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Al Barger and MoreThings - getting people's goats since 1998.
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January 29, 2003
The president's SOTU case against Saddam
President Bush didn't particularly say anything new about Iraq, but he presented the basic case quite nicely. The main issue is that Hussein almost certainly has weapons of mass destruction. Hard telling where he stands on his nuclear program, but he most definitely has a lot of other nasty stuff.
The 108 UN weapons inspectors were not sent to conduct a scavenger hunt for hidden materials across a country the size of California. The job of the inspectors is to verify that Iraq's regime is disarming. It is up to Iraq to show exactly where it is hiding its banned weapons � lay those weapons out for the world to see � and destroy them as directed. Nothing like this has happened.
The United Nations concluded in 1999 that Saddam Hussein had biological weapons materials sufficient to produce over 25,000 liters of anthrax � enough doses to kill several million people. He has not accounted for that material. He has given no evidence that he has destroyed it.
The United Nations concluded that Saddam Hussein had materials sufficient to produce more than 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin � enough to subject millions of people to death by respiratory failure. He has not accounted for that material. He has given no evidence that he has destroyed it.
Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard, and VX nerve agent. In such quantities, these chemical agents also could kill untold thousands. He has not accounted for these materials. He has given no evidence that he has destroyed them.
U.S. intelligence indicates that Saddam Hussein had upwards of 30,000 munitions capable of delivering chemical agents. Inspectors recently turned up 16 of them, despite Iraq's recent declaration denying their existence. Saddam Hussein has not accounted for the remaining 29,984 of these prohibited munitions. He has given no evidence that he has destroyed them.
From three Iraqi defectors we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs. These are designed to produce germ warfare agents, and can be moved from place to place to evade inspectors. Saddam Hussein has not disclosed these facilities. He has given no evidence that he has destroyed them.
Beyond any of the other offenses and obfuscations Bush detailed, this right here is pretty bad. Unless you want to claim that the defectors are lying, that Bush is lying with his claims about US intelligence, AND that the UN is flatly lying in its claims, then this looks pretty critical. That is a LOT of extremely dangerous weaponry.
But is this enough reason to go to war?
Before September 11, 2001, many in the world believed that Saddam Hussein could be contained. But chemical agents and lethal viruses and shadowy terrorist networks are not easily contained. Imagine those 19 hijackers with other weapons, and other plans � this time armed by Saddam Hussein. It would take just one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known. We will do everything in our power to make sure that day never comes.
Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein is not a strategy, and it is not an option.
Exactly correct. I can only too easily imagine lots of scenarios where Hussein slips WMD materials to Al Qaeda or Hamas to use on the US, with no way for us to ever know where they came from. Hussein and Al Qaeda may not like one another, but they have a common enemy. And of course, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Of course he would never come at us face forward, for we would surely destroy him. He might very well slip some nasty crap to Al Qaeda to use on us, though. He might do it just for fun, cause he definitely runs that way. More practically, he might just want us hit anonymously to cause chaos and keep us pre-occupied while he's doing some wickedness back in the Middle East. That's just running interference.
How likely is such a scenario? Think what havoc was caused with an OUNCE or two of anthrax in three or four letters, and then about him slipping a few POUNDS of such stuff to Al Qaeda. How difficult would that be, and how difficult would it be to slip the stuff into the US? Not very, so far as I can see.
How likely would you have to judge such a scenario to be before you take pre-emptive action? See, we're not just talking about a couple of people killed with a bomb, or even a building being blown up. We're talking quite plausibly tens of thousands of people slaughtered horribly all at once. We don't have much room for error, or benefits of the doubt. As has been noted, there won't be any smoking gun until it has been fired. We can't afford to wait for him to fire.
Even thinking that there was one chance in ten of such an event would make it imperative to knock him down NOW. The odds seem worse even than that to me. Consider that he's already killed a million people, including the gassing of the Kurds.
I opposed the first Gulf War. It looked to me like something between Iraq and Kuwait, and not anything to do with the US. "No blood for oil" made sense. As a staunch libertarian, I don't like throwing our military all around the world, getting involved in other people's problems.
9/11 gave us a sudden shift in paradigm, however. Suddenly, we have a bunch of people who want nothing more than to kill Americans at home, and by the bunches. It's now a very different situation. Anybody who gives us cause to think that they even MIGHT be involved in such things is asking to getting whacked. Did I mention the direct awards to Palestenian suicide bombers that Hussein was openly offering a few months ago?
By my lights, this already constitutes a necessity for decisive military action. It will doubtless cost some lives both for us and the Iraqi people, but how many lives will be lost if we don't take it to him and end the problem? The risks are far too great for him to be allowed to remain in power.
In addition though, Bush has promised more details in the next few days showing co-operation between Hussein and Al Qaeda. That would be convenient, as it would be the absolute end of any legitimate objections to the war that we're going to have to wage. That's just gravy to the making of the case, though. The meat is already on the table.
posted by Al at 1/29/2003 09:16:00 PM
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