Among the dozens of documents in English were Iraqi reports written in the 1990’s and in 2002 for United Nations inspectors in charge of making sure Iraq abandoned its unconventional arms programs after the Persian Gulf war. Experts say that at the time, Mr. Hussein’s scientists were on the verge of building an atom bomb, as little as a year away.
It's poorly written, but when you parse it in light of established fact you realize that "at the time" refers to the time of the Persian Gulf war. It's not news that Saddam was as close as a year away from a nuke at that time. The Times is giving no new information here. Furthermore, the fact that Iraq had written reports to the UN in the 1990s and 2002 about the abandonment of its unconventional weapons programs doesn't come close to proving that it had a near-weapon-producing nuclear program at these times (Do you really think that Iraq was a year away from producing a nuke in 2002? I mean really.) We all want a smoking gun but this isn't it.
"It's poorly written, but when you parse it in light of established fact you realize that "at the time" refers to the time of the Persian Gulf war. It's not news that Saddam was as close as a year away from a nuke at that time. The Times is giving no new information here. Furthermore, the fact that Iraq had written reports to the UN in the 1990s and 2002 about the abandonment of its unconventional weapons programs doesn't come close to proving that it had a near-weapon-producing nuclear program at these times (Do you really think that Iraq was a year away from producing a nuke in 2002? I mean really.) We all want a smoking gun but this isn't it."
First of all, thank you for a clear answer.
Second, yes it is written very poorly.
Third, the way I see it, and maybe you do too, the article indicates that the information given in 2002 was the same as what was given sometime during the 1990s. In other words, Saddam did not give any new information or make any changes from what he had been doing. It means he did not turn over all the copies of the information he had. To me that is not a smoking gun regarding WMDs, but it is a justification for the war. Saddam, again showed that he was defiant to the world and was not going to start over in his research. It tells me his intent was to someday restart his WMD program.