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| BBC Source: 'No WMD in Iraq' |
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posted by ewing2001
on Wednesday September 24, @04:06AM
from the BBC dept.
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'No WMD in Iraq', source claims
Update: The hunt for weapons of mass destruction yields - nothing (Guardian 09/25)
BBC -Wednesday, 24 September, 2003
No weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq by the group tasked with looking for them, according to a Bush administration source who has spoken to the BBC.
The source told the presenter of BBC television's Daily Politics show, Andrew Neil, this was the conclusion of the Iraq Survey Group's interim report, which the source said was due to be published next month.
Mr Neil said the draft report says it was highly unlikely that weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were shipped out of the country to places like Syria before the US-led war on Iraq.
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It will also claim that Saddam Hussein mounted a huge programme to deceive and hinder the work of UN weapons inspectors, he said.
Mr Neil said, according to the source, the report will say its inspectors have not even unearthed "minute amounts of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons material".
They have also not uncovered any laboratories involved in deploying WMD and no delivery systems for the weapons.
But, Mr Neil added, the report would publish computer programmes, files, pictures and paperwork which it says shows that Saddam Hussein's regime was attempting to develop a WMD programme.
The hunt for weapons of mass destruction yields - nothing
Intelligence claims of huge Iraqi stockpiles were wrong, says report
The Guardian -Thursday September 25, 2003
An intensive six-month search of Iraq for weapons of mass destruction has failed to find a single trace of an illegal arsenal, according to accounts of a report circulated in Washington and London.
A draft of the report, compiled by the CIA-led 1,400-strong Iraq Survey Group (ISG), has been sent to the White House, the Pentagon and Downing Street, a US intelligence source said, and will contain no evidence of Iraqi stockpiles of biological, chemical or nuclear weapons.
The Failure to Find Iraqi Weapons
NY Times -Friday 26 September 2003
...Americans and others in the world are glad that Mr. Hussein has been removed from power. If Iraq can be turned into a freer and happier country in coming years, it could become a focal point for the evolution of a more peaceful and democratic Middle East. But it was the fear of weapons of mass destruction placed in the hands of enemy terrorists that made doing something about Iraq seem urgent. If it had seemed unlikely that Mr. Hussein had them, we doubt that Congress or the American people would have endorsed the war.
This is clearly an uncomfortable question for the Bush administration. Yesterday, Secretary of State Colin Powell met with Times editors. Asked whether Americans would have supported this war if weapons of mass destruction had not been at issue, Mr. Powell said the question was too hypothetical to answer. Asked if he, personally, would have supported it, he smiled, thrust his hand out and said, "It was good to meet you."
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Dubya considers us all to be beneath his dignity, as he no longer even bothers to cunningly lie to us.
President Bush and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell defended yesterday a statement made by Powell early in 2001 that Iraq's Saddam Hussein did not have "any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction."
Bush, asked about how Hussein went from that status in February to becoming what he called a "great and gathering danger" a year and a half later, said his perspective was changed by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. “Nine-eleven changed my calculation," the president said after a meeting with lawmakers at the White House. "It made it really clear we have to deal with threats before they come on our shore. You know, for a long period of time, we thought oceans could protect us from danger, and we learned a tough lesson on September the 11th."
Powell's 2001 remark was similar to one made by Vice President Cheney on Sept. 16, 2001. Cheney asserted that Hussein was contained. "Saddam Hussein's bottled up, at this point, but clearly, we continue to have a fairly tough policy where the Iraqis are concerned," he said. The liberal group Center for American Progress, which publicized the 2001 statement this week, called the responses contradictory.
Rove did plan this to help the GOP in the 2002 mid-term election:
Rove convinced the president to connect Hussein to Bin Laden, even if the CIA could not. This misdirection worked. A Pew survey taken during the war showed 61% of Americans believe that Hussein and Bin Laden were confederates in the 9/11 attacks.
GOP thugs will say that that is a lie, but what about Rove’s disk? The disk found in DC’s Lafeyette Park, clearly belonging to Karl Rove, showed that the timing of the Iraq war was a political election strategy by the puppet’s political handler.
Why then is Kennedy’s remark about it being planned in for the GOP to gain seats being challenged? This calculated assault of every Democrat, particularly Max Cleland, happened less than a year ago.
What do the families of US soldiers have to say?
In a Guardian article, "Bring us home": GIs flood US with war-weary emails" of August 10, 2003 the following exemplifies the prevailing trend now in the US, "A US mother is angry. Her GI son is serving in the Iraqi town of Samarra, at the heart of the "Sunni triangle", where American troops are killed with grim regularity."
Breaking the traditional silence of military families during time of war, this proud woman knows what she wants-and who she blames for the danger to her son. "I want them to bring our troops home. I am appalled at Bush"s policies. He has got us into a terrible mess," she said.
"In a message posted on a website last week one soldier was brutally frank. "Somewhere down the line, we became an occupation force in [Iraqi] eyes. We don"t feel like heroes any more," said a US Private, who also said morale was poor, and he attacked the leadership back home.
"The rules of engagement are crippling. We are outnumbered. We are exhausted. We are in over our heads. The President says, "Bring "em on." The generals say we don"t need more troops. Well, they"re not over here," he wrote. Others have sounded off about everything from bad treatment at the hands of their officers to fears that their equipment is faulty. The army-issue gas mask "leaks under the chin. This same mask was used during Desert Storm.
Another Private gets access to a computer, and she"s been firing off e-mails. I"m very happy serving my country, but not when the government fails to take care of you."
"We volunteered our lives to be out here and we get treated worse that people in prison." The Private also writes, "There is no real reason for us to be out here!!!!, We"re protecting the oil is all, and as far as the supposed war ending, it hasn’t. Not when everyday soldiers are still getting mines placed in front of convoys. Rocket propelled grenades thrown at u
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