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→Misreporting the Duelfer Report
As <i>The Washington Times</i> reported in their editorial titled "<b>Misreporting the Duelfer Report"</b> <ref> http://washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20041007-092535-2936r.htm </ref> the day following its release, October 08, 2004, quote: ""Gotcha, Mr. President." This was the consensus of the headlines from nearly every daily newspaper yesterday responding to the CIA's Iraq Survey Group report on Iraq's prewar weapons programs. Yes, the report found no <i>stockpiles</i> of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq since the war began in March 2003. But <b>were these the findings that the report highlighted in the first line of its Key Findings summary? No.</b> "Saddam [Hussein] so dominated the Iraqi Regime that its strategic intent was his alone," the summary begins. "He wanted to end sanctions while preserving the capability to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) when sanctions were lifted." This hardly sounds as if the Iraq Survey Group, headed by Charles A. Duelfer, thought Saddam was cooperating with the international community.
As <i>The Washington Times</i> reported in their editorial titled "<b>Misreporting the Duelfer Report"</b> <ref> http://washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20041007-092535-2936r.htm </ref> the day following its release, October 08, 2004, quote: ""Gotcha, Mr. President." This was the consensus of the headlines from nearly every daily newspaper yesterday responding to the CIA's Iraq Survey Group report on Iraq's prewar weapons programs. Yes, the report found no <i>stockpiles</i> of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq since the war began in March 2003. But <b>were these the findings that the report highlighted in the first line of its Key Findings summary? No.</b> "Saddam [Hussein] so dominated the Iraqi Regime that its strategic intent was his alone," the summary begins. "He wanted to end sanctions while preserving the capability to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) when sanctions were lifted." This hardly sounds as if the Iraq Survey Group, headed by Charles A. Duelfer, thought Saddam was cooperating with the international community.
The article goes on to explain that Saddam was attempting to get the sanctions lifted, targeting the three members of the Security Council - France, China and Russia - and then he intended to use the Oil for Food program "to acquire foreign exchange both to further undermine sanctions and to provide the means to enhance dual-use infrastructure and potential WMD-related development." Then notes, <b>"While the United Nations turned a blind eye, Saddam cheated and committed mass murder in an effort to achieve his goals. To suggest that "containment" could have been sustained without dire results verges on the delusional.</b> There is a very pertinent lesson in the Duelfer report; too bad no one told the headline writers."
The article goes on to explain that Saddam was attempting to get the sanctions lifted, targeting the three members of the Security Council - France, China and Russia - and then he intended to use the Oil for Food program "to acquire foreign exchange both to further undermine sanctions and to provide the means to enhance dual-use infrastructure and potential WMD-related development." Then notes, <b>"While the United Nations turned a blind eye, Saddam cheated and committed mass murder in an effort to achieve his goals. To suggest that "containment" could have been sustained without dire results verges on the delusional.</b> There is a very pertinent lesson in the Duelfer report; too bad no one told the headline writers."
===Threat Level Concern===
It is worth noting the following concerning a current controversy about the level of threat Saddam posed. If you consider the terrorists as various minority factions all working toward the same goal, as stated by Mr. Kraft on this page when he says, <b>"there is <i>a very dangerous minority in Islam</i> that either has, or wants and may soon have, the ability to deliver small nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons almost anywhere in the world, unless <i>they</i> are prevented from doing so.</b>" It doesn't matter which of these factions would have been used to specifically target the civilized world in a nuclear or biological/chemical attack. Although recently the extent of Saddam's ties to one specific group (the Al-Qaeda terrorists) has been questioned and a recent article stated that <i>the Iraqi government and al-Qaeda figures had only limited contacts,</i> the same article goes on to say concerning Al-Qaeda that <b>"it lacked evidence of a long-term relationship <i>like the ones Iraq had forged with other terrorist groups."</i></b> <ref> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/05/AR2007040502263.html </ref> Therefore, it is known that Saddam had forged long term relationships with known terrorist GROUPS (plural) and so it was not that there was no threat from any terrorists groups, just that the threat would have come from those OTHER terrorists as the threat to the collective security of the civilized world if the US hadn't taken out Saddam.
It also remains to be seen if the ties with Al-Qaeda would have remained "limited" if that group had stepped up and volunteered to take the completed nuclear weapons from Saddam (which he would have had within a year according to <i>The New York Times</i> - see the WMD section, this page) into Washington and detonate them using sophisticated and existing sleeper cell suicide bombers as Saddam was contemplating. It appears likely that Saddam would have listened and handed them his stocks of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons by his statements (see Mr. Tierney's translation on this page). From his past actions, Saddam was an equal opportunity employer for all the terrorist groups.. including those they admit in this report with whom he had <i>"long-term relationships."</i> As Mr. Kraft observes, it is many <i>"barbarian<b>s</b></i>" at our gates with sophisticated weapons of mass destruction for the first time, not only one group (Al-Qaeda.) It is global in scope, hence the reason for calling this a <b>"Global War on Terror"</b> not a "War on Terror in Iraq." As such, it is a fight for world supremacy, and the civilized world would do well not to ignore or minimize what the civilized world is fighting over.
===Accusations of Cover-Ups===
===Accusations of Cover-Ups===