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And look what Kerry said during the Scott Ritter hearing in 1998 ( see Ritter excerpts in my post 1).

Excerpt of Kerry's statement:

KERRY: "You know, Saddam Hussein has got to be delighted with what he's hearing here today and what he's seen in the last days, because he's winning. His strategy is working. Make no mistake about it, his strategy is not to lift the sanctions. His strategy is to build weapons of mass destruction. And his strategy has been able to nip away at UNSCOM over the course of months so that he's created sanctions fatigue among our allies, who also have a different set of international or national interpretation of interest here. And the fact is that our administration recognized some time ago that it had great difficulty building the coalition to support what was necessary to let Major Ritter and his team do what they do. "

The issue is much bigger than that. If Scott Ritter and his team can't get in, then the fundamental accepted policy of our country and of the Security Council, to be able to enforce the notion that Saddam Hussein will not have weapons of mass destruction, is ineffective. And I think that's exactly what Major Ritter is trying to tell us, and has put his job on the line in order to emphasize.

Testimony of Scott Ritter, former UNSCOM Inspector before the U.S. Senate. September 3, 1998

And here is Sen. Inhofe -- also during the same Ritter hearing:

INHOFE: "You remember, nine months before Desert Storm, Saddam (Hussein ?) said -- and this is a quote: "Our missiles cannot reach Washington. If they could reach Washington, we would strike." Then shortly after the cease-fire, a statement that was made that, "If we had held off and not gone into Kuwait for five or six more years, we would have the missiles, the means of delivering the weapons that we have to deter the United States." Do you remember those statements?

MR. RITTER: Yes, sir.

SEN. INHOFE: Do you think, in your evaluation of the type of person that Saddam Hussein is, that he would hesitate in any way from using a weapon of mass destruction and delivering it to the United States, if he had the capability?

MR. RITTER: My experience with the Iraqi government is that it is a ruthless government and that it would carry out such a task if that was the decision of the president of Iraq.

http://www.ceip.org/programs/npp/ritter.htm