Being that this thread is 'for' those who still believe in Iraq having WMD....and being considered a
cult in their mentality, etc.......why
isn't there a thread started for those who fervently believe the oppposite....and being considered a the same....a
cult?
Iraq WMD was only one of various pre-texts for war. I believe it was over-emphasized and was used wrongly by the administration. I will not go into
details again and again, as I have one many myrids of other threads dealing with the issue of those WMD.
Here's how I see this whole thing...an analogy of sorts:
Let's say I accused you of grilling hamburgers.
You DENY it. I 'bust' in to your home and search and find the following:
instructions on cooking hamburgers...
ketchup
mayonaise
mustard
lettuce
tomatoes
pickles
hamburger buns
charcoal
a grill
used charcoal in the grill
a refrigerator
And on top of this, I have all your friends and neighbors telling me that you make hamburgers at your home, and that they have seen you do this. Does
the fact that I have not found an actual cooked hamburger mean that you don't cook hamburgers? This is almost how conspiracy theories, in general,
operate but we won't and don't look at it that way.....
It's "Hey! You didn't find the cooked hamburgers, thus your conclusions are bogus, based off the circumstantial evidences that you have....that
weak...no proof!!" ........
In the matters of discussions concerning this, there is a "left-wing" view and a "right-wing" view...or however one may want to classify it. The
matter is that information presented for or against Iraq having or not having WMD falls into these opposite camps.
What I find strange is how many are bashing this particular administration when in the past administration's, the evidences were documented, and
documented from and by many various reputable sources. Its like everyone turns a blind eye to this and only has eyes on this current
administration...Bush. Baffles me....and then the reputable sources, prior to this war, were just that: reputable....but since the war, etc., those
same "reputable" sources are now considered BS or in colloberation with this current administration.....doubly baffling.
Example: Clinton....
"Text Of Clinton Statement On Iraq"
Link:
www.cnn.com...
Excerpt:
"In 1995, Hussein Kamal, Saddam's son-in-law, and the chief organizer of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program, defected to Jordan. He
revealed that Iraq was continuing to conceal weapons and missiles and the capacity to build many more.
Then and only then did Iraq admit to developing numbers of weapons in significant quantities and weapon stocks. Previously, it had vehemently denied
the very thing it just simply admitted once Saddam Hussein's son-in-law defected to Jordan and told the truth. Now listen to this, what did it admit?
It admitted, among other things, an offensive biological warfare capability notably 5,000 gallons of botulinum, which causes botulism; 2,000
gallons of anthrax; 25 biological-filled Scud warheads; and 157 aerial bombs.
And I might say UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq has actually greatly understated its production.
As if we needed further confirmation, you all know what happened to his son-in-law when he made the untimely decision to go back to Iraq.
Next, throughout this entire process, Iraqi agents have undermined and undercut UNSCOM. They've harassed the inspectors, lied to them, disabled
monitoring cameras, literally spirited evidence out of the back doors of suspect facilities as inspectors walked through the front door. And our
people were there observing it and had the pictures to prove it.
Despite Iraq's deceptions, UNSCOM has nevertheless done a remarkable job. Its inspectors the eyes and ears of the civilized world have uncovered and
destroyed more weapons of mass destruction capacity than was destroyed during the Gulf War.
This includes nearly 40,000 chemical weapons, more than 100,000 gallons of chemical weapons agents, 48 operational missiles, 30 warheads
specifically fitted for chemical and biological weapons, and a massive biological weapons facility at Al Hakam equipped to produce anthrax and other
deadly agents.
Further on:
"It is obvious that there is an attempt here, based on the whole history of this operation since 1991, to protect whatever remains of his capacity
to produce weapons of mass destruction, the missiles to deliver them, and the feed stocks necessary to produce them.
The UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq still has stockpiles of chemical and biological munitions, a small force of Scud-type missiles, and the
capacity to restart quickly its production program and build many, many more weapons.
Now, against that background, let us remember the past here. It is against that background that we have repeatedly and unambiguously made clear our
preference for a diplomatic solution."
And.......
"Now, let's imagine the future. What if he fails to comply, and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third route which gives him yet more
opportunities to develop this program of weapons of mass destruction and continue to press for the release of the sanctions and continue to ignore the
solemn commitments that he made?...........If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the
threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program. We want to seriously reduce his capacity to threaten his neighbors............Let me be
clear: A military operation cannot destroy all the weapons of mass destruction capacity. But it can and will leave him significantly worse off than he
is now in terms of the ability to threaten the world with these weapons or to attack his neighbors............If we fail to respond today, Saddam and
all those who would follow in his footsteps will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge that they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear
message from the United Nations Security Council and clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program.
But if we act as one, we can safeguard our interests and send a clear message to every would-be tyrant and terrorist that the international community
does have the wisdom and the will and the way to protect peace and security in a new era. That is the future I ask you all to imagine. That is the
future I ask our allies to imagine.
If we look at the past and imagine that future, we will act as one together. And we still have, God willing, a chance to find a diplomatic resolution
to this, and if not, God willing, the chance to do the right thing for our children and grandchildren."
As to sources.....sources are presented either left or right....for or against....etc...
Example of this is with the New York Times:
"GEORGE W. BUSH'S JUST WAR
-- What The NY Times Doesn't Want You To Know!...."
Link:
www.iconoclast.ca.../newPage1.asp
Excerpt's:
"Case in point, the New York Times' headline blurb on arms-expert David Kay's preliminary report to the U.S. Congress, on his investigation of
Saddam's WMD program: NO ILLICIT ARMS FOUND IN IRAQ, U.S. INSPECTOR TELLS CONGRESS.
Excuse me! No illicit arms found in Iraq? What about the following observation by David Kay in his report:
"We have discovered dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during
the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi
scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG [Iraq
Survey Group] has discovered that should have been declared to the UN."
And just what kind of efforts at concealment of "non-existent illicit arms" (as the Times would likely refer to them) did Saddam and his cohorts
engage in? According to Mr. Kay, they included the following:
1. A clandestine network of unmonitored laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment suitable for
continuing CBW research.
2. A prison laboratory complex, possibly used in human testing of BW agents, that Iraqi officials, who were working to prepare for UN inspections,
were explicitly ordered not to declare to the UN.
3. Reference strains of biological organisms concealed in a scientist's home, one of which can be used to produce biological weapons.
4. New research on BW-applicable agents Brucella and Congo Crimean Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF), and continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin, were not
declared to the UN.
5. Documents and equipment were hidden in scientists' homes that would have been useful in resuming uranium enrichment by centrifuge and
electromagnetic isotope separation (EMIS).
6. Continuing covert capability to manufacture fuel propellant useful only for prohibited SCUD variant missiles, a capability that was maintained at
least until the end of 2001 and that cooperating Iraqi scientists have said they were told to conceal from the UN.
7. Plans and advanced design work for new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1000 km -- well beyond the 150 km range limit imposed by the
UN. These missiles, with a 1000 km range, would have allowed Iraq to threaten targets throughout the Middle East, including Ankara, Cairo, and Abu
Dhabi.
8. Clandestine attempts between late-1999 and 2002 to obtain, from North Korea, technology related to 1,300 km range ballistic missiles, 300 km range
anti-ship cruise missiles, and other prohibited military equipment.
But wait, Mr Kay wasn't quite finished: "In addition to the discovery of extensive concealment efforts," he continued, "we have been faced with a
systematic sanitization of documentary and computer evidence in a wide range of offices, laboratories, and companies suspected of WMD work. The
pattern of these efforts to erase evidence -- hard drives destroyed, specific files burned, equipment cleaned of all traces of use -- are ones of
deliberate, rather than random, acts."
Of course, this preliminary evidence is probably the tip of the iceberg. Certainly, many intelligence sources (including the Israelis and British)
believe that a year of pre-invasion haggling in the UN (as well an initial lack of vigilance by invading Allied forces) gave Saddam and his minions
plenty of time to ship any particularly visible WMD materiel to Syria and other destinations. And others believe that Saddam's main intent, all
along, was just simply to retain a scientific and informational infrastructure sufficient to renew his quest to finalize various weapons of mass
destruction -- nuclear and biochemical -- just as soon as international pressure abated (with perhaps the election of another Democratic president).
And now, as yet another rebuttal to the wishful-thinking liberal fantasy that the Bush administration simply lied about the existence of biological
and other WMDs in Iraq, take note of the following AP news report from the Hindustan Times on October 2, 2003:
KUWAIT CITY -- Kuwaiti security authorities have foiled an attempt to smuggle $60 million worth of chemical weapons and biological warheads from Iraq
to an unnamed European country, a Kuwaiti newspaper said on Wednesday.
The pro-Government Al-Siyassah, quoting an unnamed security source, said the suspects had been watched by security since they arrived in Kuwait and
were arrested "in due time." It did not say when or how the smugglers entered Kuwait or when they were arrested.
Chemical weapons and biological warheads from Iraq? Must have been planted there by the CIA. Or perhaps an example of spontaneous local Iraqi
entrepreneurial initiative, now discouraged by the mean Kuwaitis and Americans. But a product of the pre-war regime of Saddam Hussein? Impossible!
Anyone who reads the New York Times, Newsweek or The Nation knows that Saddam Hussein was a good-natured, peace-loving dictator who hated war and just
wanted to be left alone to use the oil money he stole to build more opulent palaces, prisons and torture chambers for his personal enjoyment.
The moral of this entire story, then? Contrary to what the New York Times and liberal Democrats would have you believe, the Bush administration's war
against Saddam was a just one. It was based on the assumption that Saddam had breached several UN resolutions against his creating WMDs that
potentially could threaten Iraq's many neighbors, or end up in the hands of terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda (which would use them to strike at
American cities). And it hinged on a realistic policy that assumed that unless Saddam himself were overthrown, this megalomaniacal dictator would
inevitably return to the task of creating various biological and nuclear weapons (no doubt with the assistance of German and French commercial
interests) once the United Nations, followed by the U.S., was put off the scent."
And as to those who supported this administration and the assertion that Iraq had WMD:
""One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That
is our bottom line."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction program."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998
"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear,
chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
--Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
--Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998
"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if
appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass
destruction programs."
Letter to President Clinton, signed by:
-- Democratic Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others, Oct. 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has
made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
-Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
-- Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999
"There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs
continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of
a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies."
Letter to President Bush, Signed by:
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), and others, Dec 5, 2001
"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of
the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and th! e means of delivering them."
-- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002
"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in
power."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002
"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological
weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate
that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."
-- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002
"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force -- if necessary -- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe
that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002
"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within
the next five years ... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass
destruction."
-- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002
"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy
his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do"
-- Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002
"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons
stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda
members ... It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical
warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."
-- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002
"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for
the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002
"[W]ithout question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a
particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his
continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is
real..."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003
So now the Democrats say President George W Bush lied, that there never were any WMDs, and Bush alone took America to war for his oil
buddies?"
But hey!......since those actual WMD haven't turned up labeled with warning label's saying or indicating "These boxes have WMD inside"......Iraq
had no WMD...and thus....those who continue to believe that Saddam and Iraq had them.....its becuase of the "cult mentality and belief"....
I posted this on another thread last night:
""Kay revealed a scientist has come forward with a report of the WMD being shipped out of Iraq into Syria......Iran.....and Jordan before the war
started."
Best I can say here is that sure it did!
"Therefore, any war against terrorism must target Hezbollah. We believe the administration should demand that Iran and Syria immediately cease all
military, financial, and political support for Hezbollah and its operations.
Should Iran and Syria refuse to comply, the administration should
consider appropriate measures of retaliation against these known state sponsors of terrorism.--PNAC letter to President Bush 9/20/01
Link:
www.newamericancentury.org...
Geez, those WMD sure do move around alot, don't they? Interestingly, it coincides with where ever the PNAC thinks this nation of states should be
involved next. Be assurd they (WMD) won't be found in Saudi Arabia, I mean *cough, cough*...they are an "ally."
You have the UN, who not once, but 14 times claimed he had WMDs.
regards
seekerof
[Edited on 4-10-2003 by Seekerof]