June 02, 2003

Reflections on WMDs

You've noticed I'm a little conflicted over the Iraq's WMDs. The best evidence has been two mobile bioweapons labs that look just like the ones Colin Powell described in his U.N. speech. That says to me Saddam had an active weapons program. What that doesn't tell me is did Iraq have the sort of weapons available to make them a threat to the U.S.? Being an evil, brutal regime that slaughtered its own people isn't enough justification for war. That isn't enough to send American men and women overseas to die. I didn't support NATO's bombing to defend the Kosovars because I didn't see any U.S. interests at stake. There are a lot of bad countries in the world that are no threat to the U.S. Venezuala is an example where an elected president decided he wanted to consolidate power and clamp down on opponents. Venezuala even has oil, and there's been not one scrap of talk from any Bush official that the U.S. should force regime change.

The buzz in Washington has been about Iraq's WMDs and a possible intelligence hoax.
William Safire writes in his column that the allies had to be conservative in their intelligence conclusions. They had to err on the side of caution. He writes,

When weighing the murky evidence of an aggressive tyranny's weapons, President Bush and Prime Minister Blair were obliged to take no chances. The burden on proof was on Saddam. By his contempt, he invited invasion; by its response, the coalition established the credibility of its resolve. There was no "intelligence hoax."

Then there's Tony Blair who is adamant that WMDs will be found. Politically, he has more to lose if the WMD claim was a hoax. His government could fall. He insists "Over the coming weeks and months we will assemble this evidence and then we will give it to people."

And I shouldn't forget to mention that anti-war countries like France, Germany, and Russia never claimed Saddam didn't have WMDs. Their complaint was going to war without their approval. Sean Penn can crow that he was right, but those who had a better opportunity of really knowing never challenged the allies on this point.

I'm more sanguine about the war than my past posts have shown. Seeing millions of people gulp freedom's sweet taste for the first time does that to you. But my support of this war was predicated on Iraq having WMDs. If we find out they didn't then either the administration lied to the world or the U.S.'s and U.K.'s intellegence services are incompetent (even including Kevin Whited's note that "is an imprecise business").

[Kudos to James Joyner for the Safire link.]