UN inspectors: Saddam shipped out WMD before war and after

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Originally posted by Grojlach: John D., maybe you should have added an actual source to the article you posted in that other topic, though - it's difficult to determine for anyone if you were quoting it from a source that's generally considered to be trustworthy or directly from some nut's online blog. Anyways... Judging from the "nuggets" posted by you, it's far too soon to conclude anything from Perricos's findings (when were they turned into scrap? Were they relics from the first Gulf War, or still operative at the moment Bush and Blair made their case for war? Because as it stands, this doesn't prove anything (yet?), just that some scrap from old Iraqi missiles has been located - and we know Saddam had long range missiles at some point anyways); and that's probably the reason why all of the major news outlets - including fox news I assume, whom you can hardly call anti-war - have refrained from drawing the same conclusions as you did. So it's nice and all that you're already linedancing ( ) in joy, just keep in mind that it could very well be false alarm.

You know, Grojlach, it absolutely amazes me that you and other members can criticize pro-war members as "conspiracy theorists" (implying they will believe whatever they want, no matter how far they have to stretch the facts) - yet when presented with an article like this can unequivocally state that it doesn't prove anything.

Going on the facts from your own article, it proves that illegal missiles from Iraq were shipped out of Iraq without the U.N. Inspection Team's knowledge.
The fact that newer, untagged components were also found proves that Saddam continued manufacturing WMD's (or their components) in direct violation of the U.N. Sanctions (which is one of the arguments used by Bush and Blair to support the decision to invade Iraq).
It proves that the U.N. isn't even able to keep up with the items they DID find and tag. Otherwise they would have known these items were being shipped out of Iraq.

In short, while the evidence may not be conclusive, it is irrefutable - and it certainly lends a lot of support to the accusations of Iraq storing and manufacturing WMD's in violation of the U.N. Sanctions against such actions.

[Yorick]

Originally posted by Timber Loftis: John D. that "programing language" post gets my unequivocal nomination for the longest run-on buncha junk from which I can discern no meaning whatsoever that I have ever, ever, seen online (written in a form of English, anyway).

I couldn't understand it either... sorry John [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Skunk]

Originally posted by Cerek the Barbaric: Going on the facts from your own article, it proves that illegal missiles from Iraq were shipped out of Iraq without the U.N. Inspection Team's knowledge. The fact that newer, untagged components were also found proves that Saddam continued manufacturing WMD's (or their components) in direct violation of the U.N. Sanctions (which is one of the arguments used by Bush and Blair to support the decision to invade Iraq).[/QB]

Actually, the original article states:
"He said the Iraqi facilities were dismantled and sent both to Europe and around the Middle East. at the rate of about 1,000 tons of metal a month. Destionations included Jordan, the Netherlands and Turkey.

Which *PROVES* that the weapons programme was being ***DISMANTLED*** as QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE.

[ 06-15-2004, 01:28 PM: Message edited by: Skunk ]

[Timber Loftis]

Yep. He was real quick to dismantle it once he saw the tanks lining up. Right compliant and lawful guy, that Saddam. I think he should give himself another medal.

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Originally posted by Skunk: quote: Originally posted by Cerek the Barbaric: Going on the facts from your own article, it proves that illegal missiles from Iraq were shipped out of Iraq without the U.N. Inspection Team's knowledge. The fact that newer, untagged components were also found proves that Saddam continued manufacturing WMD's (or their components) in direct violation of the U.N. Sanctions (which is one of the arguments used by Bush and Blair to support the decision to invade Iraq).[/QB]

Actually, the original article states:
"He said the Iraqi facilities were dismantled and sent both to Europe and around the Middle East. at the rate of about 1,000 tons of metal a month. Destionations included Jordan, the Netherlands and Turkey.

Which *PROVES* that the weapons programme was being ***DISMANTLED*** as QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE. [/QUOTE]Well, it was apparantly done without the knowledge of the U.N. - which makes me wonder if there were any plans to RE-Mantle them. And since the U.N. Inspectors have gone to inspect these new-found weapons and components themselves, I would guess they have the same worry.

If Saddam really was finally complying with the U.N. Sanctions, don't you think he would have been very public about it? Seems to me he would have been calling the U.N. straightaway and saying "OK, I'm dismantling them now. Come see for yourselves and document the dismantling". Instead, he dismantled them and sent the scraps out of the country without alerting or notifying any authorities.

[Timber Loftis]

Actually, I remember that he dragged out 6 or 12 crappy old SCUDs and made the biggest hullabaloo about dismantling them -- you'd have thought he'd just gotten rid of 50 ICBMs the way the news was all over like stink on poopoo.

[Seraph]

The following can also be applied to Cerek's "don't you think [Saddam] would have been very public about [dismantling the weapons]?" post.

Originally posted by Timber Loftis: I think Saddam obfuscated facts, failed to produce weapons publicly, and gave the UN inspectors the run-around just so he could quietly and discreetly abolish his weapons program in secret because he was such a nice guy but didn't want the world to know it.

Well, I know this was scarcasm, but if you replace "was such a nice guy but didn't want the world to know it." with "decided that WMD were a liability with the US but knew Iraq was surounded by people who hated him and that the vague threat of WMD may have been the only thing stoping someone like Iran from attacking" then you would have what I think happened. You don't need to have actual WMD to make effective use of them, for Saddam all that he needed was the posibility, and his reputation. Really, dismantling the weapons in secret would probably have been better then keeping them, that would have weakened the justification for invaiding Iraq (the US was supposed to know exactly where they were, so they would also know if they didn't exist) while still leaving fear in possible enemies.

[ 06-15-2004, 03:51 PM: Message edited by: Seraph ]

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Originally posted by Seraph: Well, I know this was scarcasm, but if you replace "was such a nice guy but didn't want the world to know it." with "decided that WMD were a liability with the US but knew Iraq was surounded by people who hated him and that the vague threat of WMD may have been the only thing stoping someone like Iran from attacking" then you would have what I think happened. You don't need to have actual WMD to make effective use of them, for Saddam all that he needed was the posibility, and his reputation. Really, dismantling the weapons in secret would probably have been better then keeping them, that would have weakened the justification for invaiding Iraq (the US was supposed to know exactly where they were, so they would also know if they didn't exist) while still leaving fear in possible enemies.

That's actually a very plausible theory, Seraph. Except that the U.S. never claimed they knew exactly where the WMD's were. We did know there were some suspicious sites that U.N. Inspectors had been denied access to - so that seemed like a logical place to start. And the article posted by Grojlach supports the theory that there were sites known to contain WMD's that were dismantled by Saddam Hussein and the parts shipped out of the country. So it isn't surprising that nothing was found by the U.S. once it reached Baghdad and had access to those sites.

[Timber Loftis]

Regardless, Seraph, he agreed to dismantle his program, to do it before inspectors, and to open his country to inspection and verification. If that agreement was unworkable for him, he shouldn't have made it. If he was in a pickle politically, I have little sympathy for him. If the bastard hadn't tried to attack every neighbor as well as his own people, he would not have been between a rock and a hard place. If he had no workable options and was forced to break the agreement -- then, tough titty as far as I'm concerned.

[Davros]

Oh well - even if this one is a bunch of lies, we still have the "shell of mass destruction" to fall back on - don't we? It may not be everything that Colin promised to the UN, but it is something.