Iraqi WMDs revisited

[Abraham]

Originally Posted by scandium

In any case, if you're asserting that because he had them in 1990 that he must, after a decade of sanctions, years of monitoring and inspections, still possess them in 2003 then I doubt any of us will change your mind. You should allow for the at least as likely possibility though that they were not found simply because they had already been destroyed prior to the invasion taking place.

I think any further discussion on this subject is repeating the same moves.

I am certainly not convinced that there were no WMDs in Iraq in 1943, but I fully agree that that it is a possibility.
If they were not there it is because of international (mostly US) pressure and not because Saddam Hussein had a change of heart like South African P.M. De Klerk in the early '90 (or Libyan Gadaffi lately). On the contrary; Saddam Hussein did his utmost to hide WMDs and harras the UN inspection teams.
Who can be sure and who could at the time, be sure about WMDs not being there after the inspections when you have a record of lying and cheating like Saddam Hussein?
:hmm:

As Happy Times wrote, WMDs were used but hardly necessary as a justification for a regime change. The Kurds and the Shiítes are better off today, and yes, the Sunni's have to swallow the bitter pill of losing their strongman. And however bad the situation is with almost daily suicide attacks, it still doesn't compare with state organised terror and suppression of complete ethnic groups, punishing the male population of a village where an assasination attempt was made, organised rape, enfin, whatever a real bad dictatorship brings to its subjects...


About changing my mind, well, that sometimes happens during the discussions on this board. But not by politically coloured wild guessing about subjects that are not yet fully investigated. Historic proof can change my mind, so I will leave the final outcome of this question to historic research, which will take some more time.