Don't you remember when we were all making fun of Blix, you remember We called him Inspector Cleuseau? Remember we told Blix we (the US government) knew where the weapons were. And Blix said fine if you know, then tell me where to go so I can find them. Suddenly, we started doing a shuck and jive as to why we wouldn't and couldn't direct him to the known sites. IT was at that point I knew something was wrong with our stance on WMDS
He did more than bluff, he had cards up his sleeves in the card game.
France was controlling the oil fields getting 75% of the profit in exchange for maintaining the fields and distribution when it was illegal to do so under sanctions.
Very mafia like, isn't it?
Russia and Germany were equally doing all this illegal back-door business ventures with Saddam that were illegal under sanctions.
All were making lots of money, so there was no way in hell France, Germany or Russia would sign onto Gulf War 2, despite Saddam for a year shooting at our planes and funding terrorism in Israel and elsewhere.
Nope, Saddam owned three votes in the UN.
With months to hold off inspectors or invasions, he had forever to move what he wanted to bad guys within Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Pakistan and of course France.