Remember the claim that the Iraqis could launch chemical or biological weapons in 45 minutes? The anti-war left said it was all a lie. Now, a top-ranking Iraqi officer says otherwise. He says that they had mortars with chemical and biological weapons available for launch within 45 minutes to half an hour.
When I asked him whether the information in the document relating to the 45-minute issue was 100 per cent accurate, he responded with characteristic Iraqi enthusiasm: "It is 200 per cent accurate!" he exclaimed. "And forget 45 minutes. We could have fired them within half an hour."
When I asked him whether he was the original source of the intelligence, he replied simply: "I am the one responsible for providing this information."
Lt. Col. al-Dabbagh, the source for the information states that Iraqi units were provided with chemical and biological warheads in advance of an attack. Later, when it was clear that the regime would fall, the Saddam Fedayeen took the weapons and hid them so that they wouldn’t be captured by allied forces.
Al-Dabbagh’s story coincides with several known facts and appears credible. al-Dabbagh doesn’t know where the weapons were taken, and it is more the possible that they were simply taken off into the desert and buried where only someone with the right set of GPS coordinates would be able to find them.
The whole argument that Iraq never had WMDs seems hard to believe. When the preponderance of evidence suggests that Hussein did have WMDs, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. It would be easy to simply bury those weapons in caches in the middle of nowhere where they would be unlikely to be found unless someone specifically knew where to look. Moreover, Saddam knew that he would be unable to use his unconventional arms to stop the invasion, and if they were found it would provide a justification for invasion. Saddam knew that he would be better off fighting a guerilla war than fighting on the battlefield, and hiding WMDs would do more to harm the United States than using them.
All in all, I would not be at all surprised if Saddam’s WMDs are found at some point in the future either in Iraq or elsewhere. (I’d be taking a good look at the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon if I were the US…) The argument that somehow Saddam never had WMDs and all the evidence to the contrary is some kind of massive deception strikes me as hard to believe. Iraq is a big country with vast stretches of desolate terrain in which virtually anything could be hidden. With more former Ba’athists talking, the evidence is mounting that Saddam’s unconventional weapons capability was anything but illusory.
Where are they?
into the desert and buried where only someone with the right set of GPS coordinates would be able to find them in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon!!
duh!
and now stop asking silly questions! who cares anyway? the UN? the world? half the americans?
Georges’ll find them even if he has to take over the world, which is something he really doesn’t want to do, but he is forced to do to spread security and democracy in the world just like in Irak today!
Vincent is still sad that Saddam is no longer killing Iraqis 🙁
Hey, Vince, you miss Stalin?
The families of the Kurds killed at Halabja? How about those people who pulled their family members out of some mass grave? How about the relatives of the 61,000 in Baghdad killed by Saddam?
“Vincent is still sad that Saddam is no longer killing Iraqis :(:
No, now his followers are killing Iraqis AND Americans AND South Koreans AND Brits AND Turks. Plus now Bin Laden’s followers are killing Saudis AND Iraqis AND Americans AND….
And why are you supporting the idea that our troops should be used as bait? I got a few friends in the 81st RSC that might want to challenge the wisdom of that plan.
it’s true that it is so much better when it’s american kiling iraqis…
at least the weapons are still from the same producers.
but why don’t we come back to the vey first question by whynot:
where are they?
The funny thing is, WHEN we do find them, the smug liberals that have been asking “where are they then?” (you included, vincent) will look mighty stupid. However, they would regain their composure by blaming Bush for “planting” them. That WAS the left’s backup plan for the finding of WMD’s right?
What Rob fails to understand is that I personally am concerned that any final evidence of Iraqi WMD is going to be in the form of a gas cloud over Chicago or New York.
that part has not come to our war winners’brains yet, as arrogant and proud as they are, they can’t even imagine that their opponents also have a B plan.
Saddam may well have had WMDs: after all, we all know he used some few years ago, and both France and the US know Saddam had some because…we sold him the damn WMDs! No surprise then! He may well have destroy them to comply with the UN, without telling his population not to appear too weak. this is still an option even though i don’t reall believe it.
But in any way attacking him in a pre-emptive way, while he was not really a threat to us (he was already struggling against his own people to stay in power) was stupid because if any, the WMDs are all around earth now.
Safety and security has always be something counterproductive to me when applied in a dictatorial way. Bush is a great example, and I’m sure Stalin and others would be proud of him. I mean:
-opening a concentration camp in a foreign country is pure genius.
-Raping the Un so explicitely is something nobody ever dared doing before
-clearly condemning the action of one country and cut its credit while in fact still providing him with 2.3Bn$ is the best double speech ever.
-supporting the troops while he himself quit the army for no reason (and not even in war time) is a must
…the list of all his glory facts is too long, sorry! I know you guys will miss that, but well…rules are rules!
one last comment on the “planting theory”: if the US do not allow independant experts (only the UN can be granted this term remenber?)to analyse whatever they find, it will of course be considered by the world as a lie. Remenber of the biotech lab Jay proudly announced the US found in Irak? Well the rest of the story that Jay never published is that the results from the not so independant british was that it WAS NOT mobile biolabs! clear enough farmer?
My point in asking where the WMD are is that we have some Iraqi officer who says, “I was the guy in charge of some battle-field tactical WMD.” Well, if you were the guy in charge, you must have given the order to stash them, or relayed that order. So, where did you, the guy who confirms their existance, put them?
yeah this general knows too much or too little to be credible, this is for sure.
I dont think this is the kind of argument that would bother one of Bush’s most fervent followers in his worldwide lies.
Please go here and read about this story and get your facts straight.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/12/07/wirq07.xml
The man is a colonel, he was in charge of a frontline unit, not the WMD program, etc.
Then submit some intelligent comments.
Charles