraq kicked out U.N. weapons inspectors in 1998, Saddam admitted he had:
? At least 3.9 tons of deadly VX nerve gas, along with 805 tons of precursor ingredients for the production of more VX.
? 4,000 tons of ingredients to produce other types of poison gas.
? 8,500 liters of anthrax.
? 500 bombs fitted with parachutes for the purpose of delivering poison gas or germ payloads.
? 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas.
? 107,500 casings for chemical weapons.
? 157 aerial bombs filled with germ agents.
? 25 missile warheads containing germ agents, including anthrax, aflatoxin, and botulinum.
Again, the above arsenal is NOT what U.S. or European intelligence suspected Baghdad had. These are the WMD's that Saddam himself admitted he had.
It's also worth noting that the overwhelming majority of the WMDs Saddam confessed to went completely undetected by U.N. weapons inspectors who combed Iraq for 12 years.
Still, thanks to the media's five-month-long campaign to discredit the Iraq war - not to mention the horrible job done by the White House public relations team - most Americans have no idea that questions about whether Iraq was in recent possession of WMD's have already been answered - and answered by no less an authority than Saddam Hussein himself.
On the other hand you could argue that no good evidence exists that Saddam showed an immediate desire to kill us, but when a country is so clearly in violation of UN mandates, specifically ones that are designed to protect the security of the world's nations, what are we supposed to do: ask nicely and hope that Saddam would destroy the weapons?
Obviously we are having trouble finding the weapons now, but there's a real possibility that Saddam secretly shipped them off to other countries during the most recent UN inspection. (Do you wonder why the inspectors had such a hard time searching every location they wanted to search?)
Please comment, and give reputable facts.