I keep hearing the Left claim that Bush lied about Iraq having the material to make WMDs. I keep hearing that no such material was ever found. Now it appears that the material that didn't exist has disappeared from its storage areas on Iraq.

U.N. satellite imagery experts have determined that material that could be used to make biological or chemical weapons and banned long-range missiles has been removed from 109 sites in Iraq, U.N. weapons inspectors said in a report obtained Thursday.

U.N. inspectors have been blocked from returning to Iraq since the U.S.-led war in 2003 so they have been using satellite photos to see what happened to the sites that were subject to U.N. monitoring because their equipment had both civilian and military uses.

In the report to the U.N. Security Council (search), acting chief weapons inspector Demetrius Perricos said he's reached no conclusions about who removed the items or where they went. He said it could have been moved elsewhere in Iraq, sold as scrap, melted down or purchased.

He said the missing material can be used for legitimate purposes. "However, they can also be utilized for prohibited purposes if in a good state of repair."

He said imagery analysts have identified 109 sites that have been emptied of equipment to varying degrees, up from 90 reported in March.

The report also provided much more detail about the percentage of items no longer at the places where U.N. inspectors monitored them.

So please let me understand -- things that folks claim never existed are now missing.

So which is it ?

Was Bush right about this material, or did it never exist in the first place?

I think we all know the answer -- as inconvenient as it may be for the Left to admit.

Posted by: Greg at 02:58 PM | Comments (31) | Add Comment
Post contains 307 words, total size 2 kb.

1 FOX NEWS is not reliable.

R-

Posted by: Me is the Ridor at Sat Jun 4 15:44:24 2005 (nWmj6)

2 Hear ye, hear ye. "R"'s word is gold. Let's turn over the reign to Newsweek, cBS, BBC, and the lovely Diva Ms. Couric.

Key words that the great "R" missed:

"U.N. weapons inspectors said in a report obtained Thursday."

And surprise of surprises what France said!

France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere said Thursday the commission's expertise "should not be lost for the international community."


Kill the messenger, eh "R".

A typical facist liberalista response.

Posted by: mcconnell at Sat Jun 4 17:03:53 2005 (qzj0i)

3 They're saying that materials which could feasibly be used as WMD, but were not meant as such, disappeared and that they find it odd. They aren't themselves weapons however, nor are they any sort of proof that Iraq was pursuing WMD.

The whole of the U.N.'s point was that they were monitoring these materials, which they did not believe were being used illegally. Now that they've disappeared, the situation may have changed and the materials could be used to make weapons.

Posted by: N.J. at Sat Jun 4 18:17:04 2005 (FJAxe)

4 Fox News isn't reliable, but that's besides the point here.

Materials to make WMDs are not the same as ACTUAL WMDs. I'm no chemist but I bet I could make a bomb with ordinary materials that I have in my home, but that doesn't mean that I have a bomb!

Bush's claim wasn't that Iraq had the materials to make WMDs, Bush claim as that Iraq not only had WMDs but was an imminent threat to the USA, a claim his own hand-picked weapons inspector has declared false.

Posted by: dolphin at Sat Jun 4 19:37:20 2005 (MIt/1)

5 Bush claimed they had WMDs...and they actually did have *some*...though apparently not nearly as much as he'd originally thought.

Yaknow what though, France, Italy, Germany, and Russia thought Saddam had WMDs as well. Everyone who says Bush 'lied' is full of caca. Bush was 'wrong', and even then Saddam still had to be taken out.

The person we REALLY need to dust is Kim Jung Il.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 02:37:49 2005 (r/FBF)

6 A breaking story here...

Huge underground hideout uncovered in Iraq

Search in Anbar province yields large weapons cache
Sunday, June 5, 2005 Posted: 8:14 AM EDT (1214 GMT)

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. Marines and Iraqi soldiers have uncovered a 503,000 square-foot underground insurgent hideout in central Iraq containing large stores of weapons, ammunition and supplies.

The bunker -- the size of nine American football fields or six soccer pitches -- is the largest found in the past year, the U.S. military said Sunday.

No insurgents were in the bunker, but Marines found fully charged cell phones and fresh food in the kitchen, said 1st Lt. Kate VandenBossche, a spokeswoman for the 2nd Marine Division.

The bunker, which measured 902 feet (275 meters) by 558 feet (170 meters), also included furnished living spaces, two showers and an air conditioner, she said.

Other rooms contained machine guns, mortars, rockets, artillery rounds, black uniforms, ski masks, compasses, log books and night vision goggles, she said.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/06/05/iraq.main/index.html

Of course, maybe Commie News Network is unreliable as well.

But, an underground lair about the size of 9 football fields?!! Kind gives you a new perspective of how many types of weapons could be hidden or even manufactured or the storing of WMD.

Posted by: mcconnell at Sun Jun 5 05:22:49 2005 (jXhtw)

7 Everyone who says Bush 'lied' is full of caca. Bush was 'wrong'

Well what would you call it?

We now know that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." I'd call knowingly altering intelligence report to make them back your plans when they didn't in reality lying.

Posted by: dolphin at Sun Jun 5 11:04:49 2005 (SVh3K)

8 I'd not heard that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy"; what is the context in which that was presented? Also, did Bush - directly or indirectly - get people to change the intelligence? He could have told them he wants evidence that Saddam had WMDs. That's different than lying.

Also, did Bush somehow manage to convince all of the other world leaders to lie as well?

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 11:11:20 2005 (r/FBF)

9 I don't have much faith in the Downin Street memo -- and even if the thing is authentic, and that sentences is not a later addition, one does not need to read that as "altering intelligence". It is just as easy to read it as "selecting and using the evidence that best supported the case for war".

Think about it -- you have two bits of information -- one that supports your beliefs and one that doesn't. Which do you believe and use?

Posted by: Rhymes With Right at Sun Jun 5 12:15:31 2005 (lUWVO)

10 I stated it poorly. Thankfully RWR stated it better than I.

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 14:37:04 2005 (r/FBF)

11 Let's say your right and the memo actually only indicates that he was SELECTING evidence rather than ALTERING it. Isn't intentionally leaving out information that contradicts your claim and only offering what back it also lying? Didn't I just recently get attacked when it was percieved that I had done just what you're talking about?

Posted by: dolphin at Sun Jun 5 18:02:41 2005 (MIt/1)

12 *cough* Global warming, Dolphin?

You do have a good point though, in that if that's what he was doing, unless the evidence against was minimal or weak, it was intellectually dishonest and he should have given the whole story.

Not knowing what he did or said, I'd say there's at least evidence for suspicion. That said; my personal reasons for supporting our venture in Iraq are good - though I am being logically inconsistent in said support (I have serious difficulty reconciling it with my opposition to taxation) - and all I rely upon for actions I support are my reasons, not his.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Mon Jun 6 00:07:37 2005 (r/FBF)

13 Sub,

Your pet topic (global warming) has already been addressed in another post. Why don't you address it there instead of trying to make it the topic of EVERY post.

Posted by: dolphin at Mon Jun 6 05:03:02 2005 (fgsGh)

14 Indeed, every intel agency thought Saddam had WMD. Many prominent Democrats said this very thing, too (see here). So, how did Bush "lie?"

The Downing St. Memo, from I've seen, is as RWR says most likely -- that Bush and co. utilized [certain] evidence to make their case, not that they made up evidence. If Kerry and co. want to bring impeachment charges about this, good luck with the Repub. Congress!

Posted by: Hube at Mon Jun 6 10:41:40 2005 (WfW9j)

15 Most of those who believed that Iraq had WMDs believed so based on the evidence that Bush presented to them. Yet you still ask how Bush lied?

You got it spot on with that last line Hube. Bush cannot be impeached. He could single-handly kill every first born child in the US and as long as the GOP controls Congress he would happily sit there in office.

Posted by: dolphin at Mon Jun 6 12:04:12 2005 (hkQ+k)

16 I wasn't addressing the topic of global warming, I was addressing the topic of selective use of evidence. Global warming happens to be a very convenient example thereof.

As for the rest - they had their OWN intelligence agencies and believed that WMDs were possessed based on their own data. You can't possibly believe that Russia, England, et al do not have their own competent intelligence agencies.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 00:09:19 2005 (r/FBF)

17 And you can't possibly believe that the US wasn't offering them information to try to get them on board.

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 04:19:37 2005 (fgsGh)

18 Competent Russian intelligence? Have you forgotten that Putin accused Bush for firing Dan Rather??


=========
'We didn't criticize you when you fired those reporters at CBS.'

Bush's aides have long feared that former KGB officers in Putin's inner circle are painting a twisted picture of U.S. policy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60098-2005Feb28.html
===========

Tell me again about how competent Russian intelligences are.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 06:46:36 2005 (LmcbS)

19 I can believe that we shared information with them. Can you believe that they also shared information with us?

I believe that it is entirely possible that Bush was intellectually dishonest. I just also believe it was possible that he wasn't intentionally so.

The reason I tend toward the second is because Bush has shown himself to be a fairly honest man, and I've not found proof of him ever having lied. In fact, when presented with the subject of past drug use, rather than lie, he refused to answer when he could have lied. Pretty tough thing to not lie about when he'd lie about something like this...ESPECIALLY since his request to congress for a use of force did NOT include mention of WMDs...it only included notation of Saddam's refusal to follow the basis of the cease fire.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 06:47:32 2005 (lkCzp)

20 Bush has shown himself to be a fairly honest man

I shouldn't have read that while eating. I almost choked. Funny stuff though, keep up the comedy!!

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 07:43:18 2005 (fgsGh)

21 Most of those who believed that Iraq had WMDs believed so based on the evidence that Bush presented to them. Yet you still ask how Bush lied?

URRRNT!!
Completely incorrect. Wow, I know libs are paranoid about American power projection, but to say that Bush hoodwinked every Western (and some non-Western) intel agencies as well as the UN is, well, ultra paranoid!

Posted by: Hube at Tue Jun 7 07:54:20 2005 (hLmHh)

22 BTW dolphin, you guys still can't decide whether Bush is a dunce or insidiously smart! It's a riot! Hey, but based on today's news, we now know that "intellectual/nuanced" Kerry had the same GPA at Yale as the pres.! How 'bout that?

Posted by: Hube at Tue Jun 7 07:58:35 2005 (hLmHh)

23 Sub,

You're incorrect about "his request to congress for a use of force did NOT include mention of WMDs...it only included notation of Saddam's refusal to follow the basis of the cease fire."

Look at the text of Joint Resolution on Iraq passed by the U.S. Congress on October 11, 2002.

It mentions "weapons of mass destruction" 7 times. Not to mention the word "weapons" 17 times.
Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as >>required

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:02:03 2005 (LmcbS)

24 forgot to add the link of the Joint Resolution on Iraq:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-dec02/joint_resolution_10-11-02.html

Posted by: at Tue Jun 7 08:02:58 2005 (LmcbS)

25 that was me who added the link.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:03:34 2005 (LmcbS)

26 Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as >>required

Posted by: at Tue Jun 7 08:06:21 2005 (LmcbS)

27 Ok, one more time. It's picky about a certain symbol used here.

Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as REQUIRED by the UN resolutions.
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/10/11/iraq.us/


It was an enforcement policy where the UN refused to address it after 12 years.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:48:50 2005 (LmcbS)

28 BTW dolphin, you guys still can't decide whether Bush is a dunce or insidiously smart! It's a riot! Hey, but based on today's news, we now know that "intellectual/nuanced" Kerry had the same GPA at Yale as the pres.! How 'bout that?

Bush is a moron. I've never said otherwise. If grades are so important to you, I personally scored higher than Bush on the SATs, and I didn't come from enough money to buy whatever grades I wanted. He's a moron, but a moron with an agenda, and a number of advisors.

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 09:14:45 2005 (fgsGh)

29 Every U.S. President comes in with an agenda. Clinton's first agenda after eyeing Lewinsky was probably to try and bag her. He succeeded.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 09:44:35 2005 (LmcbS)

30 I think the PBS article has the most relevant text. Looks like I was incorrect.

Mea culpa. Sorry.

Now that I've read the request, if you read the whole declaration and request for the use of force, you'll note that it's only a small part of it and that there are other things as well beyond the WMDs. That may have weighted the decision of the legislative branch, so it could be worse to be wrong about that than other things, but it's still got a strong potential for being wrong.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 09:58:09 2005 (lkCzp)

31 Bush has an agendum I am sure. So does everyone else on this planet...it's whether or not said agenda are harmful that is of concern.

What I believe about Bush is that he is sincere and wants to do the right thing. I kinda see him as being fairly similar to Carter as far as personality goes...I have vast respect for both, but disagree with many policies enacted by them.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 10:00:58 2005 (lkCzp)

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