Pull the other one, it's got bells on it

toro toro

That isn't what it - even the bit you quoted - says *at all*. It makes no mention of him destroying the weapons, it says why he didn't *tell* the world they were destroyed.

Sheesh.

Herbert Thornton

"Saddam was so terrified byt Iran.....that he destroyed his own weapons programmes."?

I'm trying to understand what Melanie's point is, but that rather baffles me.

Wm. Hazlitt

Is it not possible that there is another interpretation? The UN (US) forced Iraq to dismantle its nuclear, chemical and biological weapons (and who better placed to know precisely what Iraq had than those who sold it the stuff in the first place). Economic sanctions were doing a good job of dismantling the economy. Iraq was nonetheless keen not to broadcast the full extent of its weakness to its regional enemies. It therefore maintained the fiction that its military capability had not been seriously damaged by the UN (US) campaign.

Straydingo

I have given up on trying to understand the left wing intelligentsia.

John Edwards

Actually Saddam sounds quite plausible and is consistent with what we now know about the absence of WMD alongside non-co-operation with the weapons inspectors who would have confirmed it at the time.

Let's remember as well that it was the Iranians who were on the receiving end of Saddam's chemical warfare (while supported by the US and the West) so it is actually quite logical that Saddam would want the Iranians to think he still had this capacity

Wm. Hazlitt

Is it not possible that there is another interpretation? The UN (US) forced Iraq to dismantle its nuclear, chemical and biological weapons (and who better placed to know precisely what Iraq had than those who sold it the stuff in the first place). Economic sanctions were doing a good job of dismantling the economy. Iraq was nonetheless keen not to broadcast the full extent of its weakness to its regional enemies. It therefore maintained the fiction that its military capability had not been seriously damaged by the UN (US) campaign.

Michael B

"Hussein ... acknowledged that he should have permitted the United Nations to witness the destruction of Iraq's weapons stockpile after the 1991 Persian Gulf War." from the WaPo article

The Husseins, Saddam and sons Uday and Qusay, how their reign is missed by the uncomprehending.

King Prawn

Wm. Hazlitt

If the UN had forced Iraq to dismantle the WMD and other such programmes then why were the UN Inspectors forced out of Iraq by Saddam?

And where is the evidence that they have been destroyed?

As for the economic sanctions you describe that is a joke. The French and the Russians were openly trading with Saddam and have you forgot the Oil-For-Food scandal!

John Thomas

If Saddam did keep up the myth of having WMDs in order to prevent apparent weakness in the eyes of Iran - which sounds plausible - why didn't he find a clandestine way of telling the US what he was doing, thus removing, from their minds, their fear of Iraqui WMDs, and thus their need to attack him?

Wm. Hazlitt

King Prawn, I suggest you read some accounts of the saga of the UN Inspectors. Try Scott Ritter.

The evidence of the destruction of WMD is in the detailed reports of the UN Inspectors.

I also suggest you read some more about the effect of the sanctions on the Iraqi economy and on the Iraqi people. I think you will find that the effect on the economy and infrastructure, but more importantly on the people, particularly children, was anything but a joke.

Wm. Hazlitt

John Thomas, What makes you think that Saddam could trust the US and what makes you think the US would want to believe him? And what makes you think the US feared Saddam's WMD? The official US assessment before 2001, publicly acknowledged by Colin Powell, was that the first Gulf War and sanctions had left Saddam a threat to no-one but his own people.

Dave M

The misguided war in Iraq has had serious consequences all around. First of all, it wasn't to the advantage of Conservatives or even Republicans since it catapulted Obama into office. Added to that it strengthened Iran enormously as well as strengthening radical Islam and the enemies of Israel. More seriously, the war in Iraq weakened western democracy as it flashed images of captured Iraqis being humuliated "for kicks" by sadistic, ill-trained American guards. What a huge mess it turned out to be! The only thing you can say in Bush's favour is somehow the surge turned the war around to create some kind of stability within Iraq but wasn't there similar stability prior to the war? Saddam's regime was, after all, similar to the that of Chile under Pinochet (which America supported with open arms). That is, a dictatorship under an aged leader.
You know, one thing that stands out over Iraq that provides serious food for thought is the images nowadays on T.V. I recently saw footage of American troops patrolling areas of Iraq and lo and behold all the women were wearing burkhas! Just like in Iran! Yet bad as Saddam was supposed to be women under his regime actually went to university and enjoyed some kind of basic education and equality. All that has now disappeared yet the Iraq war is supposed to have brought freedom and democracy? Also, one wonder what effect it had on the U.S. economy. Millions of taxpayers money must have been spent on a war we should all know has nothing in common with borders or regions. The war against radical Islam is within our own borders, not confined to some region. Those who crashed planes into the twin towers trained inside America and Europe, not within Iraq.

Michael B

Dave M,

A voluptuous offering of incoherence and rhetorical indulgence.

E.g., the "stability" afforded prior to the 2003 strategic initiative against the dictatorship cum abattoir of Saddam & Sons was consonant with the "objective" reporting provided by CNN's Eason Jordan.

Next you'll be informing us of the wonderful job the U.N. has done in the DRC (Congo) and more than a dozen other U.N. missions in Africa and elsewhere by virtue of omitting any mention of the many sex scandals (rapes, child prostitution and the international sex trade) and financial scandals U.N. "peace keepers" and administrators have been involved in. But if Eason Jordan, the BBC and Katie Couric don't mention it, perhaps it doesn't need to be considered when cheapjack political point-scoring is a primary objective.

Edward in the USA

John Edwards has forgotten that the Kurds of Halabja were also on the receiving end of Saddams WMD program.

5,000 Kurds died in the 1988 poison gas WMD attack on Halabja.

Jeremiah

My publicly expressed position in 2003 was that (a) Saddam effectually admitted he had WMDs by his actions and that was a sufficient answer to supposedly legal arguments against Bush's war; (b) the war was a good thing if the US knew what is was doing (which it didn't), could therefore and would finish the job quickly (which it didn't), had the military and economic strength for this and its other hegemonic tasks (which I doubted) and had the determination to see it through if it took longer than the usual American quasi-democratic attention span(which I doubted but am glad to be proved too pessimistic about). At the same time I made a bet that we would learn that there were no WMDs because the one person who really wanted them believed in was Saddam. To be precise, I thought of his need for prestige at home and in the Arab world before I thought of his need to threaten Iran because I didn't need to think precisely about the reasons I would be proved right. So....

If sceptical agnostic reasoning from a lifetime of wide reading and experience could get me there, what does it tell those passionately wrong people like Blair, Bush and Melanie Phillips might improve their thinking. For Blair and Bush another 20 IQ points would be a start (though just a start) but that doesn't seem to be Melanie's problem. Perhaps an Aspergerish excess of focus of that ruthlessly logical mind?

John Edwards

Actually I hadn't forgotten about the poison gas attack on the Kurds in 1988. I remember going to a protest meeting held by the Kurdish community in London in 1988 at which I heard the eye witness accounts.

The interesting thing was that the only politician in attendance supporting the Kurds was the left wing Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn.

Original Tony

Mel..I think you've blown this one! A rare event.

Dave M

"A voluptuous offering of incoherence and rhetorical indulgence."

I've never quite understood why the second Iraq War still has some supporters left, although fewer I think than in the past. Certainly the war had consequences. First and foremost, it catapulted Obama into office as voters felt they had been conned by Bush after no WMD were found. Not that Obama is entirely bad for America, more so the liberals who surround him. Worse I think, the Iraq War clouded the horizons with allegations of torture by proxy, abuse of prisoners and alleged human rights abuses formally considered inconsistant with a civilized democracy. Thus, the whole fiasco also allowed the apologists for radical Islam to claim some kind of moral high ground and gain the upper hand via the back door. Hence the BBC lost little time. All in all, I think the failure to produce any WMD in Iraq and the huge cost of the war (which seems to have helped half bankrupt the U.S. economy), led us to where we are today: Obama is one of America's better educated presidents but the question is whether a liberal in office any protection against Iran and the mullahs?
Had Bush concentrated his resources on genuine terrorist targets (as well as Iran), I doubt we'd be in such a mess.
The only argument that was raised in favour of the Iraq War is it would encourage democracy in the Middle East. Is Iraq, therefore, a democracy in the making? The fact women even under Saddam could enjoy a university education and social freedoms is food for thought. In modern Iraq far far more women feel forced to wear either burkhas or veils and, in some cases, fear violence if they don't conform. There is a difference between a secular dictatorship and an Islamic dictatorship under radical clerics.

Michael B

John Edwards,

"The interesting thing" is rather that U.S., British, Polish, Lithuanian, Tongan and other nationals first secured and then more fully liberated the Kurds in northern Iraq.

John Edwards

The US continued to support Saddam Hussein against Iran after his poison gas attack on the Kurds at Halabja. Indeed intially tried to blame the Iranians.

Davod

"The evidence of the destruction of WMD is in the detailed reports of the UN Inspectors"

Rubbish. The last Iraqi WMD report to the UN before the war was deemed by the UN to be copy of the previous unnaceptable report.

I am amazed that the FBI interrogators believed everything Sadaam told them. Was there any fact checking using other intelligence?