<font color="#C4C1CA">No, not Scott Ritter this time - but David Kay!</font>

US expert slams WMD 'delusions'
Weapons of mass destruction do not exist in Iraq and it is "delusional" to think they will be found, says former chief US weapons inspector David Kay.

Mr Kay told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that British and American leaders should simply apologise and admit that they were wrong.

He said Saddam Hussein had intended to reconstitute his weapons programme at some point and had acted illegally.

However, there were no actual WMD stockpiles, he said.

Mr Kay led the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq until he stepped down as head of the Iraq Survey Group in January.

He said at the time that he did not believe there had been large-scale production of chemical or biological weapons in Iraq since the end of the first Gulf War in 1991.

In his latest comments, Mr Kay referred to the UK Prime Minister, Tony Blair, by name.

"Anyone out there holding - as I gather Prime Minister Blair has recently said - the prospect that, in fact, the Iraq Survey Group is going to unmask actual weapons of mass destruction, are really delusional," he said.

"There is nothing there. There is a programme there. There was an intention of Saddam Hussein at some point to reconstitute it.

"There were clearly illegal activities, clear violations of UN Security Council resolutions. We have accumulated that evidence and really have accumulated that evidence to a considerable degree four months ago.

"There are not actual stockpiles of newly produced weapons of mass destruction."

Mr Kay repeated his previous assertions that the US-led coalition had been mistaken in its assumption that Saddam Hussein had possessed the banned weapons.

"We simply got it wrong," he said. "Iraq was a dangerous country, Saddam was an evil man and we are better off without him and all of that. But we were wrong in our estimation."
<font size="1">BBC News</font>

<font color="#C4C1CA">Time for a Hatchet job on the man, 'Scott Ritter' style. Maybe someone can arrange to have him found carrying drugs or implicate him in underage sex as well?</font>

Edwin\ No WoMD were found in iraq, therefore Saddam had none in the first place. Excellent deduction. /Edwin

So there are no Womd in Iraq.
Did any one check Syria?

Jan\ It reminds me of that time waaaaay back /Jan, when police raided some house when searching for drugs. The drugs owner hid it in his friends house, so the judge deducted that he had none.

Untill USA checks Syria, this isue is unsolvable.

I agree with Black Baron's point that checking Syria makes the issue irrefutable.

On the other hand though, the "Syria conspiricists" should accept that there is enough paperwork on hand from enough factories and government departments that appears to establish that Iraq was not in the business of manufacturing WOMD in the period of the inspections and international threats.

Did they use to have WOMD 5-15 years ago - categorically yes. Did they unload some of that old stuff to Syria - possibly. Did they want to get back into the WOMD game - most probably. Were they producing WOMD in the prior 3-5 years - the evidence says NOT and until something says they did, the NOT position is firming towards being conclusive.

Sooner or later on this last point the intelligence community needs to produce their proof or say "whoops - sorry". Does it change a whole lot - not really - most people's minds are already pretty much madeup as to what they think of the Iraq war and the actions of their respective governments. Saying "we got it wrong" ain't gunna change a whole lot.

The only WMD in the region are in Israel, Black Baron.
Perhaps we should check there first?

Ooooh, isn't Skunk quick with the gloves off.

And, Skunk you certainly realize that you just made a false statement. Ruin your credibility if you like, but only a nincompoop would believe that NO WMD are habored in Syria, Iran, etc. -- at the very least WMD gas is certainly stored/made by those countries. Assuming it's not (which is a ludicrous stretch for one who is pragmatic), there is still the missing gas stores of Saddam -- which certainly wound up in one or more locations in the region.

Once you remove the bias, you find these quotes. Balance is a beautiful thing you've seemed to miss Skunk.

Davros' post pretty much summed up my own opinion about the whole thing. Good post! [img]graemlins/thumbsup.gif[/img]

<font color=deepskyblue>So no new WMD were found in Iraq. Gee, I guess we shouldn't have been so mean to poor Mr. Hussein, then. :rolleyes: I will agree that Bush and Blair should admit that their intelligence information regarding WMD appears to have been wrong. Oh - Wait - they already did that and were roundly criticized for not being more suspicious of the information they received.

Never mind that Hussein had actually USED WMD on the Kurds back in the 90's and had threatened to do the same to the U.S. through terrorist attacks. Never mind that Hussein's own scientists were feeding HIM false information regarding the number of WMD's they had on hand (even Hussein thought he had more than he really did), and - finally - let's just ignore the fact that Hussein had PLENTY of time to move any WMD's he may have had out of the country. I agree that the conjecture of moving the WMD's seems a little shaky. After all, you're country is being invaded - if you've got ANY WMD's, THAT would seem like the best time to use them. Then again, that also implies that the leader actually plans to stay in country and fight the infidels with every thing he has instead of leaving his troops to be slaughtered while he breaks for the nearest border at max speed.

But none of those issues really matter anymore. What DOES strike me is the highlighted portion of the interview, where David Kay acknowledges they have accumulated "considerable evidence" proving that Saddam Hussein was engaging in "clear violations of U.N. Resolutions". In other words, they have gathered apparantly irrefutable proof that Saddam Hussein DID engage in numerous illegal activities that specifically violated the U.N. Resolutions.

And what was the U.N. wanting to do about this??? Anybody??? That's right...let's give Saddam just a little more time to stop violating these sanctions and start obeying the rules. I'm sure he will eventually cease these violations if we just put enough pressure on him.

{sigh} Saddam Hussein was a blight on humanity in general and a sadistic, torturous dictator of the worst stripe. Maybe the information about the WMD's was wrong, but it was NOT THE ONLY REASON LISTED FOR GOING TO WAR!!! It may have been the most oft mentioned reason, but it was not the ONLY reason...and - by his own admission - David Kay and his group found more than enough evidence to justify the action taken against Saddam Hussein.

Of course, we could have left the decision of how to handle Saddam Husssein with the U.N.. And if we had done that, Saddam and his boys would still be murdering and torturing anybody that looked at them wrong while the U.N. engaged in some very serious hand-wringing and issued "harsh reprimands" condemning their behavior.</font>

The only WMD in the region are in Israel, Black Baron.
Perhaps we should check there first? </font>[/QUOTE]And Pakistan Skunk. And India Skunk. And Russia Skunk. So quick to point the finger at Israel.

And Skunk, what's your opinion on Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait? What's the commonality between them I wonder?

Don't even dare to complain about the UN enforcing resolutions when no country has done more to undermine this process than America.

UN Resolutions violated or ignored, by Iraq:

UN Resolutions violated, ignored, by Israel:

This list only includes the resolutions that actually got through, keeping in mind the amount of US vetoing that goes on...

That's 16 to 84, Israel actually has proven WMD's, including nuclear ones, but we never see American troops dying to invade there...

It's funny how American's never complain about UN failure to enforce resolutions when it suits their political goals. It reflects the conservative view of the world, one in which International Institutions exist to further the interests of America (IMF, World Bank etc), become no longer useful when not corresponding to these perceived 'interests' (eg. UN) and where aid becomes a tool to be used to buy political consensus on the international stage. It's simply sickening.

[ 06-07-2004, 04:39 PM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]