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C-Span now showing the Oil For Food Scandal with Congress members.

By RICHARD SPERTZEL Mr. Spertzel, head of the biological-weapons section of Unscom from 1994-99, just returned from Iraq, where he has been a member of the Iraq Survey Group (ISG). The Wall Street Journal October 14, 2004; Page A18 After the release of the Iraq Survey Group's Duelfer report, the headlines blazed "No WMD Found." Most stories continued by saying that Iraq did not constitute an imminent threat to the U.S. and thus the U.S. was wrong to eliminate that threat. This reflects the notion that Iraq was only a threat if it had military munitions filled with WMD. The...

To the people of the United States of America, I am confused now, and here is the reason: President George W. Bush's reaction to the Oct. 6 final report compiled by the U.S.-led team of inspectors on their search for weapons of mass destruction (WMD) allegedly held by the regime of Saddam Hussein

Would we have gone into Iraq had we known what he know today about the state of Saddam Hussein's programs for the production of weapons of mass destruction? The Bush White House has been unapologetic about its policy, and according to National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice, speaking on Fox News Channel on Sunday, the answer is "yes." But the point is of course that we didn't know. Saddam Hussein's truly moronic game of deception made it very hard to think otherwise than that he had all sorts of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).

Howard Dean must have been ecstatic as he read the headlines on Oct. 7: "Report Discounts Iraqi Arms Threat" affirmed the Washington Post, while The New York Times, not to be outdone, jubilantly proclaimed that "sanctions worked." The Yale dining halls were abuzz with liberal energy: I could scarcely walk to my table without hearing about "how we had contained Saddam" or how "we never should have invaded Iraq." Democrats were vindicated, Republicans were doomed; with this newfound evidence, John Kerry could "finish Bush off" while the current administration would "lose all remaining credibility." Naturally, I was a bit taken...

Sordid affairIT'S PROBABLY wishful thinking to expect - in the home stretch of an overheated U.S. presidential election race - very much reasoned debate on the final report of the top U.S. arms inspector concerning Saddam Hussein's regime and his pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. Predictably, some have seized on Charles Duelfer's findings, delivered last week, that Saddam had no stockpiles of WMDs and no active capability to reconstitute those weapons programs, to argue that the U.S.-led invasion was therefore wrong since Iraq posed no threat to the world. Others have pointed out, however, that the same report concludes...

For years, Saddam Hussein showed himself to be a master practitioner of the big bluff. Everyone outside Iraq and just about everyone inside believed that he harbored a secret stockpile of weapons of mass destruction.[snip]Saddam made a calculated decision, says the [Duelfer] report, that getting out from under sanctions was of paramount importance. He opted for a "tactical retreat" by ordering the elimination of what he had left: all biological, chemical and nuclear programs were abandoned, stockpiles destroyed.But according to the report, former officials say they "heard him say or inferred" that he "intended to resume" developing his chemical- and...

URL Given is for the 19 page "Key Findings" of the Duelfer Report -- it is in .PDF format, so cannot excerpt. Almost every word strongly underpins EVEN IN HINDSIGHT the actions of President Bush. Entire report also at same CIA site, but this is the "synoposis" THE LIBS ARE SPINNING SOME OBSCURE POINT INTO A LIE THAT WMD WASN'T A REALISTIC REASON FOR WAR -- WE HAVE GOT TO GET THIS PAST THE MEDIA EDITORS' SPIKE!!!

Corrections Washington Post, October 8, 2004, Pg. 2 "An Oct. 7 article and the lead Page One headline incorrectly attributed a quotation to Charles A. Duelfer, the chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq. The statement, 'We were almost all wrong,' was made by Duelfer's predecessor, David Kay, at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing Jan. 28." Oopsie! Isn't this the darndest thing? An enormously important report confirming that Saddam was scamming the world by selling oil to UN criminals as part of his reacquiring WMDs next year, and those silly geese at the Post just sort of got it all...

OP-ED COLUMNIST Saddam Hussein saw his life as an unfolding epic narrative, with retreats and advances, but always the same ending. He would go down in history as the glorious Arab leader, as the Saladin of his day. One thousand years from now, schoolchildren would look back and marvel at the life of The Struggler, the great leader whose life was one of incessant strife, but who restored the greatness of the Arab nation. They would look back and see the man who lived by his saying: "We will never lower our heads as long as we live, even if...

John Kerry Distorts the Charles Duelfer Report to rewind, rewrite and replay history regarding inspections, WMD's, sanctions and Oil for Food. John Kerry is using a distortion of the Charles Duelfer Report to rewind, rewrite and replay history skewed by selective-hindsight revisionism to support a naive assertion that we would be better off if George Bush had declined to launch Operation Iraqi Freedom. To test the sensibility of Kerry's claims now, let's re-wind history and operate on the basis of what the Dulfer Report now says we now know and on the basis of Kerry's claim that relying on indigenous...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 - The Bush administration's handling this week of a report on Saddam Hussein's attempts to purchase weapons and buy influence has angered French officials and set back a year of American efforts to repair the rupture caused by the Iraq war, French and other European officials said Friday. The anger of France and others is focused on the assertions in the report by Charles A. Duelfer, the top American arms inspector in Iraq, that French companies and individuals, some with close ties to the government, enriched themselves through Iraq's efforts to gain influence around the world in...

E-mail Author Author Archive Send to a Friend <% printurl = Request.ServerVariables("URL")%> Print Version October 08, 2004, 1:55 p.m. Dissimulation ReignsWhat on earth was going on in the mind of Saddam Hussein? Attention focuses on what exactly went through the minds of the major players on the scene. When John Kerry voted to authorize military action by the president, did he expect such action to be taken? If he expected something else, what was it? A supererogatory resolution by the Security Council? If so, why did he not stress the need for it at the time? As for Mr....

America involved in Oil for Food Scandal?

Al Tariq Company’sHabbaniyah I/Fallujah III Site The Al Tariq Company produced castor oil by extractionfrom 1992 until 2002, using an Iraqi-designedand produced crushing mill purchased locally. AlTariq offi cials complied with UNSCOM on therequirement that they burn the bean mash left overfrom production while UN inspectors remained inIraq. This open pit burning of mash was no longerobserved after the plant was reconstructed, post-OperationDesert Fox bombing, and went operational. Themash, which took days to burn and created signifi cantsmoke, was burned in pits near the Fallujah III facility.At one point, Al Tariq offi cials considered usingthe bean mash in animal feed,...

A SPECIAL French court yesterday charged Charles Pasqua, the senator at the centre of Iraqi bribery allegations, with offences in three cases of alleged corruption while he served as Interior Minister.The move against M Pasqua, 77, although unconnected with Iraq, embarrassed Paris as it sought to pour scorn on American allegations that he and other senior French politicians, businessmen and officials had received millions of pounds in a campaign orchestrated by the regime of Saddam Hussein to influence France. The court appearance by M Pasqua, 77, a longtime associate of President Chirac and a senior Gaullist party figure until the...

Is it really true that Saddam Hussein had no "stockpiles" of weapons of mass destruction before the U.S. invaded in March 2003? Not exactly - at least not if one counts the 500 tons of uranium that the Iraqi dictator kept stored at his al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development plant. The press hasn't made much of Saddam's 500-ton uranium stockpile, downplaying the story to such an extent that most Americans aren't even aware of it. But it's been reported - albeit in a by-the-way fashion - by the New York Times and a handful of other media outlets. And one...

The facts about the U.N.’s corrupt Oil-for-Food relationship with the deposed Iraqi tyrant are further exposed. CIA chief weapons inspector Charles Duelfer may not have found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but he sure found information enough to blow the lid off the simmering scandal of the United Nations Oil-for-Food program. As it turns out, Oil-for-Food pretty much was Saddam Hussein's weapons program. As Duelfer documents, Oil-for-Food allowed Saddam to replenish his empty coffers, firm up his networks for hiding money and buying arms, corrupt the U.N.'s own debates over Iraq, greatly erode sanctions and deliberately prep the ground...

Kerry could benefit from CIA findings on Iraq, but Bush has his own ammunition. WASHINGTON — The costs and benefits of President Bush's decision to invade Iraq loom ever larger as a potential tipping point in the 2004 presidential election after the release of a definitive CIA study this week concluding that Saddam Hussein possessed neither weapons of mass destruction nor active programs to produce them. The study comes as violence continues to plague Iraq. The situation exposes Bush to a potentially dangerous squeeze: mounting losses on the ground combined with mounting challenges to his original justification for the war....

I'm confused...does the report itself say "no WMDs found" or that Saddam was not producing any more WMDs after 1991? I thought the report clearly points out 53 chemical weapons found in 2004 but they were pre-1991?