All evidence and signs for years pointed to Saddam having WMD-s. He was given 6 months in addition to prove that his WMD were destroyed and to let the UN inspectors in and he didn't do it, he used that time to hide away and transport the WMD out of Iraq, to Syria.
I am really annoyed that people claim that just because we didn't find tons of WMD when we went into Iraq, they never existed.
If you lose something, or something is stolen, how would you like it, if the Insurance company says they won't pay, because the fact that you don't have it now is evidence that you never had it in the first place. If this sounds ridiculous, well, the exact same logic is being used in the case of the WMD: we didn't find them, after having given Saddam ample warning to hide them or dispose of them, therefore they never existed.
There is a truism in logic:
absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
You can't prove anything becuase you can't find evidence. You can only prove something based on the existance of evidence, not the lack of it. You can infer a conclusion, but you do so at great risk, for exactly the reaons that you put forward.
I feel the same way as you do....
I don't want anyone (least of all, President Bush) apologizing for faulty intelligence....unless/until we get a chance to go over all of Iraq and Syria, Lebanon and even France and Russia...
There are just too many places for WMDs to have been transported to....and then you still have the minds and evilness of Saddam and his sons....THEY were deadly all by themselves...to thousands...
Man, did you hit the nail on the head!Saddam had six months to move his WMDs before we attacked. In Oct 2004, it came out that Russian advisors were overseeing the move of the WMDs to Syria for Saddam. The news lasted exactly one news cycle and then disappeared off the radar screen. No one in the MSM picked it up--deliberately.
An Iraqi former commander just said this week Saddam moved his WMD's to Syria 6 wks before we invaded Iraq. He said NO one has looked in Syria but that's where they are.
Right. I said long ago that when Saddam saw W was really coming, he hid, buried or exported a lot of stuff. He wasn't going to let WMD finds vindicate W. Of course the guys that hid it are insurgents or dead. But hopefully as the gov't takes hold some may squeal.