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there never were WMD
 national |
anti-war / imperialism |
opinion/analysis
 Sunday January 25, 2004 21:20 by p o toole
David Kay is now convinced that previous weapons inspectors were correct all along. Is it any wonder George W. has given up on the search for WMD? They were never
there in the first place. And he knew it,- there was no threat to the US. In 1998 Scott
Ritter- chief weapons inspector and head of United Nations Special Commission
(UNSCOM) in Iraq for de-commissioning weapons said , “the chemical weapons
infrastructure had been completely dismantled.....the biological weapons programme
was gone....the nuclear weapons programme was completely eliminated...If I had to
quantify Iraq’s threat , I would say zero,” - in 1998 he was removed before his
findings became public , and not thrown out by Sadam as we were led to believe.
Hans Blix suffered the same treatment. He decried US/UK ‘intelligence’ as a “wild
goose chase”. Now David Kay, Bush’s man on the ground, has found nothing and he
has quit. Colin Powell, US secretary of defence described Iraq’s threat to the US. as
‘non-existent’ just months prior to 9/11, but Powell has since shown up in the UN
with the ‘proof of the threat’ via satellite photo’s of mobile chemical labs and launch
sites which have also proved non-existent. However, the receipts for the weapons with
which Sadam killed Iranians in the Iran/Iraq war are probably in a drawer in
the oval office and in Downing street. Along with the receipts for 27 billion dollars for
US weapons sold by Oliver North to Iran to kill Iraqis in the same war. And lets not
forget the hawk jets British Aerospace sold to Suharto in East Timor to massacre
half the population so now we can get cheap (Nike and Reebok’s and Gap) clothes for
the kids. Or most recently the receipts for 100 f-16’s sold by the US. to Israel while
Bush is tirelessly working on the ‘roadmap to peace’. It doesn’t matter to George or
Tony if the WMD are found or not. Iraq’s infrastructure is being sold (privatised)
either-way. Rebuilding contracts are already secured, telephone network’s, power
grid, health service’s, industry/manufacturing, and even airline routes are all up for
grabs.The US/UK controlled IMF will loan the money for all this under the usual
impossible terms, and the newly liberated (3rd world) citizens of free Iraq will pay for
it till the end of time. -War is big business, keeping nations poor for cheap labour is
big business, stripping natural assets (oil) is huge business, selling off manufacturing
and infrastructure to the ‘open market economy’ of newly liberated countries is
massive. Just look at the other nations the US/UK found needing liberation,
democratisation or reform on some humanitarian grounds, it’s staggering. Colombia,
Guatemala, El-Salvador, Venezuela, Chile, Nicaragua, Honduras, Gambodia,
Vietnam, Iran, Iraq, India etc,etc.... On a smaller scale its called armed robbery. The
‘justification’ to attack Iraq and kill upwards of 12,000 Iraqi civilians in the last few
months to get Sadam was never valid. To kill 685,000 Iraqi children under five
using ‘sanction’s get Sadam is not just. Nearly two million Iraqis killed to get one
dictator, who was installed and armed by the same people who find him guilty now,
of crimes he committed at a time when he was not so guilty, because he was buying
these weapons as ‘our kind of guy’ is nothing short of insanity.. It’s anyones guess
where the next threat will come from because in this business enemies are always
needed. It should be noted that the death toll amongst those who give the orders and
profit from these wars is zero.
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Comments (19 of 19)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19Remarks by the President to the Press Pool
Nothin' Fancy Cafe
Roswell, New Mexico
11:25 A.M. MST
THE PRESIDENT: I need some ribs.
Q Mr. President, how are you?
THE PRESIDENT: I'm hungry and I'm going to order some ribs.
Q What would you like?
THE PRESIDENT: Whatever you think I'd like.
Q Sir, on homeland security, critics would say you simply haven't spent enough to keep the country secure.
THE PRESIDENT: My job is to secure the homeland and that's exactly what we're going to do. But I'm here to take somebody's order. That would be you, Stretch -- what would you like? Put some of your high-priced money right here to try to help the local economy. You get paid a lot of money, you ought to be buying some food here. It's part of how the economy grows. You've got plenty of money in your pocket, and when you spend it, it drives the economy forward. So what would you like to eat?
Q Right behind you, whatever you order.
THE PRESIDENT: I'm ordering ribs. David, do you need a rib?
Q But Mr. President --
THE PRESIDENT: Stretch, thank you, this is not a press conference. This is my chance to help this lady put some money in her pocket. Let me explain how the economy works. When you spend money to buy food it helps this lady's business. It makes it more likely somebody is going to find work. So instead of asking questions, answer mine: are you going to buy some food?
Q Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay, good. What would you like?
Q Ribs.
THE PRESIDENT: Ribs? Good. Let's order up some ribs.
Q What do you think of the democratic field, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: See, his job is to ask questions, he thinks my job is to answer every question he asks. I'm here to help this restaurant by buying some food. Terry, would you like something?
Q An answer.
Q Can we buy some questions?
THE PRESIDENT: Obviously these people -- they make a lot of money and they're not going to spend much. I'm not saying they're overpaid, they're just not spending any money.
Q Do you think it's all going to come down to national security, sir, this election?
THE PRESIDENT: One of the things David does, he asks a lot of questions, and they're good, generally.
END 11:29 A.M. MST
From the whitehouse official website
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/01/20040122-5.html
Iraq has been liberated, that's all the justification I need. That's all the people wanted in the first place.
Anyway, if there were no WMDs,why didn't Saddam allow the inspectors to VERIFY that? it would have saved his hide.
Of course there were WMDs, they may never be found in Iraq though, they're probably in Syria.
So what if they didnt find any weapons?? Whats that all about? A bit of a clever bloke you seem to be,, not!! Dont be listening to western sponsored media saying that some defector now thinks that the weapons are hidden in Syria. Do you ever wonder if he is paving the way for an invasion of Syria?? If the yanks were so saintly why havent they stepped in and stopped the slaughter of other tyrants like Idi Amin or Pinochet in years gone by. If you looked a bit more into it you'd find that anywhere the yanks have stuck their noses in was to further their own vested interests in countries. Remember these are the same stand up guys who backed Iraq against Iran in the 80s and backed the Taliban against the Russians too. Wake up and become more informed fool!!
very much whether they find WMD or not.
What is at stake here is no less than the very foundation of "democracy" which these jokers claim to act in the interest of.
If as suspected there are no WMD and no active programmes to develop them it means that:
1). Bush and Bliar cannot be trusted as they lied to their own electorates
2). Any motivation they supposedly had for going to war comes into question including that of deposing Saddam which came after the fact
The two of them and their cronies should be impeached and turfed out of public office for ever!
On the intelligence appartatus side:
3). the true source of their "intelligence" (most likely Mossad) needs to be publicly identified
4). heads must roll at the top of MI5/6, CIA/FBI/NSA etc. after the second catastrophic intelligence failure in the past 3 years
Finally:
5). All "advisors" and unelected officials need to be regulated in terms of roles and not be allowed to take over government in the way Perle & Wolfowitz and Campbell were allowed to
are condemned to repeat it..
America installed saddam, america are currently manufacturing saddam like replacement government, Iraqi people will still not get to decide on who governs their country
Saddam did verify the destruction of his weapons programs. America wouldnt have invaded if there was a chance Saddam could have defended himself
Other than that, its impossible to prove a negative, its impossible to prove that Iraq didn't have weapons beyond any hint of a possibility, not because there might have been WMDS there, but because of the nature of the question.
What happened to Halabja on the Bloody Friday?
The brutal massacre of the oppressed and innocent people of Halabja began before the sunrise of Friday, 17th of March 1988. The Iraqi regime committed its most tragic and horrible crime against the civilian people on Friday, 17th of March, 1988. On that day, Halabja was bombarded more than twenty times by Iraqi regime's warplanes with chemical and cluster bombs. That Friday afternoon, the magnitude of Iraqi crimes became evident. In the streets and alleys of Halabja, corpses piled up over one a nother. Tens of children, while playing in front of their houses in the morning, were martyred instantly by cyanide gases. The innocent children did not even have time to run back home. Some children fell down at the threshold of the door of their houses and never rose. In a Simorgh Van, the corpses of 20 women and children who had been prepared to leave the town and the chemical bombardment of the town had deprived them of this opportunity, made any observer stop and ponder about the corpses of these innocent people were evident.
The doors of most houses were left open and inside of each house, there were some martyred and wounded people. The enemy had heightened the cruelty and heart-hardness to its peak and took no pity on its own people. This crime in the chemical bombardment of Halabja has indeed been unprecedented in the history of the imposed war. This crime in Halabja can never be compared to the tragedy of the chemical bombardment of Sardasht. In Halabja more than five thousand people were martyred and over seven thousand more were wounded. Women and children formed 75 percent of the martyrs and wounded of the bloody Friday of Halabja.
Along with Halabja, Khormal, Dojaileh and their surrounding frequently but the center of the catastrophe was Halabja. In late April 1987, twenty four villages of Iraq's Kudistan were targeted by the chemical bombardment because of the struggles of the Muslim-Kurds people of this town and their open opposition to the regime ruling in Iraq. These villages were chemically bombarded twice in less than 48 hours.
"WHY SILENCE ?!!!"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So Iraq never had WMD?
DO YOU THINK FOR A FUCKING SECOND THAT AMERICA IS GOING TO ALLOW THE POSSIBLITY THAT SADDAM WOULD GIVE HIS WMD TO TERRORISTS?
FUCK YOU! YOU ARSEHOLES MARCHED IN THE STREET AGAINST THE FREEDOM OF IRAQ!
on being the victims of genocide no more than any other group has.
To suggest otherwise is to ignore the millions of Cambodians, Congolese, Rwandans etc. etc. etc. who have been killed equally brutally if you count being hacked slowly to death having being first raped and tortured as being worse than a relatively quick death by poisoning.
They did not, however, benefit from coming from an oil-rich country and hence remain forgotten by the worlds media and conveniently ignored by other national/ethnic/religious pressure groups anxious to promote their own cause often to the detriment of others.
Also let us not forget that the Hallabja attack occured at a time when the USK and many others were queeuing up at Saddams door to offer him, weapons, loans and advice on how to fight his war with Iran.
This is all conveniently forgotten as BLIAR & Co. attempt to stich up Saddam as the scapegoat for the whole foul business in the hope they can escape unseen into the ensuing shitstorm!
I for one have my shit-proof glasses on ... you might do well to put on your own!
If you you would take off the ideological blindfold maybe you see my point.
Thousands of Kurds DIED in IRAQ when they were KILLED by CHEMICAL WEAPONS used by the regime of SADDAM HUSSEIN!
They didn't die of the FLU. They were killed by WMD!
How can you admit that the Kurds were murdered in this way using weapons of mass destruction used by Saddam Hussein with the support of the USA and then in the same breath announce that Iraq NEVER had weapons of mass destruction.
The FACTS are that Saddam DID have WMD and DID use the to KILL Kurds in March 1988!
If he used them in 1988 to kill INNOCENT people WHY take the chance that he would not develope them again and use them in 2003???!!
We know AFTER the invasion of Iraq that Saddam had no weapons stockpiles before the war.
If he had no intention to develope WMD why didn't he allow UNITED NATIONS inspectors to look at his weapons programmes unhindered?
Hans Blix and his colleagues were denied access to facilities in Iraq in direct contravention of directive 1441. Hans Blix openly complained bout this to the UN Security Council.
1441 openly calls for Iraq to be forced to comply with weapons insepections.
They did not comply even with 250000 troops massed on the Kuwaiti border yet France Russia and China vetoed war absolutely contradicting their vote in favour of 1441!
Bush and Blair saw the cowards Chirac, Putin and the Chinese for what they were and went ahead with war to enforce the authority of the UN.
Iraq is now free and Saddam can no longer build weapons of mass destruction nor gas innocent Kurdish men women and children!
In case you don't remember the UN inspectors were on the ground in Iraq. They were allowed by the Iraqis to search a whole range of locations and found missiles that extended beyond their allowable range which were subsequently destroyed!
These were the only WMDs found in Iraq in recent geological history!
According to the Channel4's documentary on "What Hutton Won't say" on Saturday evening the USK provided "intelligence" to the weapons inspectors which they acted upon and some of the grid references were for EMPTY DESERT!
I put it to you that there were no WMD, the Brits and the Yanks knew it ,and wilfully provided disinformation to the UN inspectors in order to delay things to such a point as to make war inevitable.
Not only this they contravened international law by going to war without an UN mandate, relying on the same hair-splitting semantics you allude to about resolution 1441.
As for cowards, Bush and bLIAR only picked on Iraq because the KNEW it didn't have WMD, otherwise if they were worried about threats to "international order" why didn't they pick on North Korea first which has openly admitted having Nuclear weapons?
Wake up and clean some of the shit off your glasses and you might actually understand what is at issue here!
I dont think its relevant wether WMD are found or not to the thousands killed in this war or the 250,000 killed in the last war or the 1.5 million killed through sanctions for the past 12 years in between these wars, or to the few 'brave' soldiers who lost their lives killing these starving barely armed conscripts and their children. To the rest of us it might matter if we care about the sanctity of life. What I find funny is the stupidity of these so called supporters of the (war) massacre, not thinking that a change of direction in justification for war in itself undermines your own logic.
Peace and logic To All.
no, it's not true that Iraq NEVER had WMD.
What Kay said is that the fictional WMD that Bush said Iraq had developed from the mid 90's onward NEVER EXISTED/
and you righteous pragmatist, here's a question.
how much condemnation did the US pour on Saddam at the time when he gassed the Kurds? FUCK ALL. because he was still fighting the IRANIANS.... oh, how moral and concerned they were back then.
but we know you're just trying to re-write history. US didn't condemn Saddam at the time, but peace activists have always condemned him regardless of his status with the White House.
US didn't kill Saddam, but murdered thousands of Iraqis.
US didn't liberatie Iraq but occupied it, have not allowed elections and have taken the funds from oil to pay illegal and over inflated contracts to Dick Cheney & Friends Inc.
You are fooling nobody.
as for UN resolutions.
Didn't they all require everybody who had evidence of WMD to give it to Hans Blix?
Didn't Hans Blix repeatedly ask the US and UK to give their 'information' to him?
and they REFUSED.
So, uhm... the US and UK breached the UN regulations on Iraqi WMD.
of course they have their own WMD too.
Trident nuclear submarines and the rest.
Not that the US would ever, EVER drop two nuclear weapons on undefended cities...
Your use of profanity is pathetic.Youve already lost any sense of reason. But to help you understand a little more, Iraq is not liberated. It has been sold to Multinationals,the new constitution has been written to enable the sale. As for Sadams attrocities on gassing the civilians, mabey youll tell me why the USK continnued to sell chemicals to him 'after the fact'.?
Iraq is now free so I'm glad that Bush liberated them. That makes me happy, and I hope they fo after Syria next.
You people going on about the "sanctity of human life" yet you all marched in the streets in the hope that Saddam could stay on and murder thousands more Iraqis. You are ALL hypocrites.
In an interview with a leading British newspaper, David Kay, former head of the Iraq Survey Group, states that the WMDs he was searching for were moved into Syria before the war.
The border was ringed with Kurds, SAS, spy satellites and USK aircraft were hitting targets of "opportunity" for over a decade with impunity and if Saddam couldn't escape across it with all the resources of Iraq at his disposal how on earth could they transport thousands of "supposed" WMD across it?
Even the slightly more likely possibility that prominent Iraqi scientists might have escaped across the border and be working for the Syrians is also unlikely for the same reason, and in any case the Yanks and Brits have interviewed all of the more prominent people involved in Iraqi weapons programmes and they're still there!
David Kay diddnt say the WMD were probably moved to Syria he said the 'weapons programmes' .They were probably e-mailed. Front page U.S.A. Today reported that Iraqs WMD's existed on paper only.
As for Sadams killing of Kurds and Marsh Arabs, none would have been possible without the help of the ever so civilised USK giving him support. If your looking to compare piles of dead bodies ,Sadams is in the ha'penny's place compared with the coalition cowards pile. They filled back 70 miles of trench on the border with Kuait using heavv earth movers burying everyone left alive after the war was declared over.
He said: Unspecified materials had been moved".
The border between Iraq and Syria is porous to say the last and both countries were governed by Baathists. I say we nuke Syria, just to be on the safe side.
Un specified materials? It's the same circular argument,created to mislead. Is that your justification for the slaughter. Some material-we dont know what it is, but we 'think' it went to Syria- so nuke it, wow.
No doubt, the Bush adminstration knew there were WMD in Iraq.
1. Bush still had the invoices for what the US had supplied Saddam to slaughter his own people with prior to 1991
and
2. 'Incontrovertible' evidence of such from the Mossad (regardless of that states own motives, it was probably the only intelligence the US had in the region)
But
After more or less constant bombing, targetting and retargetting of 'sites' in Iraq in the intervening years sice Gulf War I,, hey anyone could lose track of what's left of the stuff.