Tariq has posted an article from the NY Times online and has highlighted the following excerpt:
An interim report last September, written by former ISG head Charles Duelfer, will largely serve as the group�s final conclusions. It said that Saddam not only had no weapons of mass destruction and had not made any since 1991, but that he had no capability of making any either. Few changes will be made to the document, Mr. McClellan said. The Duelfer document contradicted virtually all the pre-war claims from London and Washington about Saddam possessing biological and chemical weapons, and reconstituting Iraq�s nuclear programme. Mario responds: Anyone who follows events in Iraq knows that the stockpiles of WMDs were not found. The controversy arises over what happened to the WMDs that they had, which led to 17 resolutions being passed from 1991 to 2003 by the UN demanding from Saddam Husayn an accounting of the WMDs. Thus the pre-war claims by the entire UN pre-dated President George Bush by 10 years since he became President only in 2001. Saddam Husayn never complied with the UN demands, even after the ultimatum contained in UN resolution 1441 that non-complience would lead to "serious consequences" which meant a regime change. All he had to do keep his dictatorship was to prove to UN inspectors that there were no WMDs in Iraq. If he had done this the sanctions would have been lifted and the coalition that wanted the regime change would have had to look for another excuse. The actual Duelfer Report can be read on several web sites, one being the following: www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/index.html The following are not my words but a verbatim excerpt from the Duelfer report. The section is called Regime Strategic Intent and the excerpt appears on page 1 of this section. It should be compared with the false assertion in the Times online article that Saddam had no intentions or capability of reconstituting Iraq's WMD programs. The Duelfer report says just the opposite in the very first bullet point shown below: Key Findings 1. Saddam Husayn so dominated the Iraqi Regime that its strategic intent was his alone. He wanted to end sanctions while preserving the capability to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) when sanctions were lifted. 2. Saddam totally dominated the Regime�s strategic decision making. He initiated most of the strategic thinking upon which decisions were made, whether in matters of war and peace (such as invading Kuwait), maintaining WMD as a national strategic goal, or on how Iraq was to position itself in the international community. 3. Loyal dissent was discouraged and constructive variations to the implementation of his wishes on strategic issues were rare. Saddam was the Regime in a strategic sense and his intent became Iraq�s strategic policy. 4. Saddam�s primary goal from 1991 to 2003 was to have UN sanctions lifted, while maintaining the security of the Regime. He sought to balance the need to cooperate with UN inspections � to gain support for lifting sanctions � with his intention to preserve Iraq�s intellectual capital for WMD with a minimum of foreign intrusiveness and loss of face. Indeed, this remained the goal to the end of the Regime, as the starting of any WMD program, conspicuous or otherwise, risked undoing the progress achieved in eroding sanctions and jeopardizing a political end to the embargo and international monitoring.
