IRAQ: U.S. Says Iraq Hid Banned Weapons Well

Yahoo News - AP ^ | June 8,2003 | DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

U.S. Says Iraq Hid Banned Weapons Well

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By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Because Iraq (news - web sites) concealed its banned weapons so well, it will take time to interview scientists and pore over seized documents to find the hiding places, say Bush administration officials who reject charges the White House overplayed prewar intelligence to justify the invasion.

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Answering claims that the administration exaggerated the threat posed by Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) expressed confidence Sunday that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction will be found.

"I'm sure more evidence and more proof will come forward as we go down this road," he told "Fox News Sunday."

Powell said his prewar statement to the United Nations (news - web sites) — that there was no doubt Saddam had the capability to produce and use such weapons — had been vetted for days by U.S. intelligence analysts.

"We spent four days and nights out at the CIA (news - web sites), making sure that whatever I said was supported by our intelligence holdings," Powell said.

But weeks of searches in Iraq by military experts have not validated the administration's portrayal of Iraq's weapons capabilities.

Alleged stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons have not turned up, nor has significant evidence of nuclear weapons program.

The discovery of two Iraqi truck trailers, equipped with fermenters, is the strongest evidence yet that Saddam had a biological weapons program. Still, no actual biological weapons have been found.

The lack of evidence has raised questions about whether the intelligence, which led to the war, was inaccurate or inflated.

The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency acknowledged last week that he had no hard evidence of Iraqi chemical weapons last fall, but believed Iraq had a program to produce them. Powell said parts of the DIA report have been taken out of context.

"The sentence that has gotten all of the attention, in this two-page, unclassified summary, talked about not having the evidence of current facilities and current stockpiling," Powell said. "The very next sentence says that it had information that weapons had been dispersed to units. Chemical weapons had been dispersed to units."

Rice said the justification for war was grounded in information from CIA directors, intelligence reports from abroad, information from U.N. weapons inspectors and efforts by Saddam's government to conceal what it was doing.

Rice also pointed to former President Clinton (news - web sites)'s statement in Dec. 16, 1998, to explain missile strikes he ordered against military and security targets in Iraq. "I have no doubt today, that left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will use these terrible weapons again," Clinton said then.

"No one ever said that we knew precisely where all of these agents were, where they were stored," Rice told on NBC's "Meet the Press."

But she acknowledged that Bush erred when he talked, in his State of the Union address, about how the British government had learned that Iraq had sought uranium from Africa to build weapons.

"We did not know at the time — maybe someone knew down in the bowels of the agency — but no one in our circles knew that there were doubts and suspicions that this might be a forgery. Of course, it was information that was mistaken," Rice said.

Rice expressed confidence that the weapons will be found.

"We have thousands and thousands and thousands of documents that we've not yet gone through," she said on CBS' "Face the Nation." "We have many, many people; we've interviewed just a fraction of them. There are sites to visit.

"We will put together this whole picture, but the preponderance of evidence is that this was a regime that had the capability, that had unaccounted-for stockpiles and unaccounted-for weapons."

Rice dismissed allegations that Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites), during several visits to the Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites), applied political pressure to get intelligence officials to exaggerate their reports of the Iraqi threat.

"Simply not true," Rice said.

One Democrat running for president, Rep. Dick Gephardt (news - web sites) of Missouri, said Sunday he thought the weapons would be found. But, he added, if Bush, the United Nations and international leaders were "all duped, or if they didn't have the right information, then this is the most colossal hype that ever was."

Sen. Pat Roberts (news, bio, voting record), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said a congressional investigation of how intelligence was used in the run-up to the war is premature. "There's a little tad bit of politics being played here," Roberts, R-Kan., told CNN's "Late Edition." "I think it's very, very counterproductive."

Sen. Carl Levin (news, bio, voting record), D-Mich., the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee (news - web sites), said he wants a full-blown congressional investigation.

"I think that the nation's credibility is on the line, as well as his," Levin said, referring to Bush. "This nation has got to lead in this world. If we're going to really lead in a war against terrorism, we must have people who believe in us, who, when we say that something is true, believe that it is true.

"And there is real doubt now that that is the case, because there's too much evidence that intelligence was shaded."

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

OK, good summary from the talkshows today , perhaps!

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[ThreePuttinDude]

"I have no doubt today, that left unchecked,
Saddam Hussein will use these terrible weapons again,"
Clinton said then.

How can the Dems not remember this??

[backhoe]

-Weapons of Mass Destruction ( or Distorsion or Deception? You decide...)--

[Mark]

How long was Scott Ritter and thousands of inspectors in that country? WHEN did they find them? Now with a couple of hundred looking in only a couple of months and the shrills of the left come out.

[Dog Gone]

I would love a large stash of weapons to be found shortly before the election next year. Preferably not before then.

[Grut]

How can the Dems not remember this??

Pols generally, and Dems in particular, are good at not remembering.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

I would love a large stash of weapons to be found shortly before the election next year.

Yes, it would feel good, of course they will cry out

--- IT WAS PLANTED!!!

[Parley Baer]

I bet that those who helped bury or hide the WMD's are being found in the mass graves. One way to shut them up. Parley

[Carry_Okie]

Yes indeedy, this has the classic look of another one of W's rope-a-dope gambits.

The mediots and the Slave Party are as bad as Charlie Brown trying to kick a football.

[alloysteel]

Saddam Hussein got a heads-up on the word to hide the WMD back in 1998, when the regime of the "Former Occupant of the Oval Office, 1993-2001" was making noises of carrying out threats to take out the Iraqi high command. The WMD are hidden, buried in the desert or distributed to a number of other allied parties, as a strategy to put the inspectors off in the event they did some day return. And sure enough, the WMD did not seem to be anywhere in sight when Hans Blix & Company returned in 2002. Big trucks, rail cars, vehicles of all kinds, were busy hauling away the incriminating evidence, all during the intervening four years. There was a phony, not very informative, data dump done for the benefit of the UN Security Council, and whoever else was willing to take Saddam at face value. Then, in seeming surrender to the UN and US demands that either the WMD be revealed, or explanation that they were already destroyed, Saddam said, "Come in and take a look. Look anywhere you want." When Blix & Co. came up empty, he continued to thumb his nose at us. This ruse would have worked with a Democrat President. None of the potential Democrats would have followed up with military action, but simply backed down as no evidence of the WMD. But the difference was, that WMD was not the only, or even a somewhat compelling, reason for the US to have invaded, and liberated, Iraq. Most of it was for purely humanitarian reasons, and to establish a position of dominance in the Middle East.

Mission accomplished. Now, a new mission. Make a real country out of that region known as Iraq, without giving one faction or another exclusive control not commensurate with their representation of the population.

There is no going back to restoring Saddam Hussein or any of his successors.

[stars & stripes forever]

If Saddam did not have chemical weapons....why do so many soldiers have Gulf War Syndrome from the first Gulf war? Those CMD are out there.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

*Ping*

CENTCOM: Two detailed logs - DAILY:

*COALITION EFFORTS AID IRAQ'S RECOVERY (June 8, 2003) *COALITION AND IRAQI POLICE WORK TO MAKE IRAQ SECURE (JUNE 7, 2003)   VOICES OF FREEDOM Quotes from the grateful Iraqi people. Y
***Operation Infinite Freedom - Situation Room - 8 JUN 03/Day 81***

[Dog Gone]

They will say that, of course, but if Bush had deliberately set out to deceive the world and the American public about WMD in Iraq, you'd think that he'd also be smart enough to plant some to be found on Day Two.

The line of attack by the Democrats is ridiculous for that reason, and for the reason that if Saddam had none, he'd surely be glad to prove it, which he most certainly did not.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Riciculous is right:

See these:

A Plot to Deceive?

on the Acquisition of Technology - Relating to WMD ... Through 30 June 2002 CIA

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Powell article with Links:

IRAQ: Powell Defends Information He Used to Justify Iraq War