www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6190720
International News Inspector: Iraq had no WMD before invasion Final report says Saddam had ambitions, but no chem or bio arms FILE PHOTO: UN ARMS INSPECTION VEHICLE Hussein Malla / AP file A UN vehicle of the International Atomic Energy Agency monitoring team passes in front of a large poster of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein after completing inspections at a factory near Baghdad in November 2002.
The assessment contrasted with statements by President Bush before the in vasion, when he cited a growing threat from Iraqs weapons of mass destr uction as the reason for overthrowing President Saddam Hussein. I still do not expect that militarily significant WMD stocks are cached in Iraq, Charles Duelfer, the CIA special adviser who led the hunt for weapons of mass destruction, said in testimony prepared for the Senate A rmed Services Committee. His prepared remarks were obtained by Reuters b efore the 2:30 pm ET hearing. Nuclear weapons program deteriorated Duelfer said Iraqs nuclear weapons program had deteriorated since the 19 91 Gulf War, but he said Saddam did not abandon his nuclear ambitions. DULEFER Richard Drew / AP file Charles Duelfer speaking with reporters at the UN in 1998. The issue has figured prominently in the campaign for the Nov.
He said in a speec h in Pennsylvania on Wednesday that the concern was that terrorists woul d get banned weapons from Saddam. There was a risk, a real risk, that Saddam Hussein would pass weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks, Bush said. In the world after September the 11th, that was a risk we could not affo rd to take, he said, referring to the 2001 attacks on the United States attributed to al-Qaida.
Threat posed by insurgents I believe we got ahead of this problem through a series of raids through out the spring and summer. I am convinced we successfully contained a pr oblem before it matured into a major threat, Duelfer said. Nevertheless, it points to the problem that the dangerous expertise deve loped by the previous regime could be transferred to other hands, he sa id. Duelfer said that by the time of the war in 2003, Iraq would have been ab le to produce mustard agent in months and nerve agent in less than a yea r We have not come across explicit guidance from Saddam on this point, yet it was an inherent consequence of his decision to develop a domestic ch emical production capacity, Duelfer said. Duelfer said that despite Saddams expressed desire to retain the knowle dge of his nuclear team, and his attempts to retain some key parts of th e program (after 1991), during the course of the following 12 years Iraq s ability to produce a weapon decayed. Duelfer briefed the Senate Intelligence Committee behind closed doors abo ut his report in the morning and was to testify later at an open Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Little work done on warheads While it is clear that Saddam wanted a long-range missile, there was lit tle work done on warheads. so long as sanctions remained, Duelfer said in his prepared r emarks. One of Saddams priorities was to escape UN sanctions, he said. Over time, sanctions had steadily weakened to the point where Iraq, in 2 000-2001, was confidently designing missiles around components that coul d only be obtained outside sanctions, Duelfer said. Duelfers key conclusion tallied with that of his predecessor, David Kay, who said when he stepped down in January that no large stockpiles of bi ological and chemical weapons existed in Iraq when the United States wen t to war. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Tuesday the report will conclu de that Saddam Hussein had the intent and the capability, that he was p ursuing an aggressive strategy to bring down the sanctions, the internat ional sanctions, imposed by the United Nations through illegal financing procurement schemes. Saddam was importing banned materials, working on unmanned aerial vehicle s in violation of UN agreements and maintaining industrial capability that could be converted to produce weapons, officials have said. Duelfer also describes Saddams Iraq as having had limited research efforts int o chemical and biological weapons. White House on the defensive Duelfers report comes in a week that the White House has been put on the defensive in a number of Iraq issues. Remarks by L Paul Bremer, former US administrator in occupied Iraq, su ggested he argued for more troops in the immediate aftermath of the inva sion, when looting was rampant. A spokesman for Bushs re-election campa ign said Bremer indeed differed with military commanders. President Bushs election rival, Democrat John Kerry, pounced on Bremers statements that the United States paid a big price for having insuffi cient troop levels. On weapons, however, the Massachusetts senator has s aid he still would have voted to authorize the invasion even if he had k nown none would be found. The White House maintained Duelfers report supports its view on Iraqs p rewar threat. The report will continue to show that he was a gathering threat that nee ded to be taken seriously, that it was a matter of time before he was go ing to begin pursuing those weapons of mass destruction, McClellan said . Compare that to the words of Vice President Dick Cheney, in a speech on A ug. There is no doubt he is amassing them to us e against our friends, against our allies and against us. The Iraq threat The president made similar charges, laying out in an Oct. What US forces found: * A single artillery shell filled with two chemicals that, when mixed w hile the shell was in flight, would have created sarin. US forces learned of it only when insurgents, apparently believing it was filled with conventional explosives, tried to detonate it as a roadside bomb in May in Baghdad. Two US soldiers suffered from symptoms of low-level exposure to the nerve agent. These were part of Saddams pre-1991 nuclear program, which was dismantled after the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Since the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq had been prohibited from having missiles with ranges longer than 93 miles. The Iraq Survey Group did not deal with whether Saddams government had c ontacts with members of the al-Qaida network, a matter that remains subj ect to wide debate. The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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