Would Finding WMD in Iraq Change Your Opinion On the War?

But it's looking increasingly likely that these degenerates might actually have been telling the truth! At the very least you can quite plainly state that there was no credible evidence that Iraq posed an immediate threat from WMD - the country was crippled by a decade of sanctions, its military capabilities were seriously dented, its WMD programs largely and very effectively destroyed by UNSCOM. This was clear to many people at the time. To those of us who are inclined to take politically motivated "evidence" like Colin Powell's UN slide-show and Tony Blair's "dodgy dossiers" with a pinch of salt, anyway. Hell, it was even clear to Colin Powell when on 24th February 2001 he stated:

"He has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors."

But this was before the Bush regime's change in policy regarding Iraq, after which the facts also changed!

As for the question, would it change my opinion of the war if WMDs were found? Probably not, unless there is convincing evidence of large usable stockpiles or active programs. The war was obviously politically motivated and fought for reasons other than those stated. In fact I'm surprised that *absolutely nothing* has been found, I went along with the ever-sensible and neutral Hans Blix - it seemed reasonable to assume that there might be some remnants of Saddam's stockpiles from the 1980s, somewhere.

If you read Blix's reports, he certainly doesn't say that Iraq was disarmed. But also - and equally importantly - in weighing all the evidence, neither does he say that Iraq is still in possession of proscribed materials, it was an issue of items which might have existed, remaining "unaccounted for". Bearing in mind that UNMOVIC had access to international governmental intelligence which was not made public, and a team of CBW experts on the ground in Iraq, Blix was probably the most accurate and impartial source on the existence or non-existence of WMD in Iraq. And he consistently urged caution, because there was simply no evidence that Iraq posed an imminent threat.

Interesting quote from Hans Blix's report to the UN, February 2003 which seems to sum up the best interpretation of the situation available at the time(emphasis added):

"How much, if any, is left of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and related proscribed items and programmes? So far, UNMOVIC has not found any such weapons, only a small number of empty chemical munitions, which should have been declared and destroyed. Another matter - and one of great significance - is that many proscribed weapons and items are not accounted for. To take an example, a document, which Iraq provided, suggested to us that some 1,000 tonnes of chemical agent were "unaccounted for". One must not jump to the conclusion that they exist. However, that possibility is also not excluded. If they exist, they should be presented for destruction. If they do not exist, credible evidence to that effect should be presented."
http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/pages/security_council_briefings.asp#6

 

To me and I think most Americans the most convincing arguement for going to war with Sadam was his reluctance. The UN teams had some unanswered questions and from time to time stumbled onto something. But the used car salesman who sold me the war wasn't Bush it was Sadam. After seeing the presentation Colin Powel made at the UN with war looming why Sadam didn't just open his hands and say go where ever your heart desires without escort, I have nothing to hide.

The picture painted to America was Sadam required advance notice of each visit and was dicking around with a bunch of scientist.

And near the end the one by one destruction of the illegal range misles was provoking in my view. It just seemed like a continuation of the preceeding decade. He, Sadam sold me it was a good idea to get rid of him.

Changeyourlatitude

 

It certainly seemed strange. The messing about with paperwork and failing to properly address inconsistencies in their declarations. Perhaps the record-keeping genuinely was haphazard and inconsistent? Perhaps the chemical stockpiles were unilaterally destroyed in the summer of 1991 as they stated, and records not made or subsequently destroyed? That's not outside of the realm of possibility. Given what's happened since, it actually appears to be the most reasonable explanation.

If you follow Blix's UN reports in the immediate few months before the war (I followed these in great detail) you will see that by the end, Saddam was complying with everything demanded of him by the inspectors. He just seemed to open his hands too late - a fatal miscalculation on his part.

There are also good reasons why he might have been reluctant to co-operate besides "hiding something" - the CIA had previously infiltrated UNSCOM with secret agents, there to glean military intelligence quite apart from the disarmament process, and in contravention of the UN's policy. Saddam knew this. He was rightly suspicioius of the inspectors.

Saddam's actions don't seem to make much sense to us from this distance - but then none of his actions ever made much sense. One thing is clear: the USA was not prepared to wait the "months, not years" Hans Blix deemed were necessary to complete his mission. The war had to go ahead when it did - Bush was never interested in disarming Iraq peacefully!

 

I agree with your logic and the facts of what is evident. I was just convinced by Sadam that he was hiding something. I couldn’t justify in my mind why someone in a situation of certain defeat would take such a gamble.

It could be quite true the claims were hyped up, but if you were going to lose your country and power why should you care if the CIA was snooping around your country or not. Satisfy the doubts, reclaim pre-war status and then do whatever you feel necessary to control security within your neighborhood. If you have nothing to hide why care if the CIA knows how many airplanes or tanks or MLRS systems you have. Hell, they will count them on the battlefield later when you lose. Sadam could have let everyone from the UN a free reign in his country and satisfied the UN beyond doubt and then went on with the pre-war status. I know I wouldn’t have a problem with that. I just couldn’t understand what he felt he had to hide. I mean it’s not like he might whip Americas ass and then the neighborhood wouldn’t know what he had. It was destiny that America could tour his country after his defeat so why not let the UN do the same before the war and eliminate the need for war.

Changeyourlatitude

 

But you're looking at it from your (relatively) sane standpoint. The difficulty is to try to climb inside the other fella's logic bubble and try to understand what he thought he was doing. And when the other fella is a murderous deluded lunatic, who knows why he thought it made sense to do as he did?! Maybe he thought war would not happen if he kept drip-dripping concessions - which he was doing right up to the end.

Whatever he thought he was doing, the lack of reliable evidence of imminent threat means that caution would have been the best and most prudent option. Instead the US and Britain acted rashly despite the warnings of many people who were very well placed to make such judgements. And they're now in a heap of trouble because of the almighty cock-up that everyone but them could see coming - this all happened far too publicly for people to easily forget about it.

Blair has committed political suicide here by going to war on a false prospectus, and hopefully the same will prove true of Bush.

 

i still think this whole attack on iraq was just to set up a staging point to attack syria and other such "unfriendly" countries. go after the one that has been weakened the most, first. then you have a base of operations to go after the other coutries that DO in fact have the WMD's, probably purchased from iraq, anyway.

 

Shit, sorry, that came out wrong. I'm high...

 

Hello? Is everyone here stupid?

How can you object to a war that began before anybody knew the intelligence about WMDs was wrong?

You can't object to a decision that was made in the past, in the light of new evience. At the time, everyone thought there was an immediate threat. Going to war was the right decision. You can object to the methods used to gain intelligence, or the credence the intelligence was given, but not to the war.

Suppose a strange man came up to you with a gun and told you to hand over your wallet, and you hit him over the head hard and knocked him unconscious. Then later, you found out it was all a joke as part of a hidden camera show. Does that mean you made the wrong decision to hit him over the head? Of course not. If it had been a real gun, your life would have been in danger and you could have been killed. The decision to hit him was the right one. The only things that were wrong were the decisions the TV executives made when they planned the stunt.

But anyway, the WMD was not the most important reason for going to war. The point of the war was to save the Iraqi people! Saddam had to be stopped. He'd killed and tortured something like a million people in his 25 year reign. Who gives a fuck about the UN or the Geneva Convention when so many lives were at stake? In the last year alone, the war has probably already saved 40,000 lives.

 

Showmet and KC

After 9-11 you just can’t trust a lunatic to do the right thing. If a lunatic gives you the finger and shoots at your aircraft you can’t keep him in a box.

After everyone reads your above statement many reasonable people would probably agree with you. Guess I kind of understand Bush’s logic here, that if this guy is this cocky to give the UN the finger and I wait indefinitely, sooner or later he will be found in compliance and be able to do exactly what I say he can do right now, endanger his neighbors and my country.

The reason for saying, “knock off the debate, show empty hands or get your ass kicked” was for the reason of intent. Bush had Probable Cause for confronting Sadam while in material breach and wouldn’t have he returned to pre-war status by satisfying the UN. Thus the ultimatums show your hands empty.

Why not deal with North Korea the same? North Korea is in a box, like the cold war he is watched 24-7-365, every ship leaving is traced like DNA. He acts and dies along with his nation minutes later. And North Korea has not attacked his neighbors yet under current leadership.

You may be correct that people won’t forget about it, yet if in the upcoming months things sort out the memory might change to justification.

KC as far as the region goes you have credibility in your notion. Had the US backed down to Sadam the region mullahs and leaders would perceive weakness. I feel that is why Iran and Syria are so deeply involved in Iraq now. If Iraq comes to peace with a representative government these guys have their countries to lose to their populations. Especially Iran. Syria is testing very dangerous waters with the US right now as shown in the wedding (terror rest stop) event. If it wasn’t just before election Syria would be next to receive an ultimatum.

Changeyourlatitude

 

and even if the US hadn't planted them, the fact that its taken so long is proof that this administration had no clue whether Iraq had weapons or not.

 

but we didn't buy the excuses before the war either. They were lies.

 

You are confussed, the requirement was on Sadam the last 12 years to prove he didn't have WMD, not for the US to prove he has them!

He gave the UN the finger! So it shold have been Sadam helping to find or prove they don't exist, not the other way around.

Changeyourlatitude

 

I must say this makes you sound very trusting - perhaps naively so - of the neo-con motives which were underlying the shift in policy towards Iraq. It seems to have become Bush policy to effect regime change no matter what Saddam did. In early 2001 it was the administration's policy to continue its very effective "containment" of Iraq - they knew Saddam's military was crippled and posed no threat either in terms of WMD or even conventional weapons. The WMD crisis was pretty much engineered politically during 2002 in order to enact the new policy of pre-emtive strike and regime change. You can see this if you trace the differences in official statements about Iraq between 2001 and 2002. There was a policy u-turn. There were repeated and deliberate attempts to link Saddam with al-Qaeda in order to prove that Saddam could sell his fictional WMDs to terrorists. These were all blatantly false, political propaganda. Saddam and al-Qaeda were ideologically opposed, there was no evidence of Saddam selling WMDs to anybody - or even that he had WMDs to sell!