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Bush, Clinton and Kerry on WMD - Were they all fooled?

AN unapologetic George W. Bush conceded yesterday that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, but insisted he was right to invade Iraq because it was "gaming the system" to end UN sanctions so it could develop a new terror arsenal. [more]

Was Bush fooled? Did he have another agenda and purposely misled the public to motivate war? If he did, both Bill Clinton and John Kerry were in on the secret.

A well documented chronology of the Clinton administration's public case against Iraq has been published here. On the Larry King show Clinton stated, "People can quarrel with whether we should have more troops in Afghanistan or internationalize Iraq or whatever, but it is incontestable that on the day I left office, there were unaccounted for stocks of biological and chemical weapons." In fact, the BBC reported:

Bill Clinton says that no government could have failed to act against Iraq after the 11 September 2001 attacks in view of intelligence provided.

The former US president told the BBC that UK intelligence on the activity of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was more "aggressive" than Washington's.

He added that the world was right to demand weapons inspections in 2002.

But he said war could have been avoided if the UN had passed a resolution threatening military action.

At the time of this statement Clinton apparently did not know that top UN officials and member countries of the UN Security Counsel were recipients of Iraqi bribes (example). In addition, Saddam managed to keep his abandoned WMD programs secret from virtually everyone, even fooling his top military generals. Consequently, it is hard to blame Clinton for his public statements regarding WMD and Iraq.

Given Saddam's deception and the flawed intelligence reports of Clinton appointee William Tenet, it is understandable why John Kerry claimed Iraq had WMD:

Jan 2003 - For: “If You Don't Believe Saddam Hussein Is A Threat With Nuclear Weapons, Then You Shouldn't Vote For Me.” (LA Times, 1/31/03)

Feb 2003 - For: Kerry Said Leaving Saddam Hussein "Unfettered With Nuclear Weapons Or Weapons Of Mass Destruction Is Unacceptable." (Jill Lawrence, "War Issue Challenges Democratic Candidates," USA Today, 2/12/03)

Mar 2003 - For: “I think Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction are a threat, and that's why I voted to hold him accountable and to make certain that we disarm him. I think we need to …” (“All Things Considered”, 3/19/03)

While it seems clear that Bush, Clinton and Kerry were fooled by Saddam's misinformation and other intelligence failures, what is also clear from the Duelfer Report is that Saddam was acting to re-create his WMD capability [Washington Times].

The press hasn't made much of Saddam's 500 ton uranium stockpile, downplaying the story to such an extent that most Americans aren't even aware of it.... Fortunately for the world, Saddam didn't have the nuclear enrichment technology to convert his 500 ton uranium stockpile into weapons grade bombmaking material. Or did he? [more]

So, given the Duelfer Report, was war justified?

Posted by tim at October 8, 2004 7:36 AM

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