Where are the WMD? (long)

“IF all that comes to pass, we should take a day off work to watch the impeachment proceedings on CSPAN.”

“I guess you didn't read the comments from Blix.”

“I was being hypothetical, we didn't think Blix was very credible before... and I don't anything has changed that. I'm wondering what we should do if we find that the Bush administration slanted intelligence in their favor. Iraq is a decent sized country and we haven't searched everywhere, but the CIA analysts (hee hee I said anal) that are creeping out from under rocks are really making me feel kinda sick”

“WMD's were documented by the UN inspection teams. The UN was not able to destroy them before they were kicked out of Iraq. When Bush forced the UN to get back in Iraq the WMD's were gone.

Iraq did not have any evidence that they were distroyed. They were just missing.

We may never find them, but there is documented evidence by the UN that they existed.”

“"We may never find them, but there is documented evidence by the UN that they existed."
bacpac
05:57:56 PM
06/05/03




<< back to Trail Talk main page







Username: pedxing

Subject:

Message:




By posting a message to the Trail Talk message board, you agree to abide by the Terms of Participation.






















Backpacks
Canteens, Coolers
Cooking Supplies
Flashlights, Lanterns
Sleeping Gear
Tents, Canopies
Tools
Walking Sticks
Other









Search the thebackpacker.com website.
Search For:










Phaedrus
10:49:50 AM, 06/05/03
Phaedrus
10:50:13 AM, 06/05/03
ViOliN
10:53:37 AM, 06/05/03
Phaedrus
10:56:06 AM, 06/05/03
Tinkledrinker
10:59:39 AM, 06/05/03
ViOliN
11:01:47 AM, 06/05/03
mtnsteve
12:15:01 PM, 06/05/03
Phaedrus
12:18:27 PM, 06/05/03
roseymonster
12:48:39 PM, 06/05/03
Tilt
12:54:42 PM, 06/05/03
deeddawg
01:10:50 PM, 06/05/03
pedxing
03:53:24 PM, 06/05/03
pedxing
03:53:25 PM, 06/05/03
pedxing
03:53:26 PM, 06/05/03
Phaedrus
03:56:02 PM, 06/05/03
Donman
03:57:24 PM, 06/05/03
Phaedrus
04:59:09 PM, 06/05/03
bacpac
05:38:13 PM, 06/05/03
Donman
05:51:55 PM, 06/05/03
bacpac
05:57:56 PM, 06/05/03





We may never find them, but there is documented evidence by the UN that they existed."
bacpac
05:57:56 PM
06/05/03


Everybody knew that. The reason for the invasion was supposed to be more than that. The reason was supposed to be that there was an imminent danger. Bio and chemical weapons degrade over time. If none of the unaccounted weapons were destroyed and miraculously none degraded in the intervening years - Hussein would still fewer WMD than he did when the US was helping him fight Iran and when Hussein was actually using the suckers!.”

“we'll see, it's just fishy as all get out. I trust what CIA analysts say over Hans Blix... and the UN wasn't kicked out of Iraq.”

“They shrink?”

“It's also fishy that the Bush boys don't want UN inspectors in Iraq now... while they have a new team trying to "search" for weapons.”

“they don't shrink, they degrade... wmd's lose thier effectiveness over time.

(wow something weird happened to my cut and paste of bacpac's statement!)”

“Significant Shrinkage.

Like a frightened turtle.”

“The comments bacpac is referring to:

"The commission has not at any time during the inspections in Iraq found evidence of the continuation or resumption of programs of weapons of mass destruction or significant quantities of proscribed items, whether from pre-1991 or later," Blix told the U.N. Security Council in what is expected to be his final report.

But he also said that the former Iraqi regime was unable to account for chemical or biological weapons it claimed to have destroyed and that weapons inspectors were unable to clear up discrepancies before leaving Baghdad in advance of the invasion.

"This does not necessarily mean that such items could not exist. They might. There remain a long list of items unaccounted for," Blix said. "But it is not justified to jump to the conclusion that something exists just because it was unaccounted for."
”

“The commission has not at any time during the inspections in Iraq found evidence of the continuation or resumption of programs of weapons of mass destruction or significant quantities of proscribed items, whether from pre-1991 or later," Blix told the U.N. Security Council in what is expected to be his final report.

But he also said that the former Iraqi regime was unable to account for chemical or biological weapons it claimed to have destroyed and that weapons inspectors were unable to clear up discrepancies before leaving Baghdad in advance of the invasion.

"This does not necessarily mean that such items could not exist. They might. There remain a long list of items unaccounted for," Blix said."But it is not justified to jump to the conclusion that something exists just because it was unaccounted for."
"”

“Yeah, bacpac. Unaccounted for. Despite the contrivances presented to the UN security council in hopes of building a case for invasion. You remember that episode, right? Where Powell gave us irrefutable evidence based on solid intelligence?”

“I do not think the intelligence was perfect. We can agree on that.

The Bush administration is in trouble unless they produce more evidence. I am willing to give this thing more time.

I won't be satisfied until I see the evidence also. I am certain we agree on that!”

“I... Uh...


You... agree...


WHO ARE YOU AN HOW DID YOU HACK INTO BACPAC'S ACCOUNT?!”

“Okay and that goes back to my question. Given more time, we see no WMD, no evidence of WMD, and discover our intelligence was intentionally skewed (all hypothetical), what do Bush supporters think should happen??”

“Listen,,,,,, to all the fork tongues flickering with vile and contempt. You liberal folks are funny! Now its 'our' man under the scope,,,is this to be his Achille tendon? Y'll gunna run wit it???? He is a just man and prone to err,,,, how quickly we forget of recent slickery HIStory. That con had months before he had to come clean. He doop us for 8 years.

Who is gonna carry the torch for others, if we don't?

I am sorry American lives where taken. I am sorry that we view the greater good of this war in different light. Terrorism needs to stop. Why are you whiners trying to hijack the efforts of this Nation in it's attempt to fight terrorism by ridiculing the noble actions. Try not to paint yourself as sympathizers. If its not one thing its another with 'your' people.”

“We have seen evidence of WMD. Your question is moot.

Would a large cache of WMD bury the Democrats? Of course. Would the lack of a big cache cost Bush the election? Depends on the economy.

If the mid-east peace thing works out, Bush is a shoe in. That is a long shot. I don't trust the Palestinians or the Jews.”

“you guys aren't answering the question... considering I'm a non-affiliated former Republican you guys look silly...

This war has done NOTHING to curb terrorism. American Soldiers are getting killed on a daily basis by the people we 'saved', our tax money is being stuffed into the pockets of the companies that Bush and Cheney have always championed, Bin Laden is still around, so's Saddam... we've spent so much money for nothing. You guys that walk the party line regardless of the results look really silly.

the question is, if this proves to be a manufactured war (which is illegal) what do you think should happen?


and Briar... he was dooping us when we gave him biological material to make weapons, and when we told his people to raise up and we'd support them. and when we then told Saddam it was okay to start flying attack helicopters again. It's called Right from Wrong, I understand that people that are too affiliated with political parties have a problem with that concept.”

“"Complain Complain thats all you do
ever since we lost
if its not the crucifiction,
then its the Holocaust."”

“Do unto others as they have done unto you......



Paypbacks a #&%!$, huh.”

“Thats the spirit!!!!! Ped. LOL

Hey Don I'm sorry,,, I was trying to refer to Slick Willy and his story. But,,,,, nice take on things!”

“um slick willy is history, the deserter we have in office now is the issue... but I guess what they say about the Neo-Conservatives is true... when the evidence in damning blame clinton (no I didn't vote for him)... sounds like you and your 'hero' clinton both have integrity issues”

“KKK robert byrd, the pride of TT....


keep praying that it'll all turn to $h1t, boys......hopefully for you, the country will suffer financial disaster, horrible terrorist attacks and maybe a famie or two and then john kerry can get elected.....it could happen...



BAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHHA!

NAWT!”

“I love it when people pull out Clinton and try to make a comparison. Yeah. Getting a bj and lying about it it the same as generating lies to start a war. Very comparable indeed.

Bush et. all make Clinton's flubdub look like a little white lie.”

“the hatred for this president has surpassed by far the #&%!$ clinton had to put uo with. i can't believe it, it's so bad. chippin away at the stone, suggesting every single thing is bad.....it's laughable and jsut like it did for the repubs, it will backfire on the dems...”

“Yeah. But Bush is reeaaaally a loser. C+ students should not hold the most powerful seat in the country.”

“Personal attacks, really Donman, get with the program will ya. Integrity issues??? I sleep well at night how abot you? Who is spewing the venom here? Have you listened to yourself and others of your kind? Clinton is not my 'hero' and he should not be the candle to judge other presidents by. Clinton did is far share of 'wagging the dog' in more ways then expected in his 8 years of lies and deceit. The bj just happened to be the climax.”

“Name one other.”

“i once knew an otter named ocsar...”

“I'm sorry if anyone felt I made a personal attack, I didn't mean anything personally. I do however find it funny that ethics have no place in politics. Clinton is a scummy dude, and pardoning potentially illegal and unethical manipulations by Presidient Bush by comparing them Clinton is really funny. If something is wrong, it's wrong... even if it's done by someone on "your team"... since I'm not on a team I have too much fun throwing rocks at everybody (it's a joke, sorry)”

“Bush supporters guide to political analysis.

1) Blame Clinton -
if not entirely convincing
2) Invoke 9/11
if needed:
3) Tax cuts!

Repeat as necessary.”

“4) call those who disagree unamerican
5) whine and complain about how bad a rap Bush is getting
6) Call all evidence that goes against Bush "Fear-mongering" or the like.
7) use several cut-and-paste quotes that have little to do with the subject matter in an attempt to muddy the water.
8) Call your opponent a liberal
9) be sure to have no real understanding of the meaning of the word "liberal"
10) Lump the political left in the US in with socialist parties of other countries.
11) make wildly reductionist analogies of taxes to "lunch"
12) Tell your opponent he's sore because he lost the election.
13) ignore the facts about the election
14) If all else fails: Insult Ted Turner.”

“I think number 12 is the best!!! What a stickler for you folks !!! Get over it and prepare for the next election or you will still be moaning another 4 yrs from now. Yea, baby!

Can you even fathom what Al and his bl. box would be doing right now. LOL.”

“I have to agree. Briar. Al Gore is too middle-of-the-road. We need a LIBERAL president. Let's elect Nancy Pelosi!”

“The Democrats will win the next election because the Republicans will still be running against Clinton.”

“I already predicted that, Dunadan! I predicted the next president would be a democrat, followed by Colin Powell.”

“Published on Friday, June 6, 2003 by FindLaw's Legal Commentary
Missing Weapons Of Mass Destruction
Is Lying About The Reason For War An Impeachable Offense?

by John W. Dean

President George W. Bush has got a very serious problem. Before asking Congress for a Joint Resolution authorizing the use of American military forces in Iraq, he made a number of unequivocal statements about the reason the United States needed to pursue the most radical actions any nation can undertake - acts of war against another nation.

Now it is clear that many of his statements appear to be false. In the past, Bush's White House has been very good at sweeping ugly issues like this under the carpet, and out of sight. But it is not clear that they will be able to make the question of what happened to Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) go away - unless, perhaps, they start another war.

That seems unlikely. Until the questions surrounding the Iraqi war are answered, Congress and the public may strongly resist more of President Bush's warmaking.

Presidential statements, particularly on matters of national security, are held to an expectation of the highest standard of truthfulness. A president cannot stretch, twist or distort facts and get away with it. President Lyndon Johnson's distortions of the truth about Vietnam forced him to stand down from reelection. President Richard Nixon's false statements about Watergate forced his resignation.

Frankly, I hope the WMDs are found, for it will end the matter. Clearly, the story of the missing WMDs is far from over. And it is too early, of course, to draw conclusions. But it is not too early to explore the relevant issues.

President Bush's Statements On Iraq's Weapons Of Mass Destruction

Readers may not recall exactly what President Bush said about weapons of mass destruction; I certainly didn't. Thus, I have compiled these statements below. In reviewing them, I saw that he had, indeed, been as explicit and declarative as I had recalled.

Bush's statements, in chronological order, were:

"Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons."

United Nations Address
September 12, 2002

"Iraq has stockpiled biological and chemical weapons, and is rebuilding the facilities used to make more of those weapons."

"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."

Radio Address
October 5, 2002

"The Iraqi regime . . . possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons."

"We know that the regime has produced thousands of tons of chemical agents, including mustard gas, sarin nerve gas, VX nerve gas."

"We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVS for missions targeting the United States."

"The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group he calls his "nuclear mujahideen" - his nuclear holy warriors. Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of its nuclear program in the past. Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons."

Cincinnati, Ohio Speech
October 7, 2002

"Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent."

State of the Union Address
January 28, 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."

Address to the Nation
March 17, 2003

Should The President Get The Benefit Of The Doubt?

When these statements were made, Bush's let-me-mince-no-words posture was convincing to many Americans. Yet much of the rest of the world, and many other Americans, doubted them.

As Bush's veracity was being debated at the United Nations, it was also being debated on campuses - including those where I happened to be lecturing at the time.

On several occasions, students asked me the following question: Should they believe the President of the United States? My answer was that they should give the President the benefit of the doubt, for several reasons deriving from the usual procedures that have operated in every modern White House and that, I assumed, had to be operating in the Bush White House, too.

First, I assured the students that these statements had all been carefully considered and crafted. Presidential statements are the result of a process, not a moment's thought. White House speechwriters process raw information, and their statements are passed on to senior aides who have both substantive knowledge and political insights. And this all occurs before the statement ever reaches the President for his own review and possible revision.

Second, I explained that - at least in every White House and administration with which I was familiar, from Truman to Clinton - statements with national security implications were the most carefully considered of all. The White House is aware that, in making these statements, the President is speaking not only to the nation, but also to the world.

Third, I pointed out to the students, these statements are typically corrected rapidly if they are later found to be false. And in this case, far from backpedaling from the President's more extreme claims, Bush's press secretary, Ari Fleischer had actually, at times, been even more emphatic than the President had. For example, on January 9, 2003, Fleischer stated, during his press briefing, "We know for a fact that there are weapons there."

In addition, others in the Administration were similarly quick to back the President up, in some cases with even more unequivocal statements. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld repeatedly claimed that Saddam had WMDs - and even went so far as to claim he knew "where they are; they're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad."

Finally, I explained to the students that the political risk was so great that, to me, it was inconceivable that Bush would make these statements if he didn't have damn solid intelligence to back him up. Presidents do not stick their necks out only to have them chopped off by political opponents on an issue as important as this, and if there was any doubt, I suggested, Bush's political advisers would be telling him to hedge. Rather than stating a matter as fact, he would be say: "I have been advised," or "Our intelligence reports strongly suggest," or some such similar hedge. But Bush had not done so.

So what are we now to conclude if Bush's statements are found, indeed, to be as grossly inaccurate as they currently appear to have been?

After all, no weapons of mass destruction have been found, and given Bush's statements, they should not have been very hard to find - for they existed in large quantities, "thousands of tons" of chemical weapons alone. Moreover, according to the statements, telltale facilities, groups of scientists who could testify, and production equipment also existed.

So where is all that? And how can we reconcile the White House's unequivocal statements with the fact that they may not exist?

There are two main possibilities. One that something is seriously wrong within the Bush White House's national security operations. That seems difficult to believe. The other is that the President has deliberately misled the nation, and the world.

A Desperate Search For WMDs Has So Far Yielded Little, If Any, Fruit

Even before formally declaring war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the President had dispatched American military special forces into Iraq to search for weapons of mass destruction, which he knew would provide the primary justification for Operation Freedom. None were found.

Throughout Operation Freedom's penetration of Iraq and drive toward Baghdad, the search for WMDs continued. None were found.

As the coalition forces gained control of Iraqi cities and countryside, special search teams were dispatched to look for WMDs. None were found.

During the past two and a half months, according to reliable news reports, military patrols have visited over 300 suspected WMD sites throughout Iraq. None of the prohibited weapons were found there.

British and American Press Reaction to the Missing WMDs

British Prime Minister Tony Blair is also under serious attack in England, which he dragged into the war unwillingly, based on the missing WMDs. In Britain, the missing WMDs are being treated as scandalous; so far, the reaction in the U.S. has been milder.

New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, has taken Bush sharply to task, asserting that it is "long past time for this administration to be held accountable." "The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat," Krugman argued. "If that claim was fraudulent," he continued, "the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history - worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra." But most media outlets have reserved judgment as the search for WMDs in Iraq continues.

Still, signs do not look good. Last week, the Pentagon announced it was shifting its search from looking for WMD sites, to looking for people who can provide leads as to where the missing WMDs might be.

Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton, while offering no new evidence, assured Congress that WMDs will indeed be found. And he advised that a new unit called the Iraq Survey Group, composed of some 1400 experts and technicians from around the world, is being deployed to assist in the searching.

But, as Time magazine reported, the leads are running out. According to Time, the Marine general in charge explained that "[w]e've been to virtually every ammunition supply point between the Kuwaiti border and Baghdad," and remarked flatly, "They're simply not there."

Perhaps most troubling, the President has failed to provide any explanation of how he could have made his very specific statements, yet now be unable to back them up with supporting evidence. Was there an Iraqi informant thought to be reliable, who turned out not to be? Were satellite photos innocently, if negligently misinterpreted? Or was his evidence not as solid as he led the world to believe?

The absence of any explanation for the gap between the statements and reality only increases the sense that the President's misstatements may actually have been intentional lies.

--- Investigating The Iraqi War Intelligence Reports ---

Even now, while the jury is still out as to whether intentional misconduct occurred, the President has a serious credibility problem. Newsweek magazine posed the key questions: "If America has entered a new age of pre-emption --when it must strike first because it cannot afford to find out later if terrorists possess nuclear or biological weapons--exact intelligence is critical. How will the United States take out a mad despot or a nuclear bomb hidden in a cave if the CIA can't say for sure where they are? And how will Bush be able to maintain support at home and abroad?"

In an apparent attempt to bolster the President's credibility, and his own, Secretary Rumsfeld himself has now called for a Defense Department investigation into what went wrong with the pre-war intelligence. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd finds this effort about on par with O. J.'s looking for his wife's killer. But there may be a difference: Unless the members of Administration can find someone else to blame - informants, surveillance technology, lower-level personnel, you name it - they may not escape fault themselves.

Congressional committees are also looking into the pre-war intelligence collection and evaluation. Senator John Warner (R-VA), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said his committee and the Senate Intelligence Committee would jointly investigate the situation. And the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence plans an investigation.

These investigations are certainly appropriate, for there is potent evidence of either a colossal intelligence failure or misconduct - and either would be a serious problem. When the best case scenario seems to be mere incompetence, investigations certainly need to be made.

Senator Bob Graham - a former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee - told CNN's Aaron Brown, that while he still hopes they find WMDs or at least evidence thereof, he has also contemplated three other possible alternative scenarios:

One is that [the WMDs] were spirited out of Iraq, which maybe is the worst of all possibilities, because now the very thing that we were trying to avoid, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, could be in the hands of dozens of groups. Second, that we had bad intelligence. Or third, that the intelligence was satisfactory but that it was manipulated, so as just to present to the American people and to the world those things that made the case for the necessity of war against Iraq.

Senator Graham seems to believe there is a serious chance that it is the final scenario that reflects reality. Indeed, Graham told CNN "there's been a pattern of manipulation by this administration."

Graham has good reason to complain. According to the New York Times, he was one of the few members of the Senate who saw the national intelligence estimate that was the basis for Bush's decisions. After reviewing it, Senator Graham requested that the Bush Administration declassify the information before the Senate voted on the Administration's resolution requesting use of the military in Iraq.

But rather than do so, CIA Director Tenet merely sent Graham a letter discussing the findings. Graham then complained that Tenet's letter only addressed "findings that supported the administration's position on Iraq," and ignored information that raised questions about intelligence. In short, Graham suggested that the Administration, by cherrypicking only evidence to its own liking, had manipulated the information to support its conclusion.

Recent statements by one of the high-level officials privy to the decisionmaking process that lead to the Iraqi war also strongly suggests manipulation, if not misuse of the intelligence agencies. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, during an interview with Sam Tannenhaus of Vanity Fair magazine, said: "The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason." More recently, Wolfowitz added what most have believed all along, that the reason we went after Iraq is that "[t]he country swims on a sea of oil."

--- Worse than Watergate? A Potential Huge Scandal If WMDs Are Still Missing ---

Krugman is right to suggest a possible comparison to Watergate. In the three decades since Watergate, this is the first potential scandal I have seen that could make Watergate pale by comparison. If the Bush Administration intentionally manipulated or misrepresented intelligence to get Congress to authorize, and the public to support, military action to take control of Iraq, then that would be a monstrous misdeed.

As I remarked in an earlier column, this Administration may be due for a scandal. While Bush narrowly escaped being dragged into Enron, it was not, in any event, his doing. But the war in Iraq is all Bush's doing, and it is appropriate that he be held accountable.

To put it bluntly, if Bush has taken Congress and the nation into war based on bogus information, he is cooked. Manipulation or deliberate misuse of national security intelligence data, if proven, could be "a high crime" under the Constitution's impeachment clause. It would also be a violation of federal criminal law, including the broad federal anti-conspiracy statute, which renders it a felony "to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose."

It's important to recall that when Richard Nixon resigned, he was about to be impeached by the House of Representatives for misusing the CIA and FBI. After Watergate, all presidents are on notice that manipulating or misusing any agency of the executive branch improperly is a serious abuse of presidential power.

Nixon claimed that his misuses of the federal agencies for his political purposes were in the interest of national security. The same kind of thinking might lead a President to manipulate and misuse national security agencies or their intelligence to create a phony reason to lead the nation into a politically desirable war. Let us hope that is not the case.

John Dean, a FindLaw columnist, is a former Counsel to the President of the United States.”

“

Sometimes it helps if you close the tag a number of times.”

“Violin, you Rool, buddy!”

“See?

It pays to have kids.



I said no. No. No. Nope. Because I said so. No. No. Still no.”

“LOL!”

“The White House, Pentagon and CIA came under heightened scrutiny
this week as voices on Capitol Hill called for hearings on the
absence of any WMD finds in the wake of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Both houses of Congress are planning to conduct inquiries into
the intelligence information used to justify the war, questioning
whether intelligence was molded to fit the administration's policy
objectives.

CIA Director George Tenet, who is expected to testify before joint
hearings of the Senate Intelligence and Armed Services committees,
adamantly defended the agency's work. "Our role is to call it
like we see it, to tell policymakers what we know, what we don't
know, what we think, and what we base it on," Tenet said in a
rare public statement released by the agency. "The integrity of
our process was maintained throughout and any suggestion to the
contrary is simply wrong."

As Tenet and the intelligence community stand behind their
assertions of Iraqi WMD, other administration officials have
likewise voiced confidence in the search. L. Paul Bremer, head
of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq, concluded,
"It seems very hard to believe that Saddam Hussein would have put
his people through the misery he put them through for 12 years
... if he didn't have something to hide." President Bush, whose
own Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board is also investigating
the alleged intelligence shortcomings, reassured U.S. troops at
coalition headquarters in Qatar this week, saying confidently,
"We'll reveal the truth" about Saddam's WMD programs, adding
that while the search may take time, "We've made sure Iraq is not
going to be used as an arsenal for terrorist groups. ... America
sent you on a mission to remove a grave threat and liberate an
oppressed people, and that mission has been accomplished."

As the Left took its assailing of the President and the
intelligence community to a whole new level (while the President
was out of the country), the CIA went on the offensive. This week
the agency "leaked" a report indicating al-Qa'ida's readiness
to use chemical, biological and radiological or nuclear (CBRN)
weapons. The report, entitled "Terrorist CBRN: Materials and
Effects," states that al-Qa'ida's "goal is the use of CBRN to
cause mass casualties," adding that Islamic terrorists, including
and linked to al-Qa'ida, "have a wide variety of potential agents
and delivery means to choose from for chemical, biological and
radiological or nuclear attacks." The report confirms that several
al-Qa'ida chemical weapons attacks against European leaders and
population centers have been intercepted and suggests that the
terror group could produce an "improvised nuclear device" or a
radiological dispersion device -- a so-called "dirty bomb."

For its part, the Pentagon also came out swinging against critics
of the Iraq-al-Qa'ida connection, as Douglas Feith, undersecretary
of defense for policy, announced the findings of a special
intelligence team which has concluded that al-Qa'ida's religious
ideology does not prevent the group from cooperating with state
sponsors of terrorism. The team, commissioned in the aftermath of
the September 11 attacks, concludes that "groups and states were
willing to cooperate across philosophical, ideological lines."
The intelligence report debunks popular myths about Islamic
terrorists, says Feith, showing that "Sunni and Shi'a groups
cooperated, or religious-based groups cooperated with secular
groups or states." Amid the growing storm of accusations ranging
from "tweaked" intelligence to outright lies, the undersecretary
concluded unambiguously, "From our perspective, it's pretty
clear that the intelligence community's judgments concerning
Iraqi weapons of mass destruction did not undergo a major change
between the Clinton and Bush administrations."

The absence of evidence is
not evidence of absence. The politicization and Leftmedia hype
of this issue will not change the fact that Saddam Hussein was
evil, his regime needed to be destroyed, and WMD -- like the two
mobile biological-weapons labs discovered in recent weeks -- will
be found. The $64,000 question is, will Iraq's WMD stores be found
prior to their use by Jihadi terrorists? UN and European obstructionists to the war with Iraq
provided a significant window for those weapons -- particularly
biological and nuclear -- to be transported out of Iraq to Iran
or Syria.”

“: "We know that he has stored
secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his
country." --Albert Gore, 23 September 2001, admitting the existence
of Iraqi WMD while criticizing the Bush administration's adamancy
in going after Saddam Hussein.”

“Every knows they had them... every small country that doesn't have Nukes does (Bios, etc..)...the question should be are they a threat to us and are they plaining to use them.

We were told that they had tons of the stuff and they were such a threat to us we had to go in immediately or they may use them on us any day.

I'm a lot of things, but I'm not that paranoid.”