@Yanny:
Except the ceasefire didn’t require Sadam not to kill people with his WMD but to turn them over to a U.N. comission to be destroyed. He failed to do this, and (and as in addition to) expelled the weapons inspecters in 1998.
Sadam has violated two provisions of the ceasefire, effectively rendering it void.
According to one of the former Inspectors (I forget his name, he wrote a book about his time in Iraq), 98% of Saddam’s weapon capability was destroyed. All of his creation ability that they knew about (And Saddam declared for the most part by the way) they destroyed. Saddam let them into most SCUD missle silos, which they destroyed.
So, that means that today, Saddam has (assuming none of it has expired or been destroyed), 2% of his original weapons capability, zero (except what he has been able to put together since 1998) creation capability, and a handful of 1970s era scud missles.
And if you claim Saddam has 1000 “Canisters” (incredibly vague term) of Biological/Chemical weapons, let Bush prove that. I’m sure he has much better intelligence than anyone else who claims he has 1000 Canisters. Let him lay out the evidence and prove to the American people (who he serveS) and the world that Saddam has what he says he has.
But I still don’t think thats cause for war. A cause for war would be proof that Saddam is involved in plots to kill Americans. I still have not seen a single shred of proof that he is doing this.
“But we should go into Iraq to bring Humanitarian aid to the people”. There are a HELL of a lot of worse off places to be than Iraq. And most of them would not require a 250,000 man war. As I’ve stated, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and North Korea are all more oppressive than Saddam Hussein. Any country in East Africa (Ex, Sudan, Ethipia, Somolia), needs Humanitarian assistance more than Iraq. The countries of Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Pakistan all support terrorism.
Iraq? Iraq has violated UN resolutions, big deal. Israel has violated plenty of them. The US has violated it’s share. Hell, lets attack China if we’re going after Resolution-killers.
Is it Scott Ritter you’re referring to Yanny? Anyways, Ritter only knew what he (and the other inspectors) destroyed. He has no idea whatsoever that Saddam was even showing him the full extent of what he had stored away, nor does he know what Saddam has accomplished in the last 10 yrs.
Really, it doesn’t even matter. A “cause for war” (as you like to call it) is any violation of the UN resolution that was imposed upon Saddam. You’re missing the point here Yanny, it is not up to us to prove that he has these weapons. This is not an easter egg hunt where we’re supposed to play hide-n-seek with this fool. We simply need to prove that he has violated the terms of the agreement set forth, and I’m fairly confident that Bush will present a strong case for this after the inspectors make their report (January 23?). We knew that Saddam had “x” amount of chemical/biological weapons (that were undestroyed) when the inspectors left Iraq. Now, we need to know where those weapons are; yet so-far Saddam will not tell us where these weapons are.
Realistically, it is not feasible to think that the inspectors are actually going to uncover some “profound” discovery while they’re on their little vacation over there. Do you really think Saddam was stupid enough to leave his stuff in the same places we checked in before we left in the 90’s (with the addition of his palaces.) Of course not. In fact, it’s more practical that he has either:
A.) Moved the weapons to a country such as Syria.
B.) Given control of the weapons to his military, which (so-far) has not been under the dissection of the inspectors.
Here’s a story (I’m not even sure if it’s true, but it’s interesting to hypothethize–read the last question when the interviewer asks where the weapons are): http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=247
