UN says no WMD's in Iraq

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2004-03-02 10:39pm

Yahoo News wrote:By Bill Nichols, USA TODAY

A report from U.N. weapons inspectors to be released today says they now believe there were no weapons of mass destruction of any significance in Iraq (news - web sites) after 1994, according to two U.N. diplomats who have seen the document.

The historical review of inspections in Iraq is the first outside study to confirm the recent conclusion by David Kay, the former U.S. chief inspector, that Iraq had no banned weapons before last year's U.S-led invasion. It also goes further than prewar U.N. reports, which said no weapons had been found but noted that Iraq had not fully accounted for weapons it was known to have had at the end of the Gulf War (news - web sites) in 1991.

The report, to be outlined to the U.N. Security Council as early as Friday, is based on information gathered over more than seven years of U.N. inspections in Iraq before the 2003 war, plus postwar findings discussed publicly by Kay.

Kay reported in October that his team found "dozens of WMD-related program activities" that Iraq was required to reveal to U.N. inspectors but did not. However, he said he found no actual WMDs.

The study, a quarterly report on Iraq from U.N. inspectors, notes that the U.S. teams' inability to find any weapons after the war mirrors the experience of U.N. inspectors who searched there from November 2002 until March 2003.

Many Bush administration officials were harshly critical of the U.N. inspection efforts in the months before the war. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in August 2002 that inspections "will be a sham."

The Bush administration also pointedly declined U.N. offers to help in the postwar weapons hunt, preferring instead to use U.S. inspectors and specialists from other coalition countries such as Britain and Australia.

But U.N. reports submitted to the Security Council before the war by Hans Blix, former chief U.N. arms inspector, and Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency, have been largely validated by U.S. weapons teams. The common findings:

Iraq's nuclear weapons program was dormant.

No evidence was found to suggest Iraq possessed chemical or biological weapons. U.N. officials believe the weapons were destroyed by U.N. inspectors or Iraqi officials in the years after the 1991 Gulf War.

Iraq was attempting to develop missiles capable of exceeding a U.N.-mandated limit of 93 miles.

Demetrius Perricos, the acting executive chairman of the U.N. inspection teams, said in an interview that the failure to find banned weapons in Iraq since the war undercuts administration criticism of the U.N.'s search before the war.

"You cannot say that only the Americans or the British or the Australians currently inspecting in Iraq are the clever inspectors - and the Americans and the British and the Australians that we had were not," he said.

BlkbrryTheGreat · Post by **BlkbrryTheGreat** » 2004-03-02 10:40pm

In other news, the sky is blue.

Montcalm · Post by **Montcalm** » 2004-03-02 11:02pm

Then why the hell did they wasted time going there if there was nothing after 1994.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-03-02 11:41pm

BlkbrryTheGreat wrote:In other news, the sky is blue.

I have to say Blkbrry, that is for some reason the most witty thing I've heard today, and I mean that, honestly.

Post by **Vympel** » 2004-03-03 12:04am

Montcalm wrote:Then why the hell did they wasted time going there if there was nothing after 1994.

Because it was a good idea?

Sharp-kun · Post by **Sharp-kun** » 2004-03-03 11:22am

Montcalm wrote:Then why the hell did they wasted time going there if there was nothing after 1994.

Keep Blix in a job?

KrauserKrauser · Post by **KrauserKrauser** » 2004-03-03 11:29am

Oh so now they decide there aren't any? Sure were singing a different song before we ousted Saddam.

Rye · Post by **Rye** » 2004-03-03 12:25pm

KrauserKrauser wrote:Oh so now they decide there aren't any? Sure were singing a different song before we ousted Saddam.

They can deploy new songs in 45 minutes, songs that may be able to reach our bases in cyprus, and our allies' bases in Jordan, Kuwait and Turkey.

Knife · Post by **Knife** » 2004-03-03 12:30pm

*shrug* so I guess it takes 12 years, 3 months and 2 days. Meh, who'd of known.

Bug-Eyed Earl · Post by **Bug-Eyed Earl** » 2004-03-03 03:13pm

So now all of the conservatives will change their tune to "We had to oust Saddam because it wsa the right thing to do."

OK, since it was the right thing to do, let's go after every dictator and see what happens to the international community's opinion of us, our deficit, the lives of our men.

After all, it would be the right thing to do, according to their logic.

Chardok · Post by **Chardok** » 2004-03-03 03:17pm

Gasp.

Comosicus · Post by **Comosicus** » 2004-03-03 05:05pm

Montcalm wrote:Then why the hell did they wasted time going there if there was nothing after 1994.

Oil maybe?

Or the need to keep the military industry alive? To show the world Uncle Sam's muscles?

Post by **Vympel** » 2004-03-03 10:33pm

KrauserKrauser wrote:Oh so now they decide there aren't any? Sure were singing a different song before we ousted Saddam.

Maybe you should seperate US spin from UN fact.