WMD conjecture after the 2003 invasion of Iraq

WMD theories in the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq war concern the failure by the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the U.S.-led Iraq Survey Group (ISG) to locate stockpiles of Weapons of Mass Destruction both before and after the invasion of Iraq. The United States effectively terminated the concentrated search effort for unconventional weaponry in January 2005, though other investigative bodies continue to examine material evidence relating to past programs. Major controversy was generated when prohibited weapons were not found. Some observers reason Saddam Hussein miscalculated by deceiving Intelligence services into believing he had retained active stockpiles while others remain convinced, contrary to the official findings of the ISG, that such weapons continue to exist. A number of alternative, speculative theories have been put forward to explain their possible whereabouts.

Stockpiles still hidden

Appearing on MSNBC's Hardball in June 2004, Paul Wolfowitz insisted the weapons picture was without change, since Iraq "had a lot of time to move stuff, a lot of time to hide stuff." Three weeks later, Lord Butler of Brockwell said upon conclusion of the Butler Review, "Iraq is a very big place, there is a lot of sand. ... It is impractical to dig up the whole of Iraq, but for somebody to say 'we are absolutely certain that there is nothing there' would be a very rash and unfounded thing to say, in our judgment."

Some experts, such as former Pentagon investigator Dave Gaubatz, allege that not all of the potential sites that may have WMDs have been searched. On February 12, 2006, he appeared on Fox News Channel and claimed he and fellow military investigators identified four underground bunkers with five foot thick concrete walls in southern Iraq believed to hold WMD. Iraqi "informants" had brought these sites to the attention of Gaubatz and his colleagues. Gaubatz claims that, for various reasons, these sites have never been inspected by the Iraq Survey Group or the CIA, and made a plea the sites be inspected. Gaubatz also reiterated his claims in a telephone interview with The New York Sun and later FrontPage Magazine. Tom Ferrick reported in The Philadelphia Inquirer June, 2006 that US Republicans Curt Weldon and Peter Hoekstra had secretly planned to visit Iraq with the intention of locating and inspecting the four suspected sites themselves. According to Gaubatz, the trip was canceled when news of the trip was leaked to the press. "I think the jury is still out on WMD," said Weldon the same month.

Stockpiles transported to another country

Rumors from governmental officials have abounded of possible transportation of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to foreign countries, namely Syria, Lebanon and Iran, in the weeks before Operation Iraqi Freedom began. John Bolton told the House Committee on Foreign Affairs that these reports give "cause for concern."

Syria

Former Iraqi general Georges Sada claimed that in late summer 2002, Saddam had ordered all of his stockpiles to be moved to Syria. He appeared on Fox News' Hannity & Colmes in January 2006 to discuss his book, Saddam's Secrets: How an Iraqi General Defied and Survived Saddam Hussein. Anticipating the arrival of weapon inspectors on November 1, Sada said Saddam took advantage of the June 4 Zeyzoun Dam disaster in Syria by forming an "air bridge", loading them onto cargo aircraft and piloting them out of the country.

They were moved by air and by ground, 56 sorties by jumbo, 747, and 27 were moved, after they were converted to cargo aircraft, they were moved to Syria.

In January 2004, Nizar Nayuf, a Syrian journalist who moved to Western Europe, said in a letter to the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf that he knows the three sites where Iraq's weapons of mass destruction are kept inside Syria. According to Nayuf's source, described as a senior source inside Syrian military intelligence he had known for two years, Iraq's WMD are in tunnels dug under the town of al-Baida near the city of Hama in northern Syria, in the village of Tal Snan, north of the town of Salamija, where there is a big Syrian air force camp, and in the city of Sjinsjar on the Syrian border with the Lebanon, south of Homs city. Nayouf also wrote that the transfer of Iraqi WMD to Syria was organized by the commanders of Saddam Hussein's Iraqi Republican Guard, including General Shalish, with the help of Assif Shoakat, Bashar Assad's cousin. Shoakat is the CEO of Bhaha, an import/export company owned by the Assad family. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice responded to this accusation by saying "I don't think we are at the point that we can make a judgment on this issue. There hasn't been any hard evidence that such a thing happened. But obviously we're going to follow up every lead, and it would be a serious problem if that, in fact, did happen."

A similar claim was made by Lieutenant General Moshe Yaalon, a former Israeli officer who served as chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces from July 2002 to June 2005. In April 2004, he was quoted as saying that "perhaps they transferred them to another country, such as Syria." General Yaalon told the New York Sun more firmly in December 2005 that "He [Saddam] transferred the chemical agents from Iraq to Syria." The Fall 2005 Middle East Quarterly reported Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as having said in a December, 2002 appearance on Israel's Channel 2, "Chemical and biological weapons which Saddam is endeavoring to conceal have been moved from Iraq to Syria."

In February 2006, Ali Ibrahim al-Tikriti, a former Iraqi general who defected shortly before the Gulf War in 1991, gave an interview to Ryan Mauro, author of Death to America: The Unreported Battle of Iraq and founder of WorldThreats. In the interview, al-Tikriti, who was once known as the "Butcher of Basra", told Mauro:

I know Saddam's weapons are in Syria due to certain military deals that were made going as far back as the late 1980s that dealt with the event that either capitols were threatened with being overrun by an enemy nation. Not to mention I have discussed this in-depth with various contacts of mine who have confirmed what I already knew. At this point Saddam knew that the United States were eventually going to come for his weapons and the United States wasn't going to just let this go like they did in the original Gulf War. He knew that he had lied for this many years and wanted to maintain legitimacy with the pan Arab nationalists. He also has wanted since he took power to embarrass the West and this was the perfect opportunity to do so. After Saddam denied he had such weapons why would he use them or leave them readily available to be found? That would only legitimize President Bush, whom he has a personal grudge against. What we are witnessing now is many who opposed the war to begin with are rallying around Saddam saying we overthrew a sovereign leader based on a lie about WMD. This is exactly what Saddam wanted and predicted.

Al-Tikriti's interview has been featured prominently on conservative web sites such as FrontPageMag and WorldNetDaily, but hasn't received main stream press attention. Salon magazine editor Alex Koppelman found reason to doubt both Sada's and al-Tikriti's statements.

The Iraq Survey Group was told that Saddam Hussein periodically removed guards from the Syrian border and replaced them with his intelligence agents who then supervised the movement of banned materials between Syria and Iraq, according to two unnamed defense sources that spoke with The Washington Times. They reported heavy traffic in large trucks on the border before the United States invasion.

ISG formed a special working group to investigate and consider these claims. Charles Duelfer, who headed the group, summarized the group's conclusion: "Based on the evidence available at present, ISG judged that it was unlikely that an official transfer of WMD material from Iraq to Syria took place."

Jordan

On April 27 2004 Fox News reported that operatives confessed to planning a chemical attack against Jordan under the orders of Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, then leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Jordanian officials said the plotters entered Jordan from Syria with trucks filled with 20 tons of toxic chemicals. The attackers allegedly planned to kill some 80,000 civilians. The chemicals, reported as "Iraqi nerve gas" by Hal Lindsey's TBN International Intelligence Briefing, were said to have been part of a much larger cache buried in Syria. Georges Sada claimed these were the same weapons Saddam Hussein transported out of the country before the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

Lebanon

American Internet newspaper World Tribune reported in August 2003 that Iraq's WMD may have been moved to Lebanon's heavily-fortified Bekaa Valley. According to the story, United States intelligence identified "a stream of tractor-trailer trucks" moving from Iraq through Syria to Lebanon in the weeks before invasion. WorldNetDaily followed up the same story in May 2004 adding affirmatively "much, if not all, of Iraq's biological and chemical weapons assets are being protected by Syria, with Iranian help, in the Bekaa Valley."

Former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense John A. Shaw has also alleged that the Russians played an extensive role in transporting materials into both Syria and Lebanon, and claims he found that trucks were transporting materials to Syria and returning empty. Also, containers with warnings painted on them were moved to a Beirut hospital basement. Russia and China were also alleged to have helped remove WMD equipment.

Pakistan

Former head of the Indian counter-terrorism division and member of the National Security Advisory Board, B Raman, suggests A.Q. Khan may have assisted in shifting Iraq's WMD to Pakistan. Writing for the South Asia Analysis Group, he cites Pakistani sources claiming Khan agreed to aid Iraqi intelligence officials "who sought his help" in having some prohibited material airlifted from Syria to Pakistan to prevent it "falling into the hands of the UN inspectors." According to Raman, Pervez Musharraf has been "desperately trying to see that this is not played up in the Pakistani media."

In 2003 the Jerusalem Post reported that Iraq's WMD might be found on cargo ships that were cruising aimlessly around the Indian Ocean.

Iran

In addition to Syria and Lebanon, former deputy commander of U.S. Central Command Lt. General Michael DeLong said that some weapons of mass destruction were transported to Iran. Speaking to WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg, he said: "I do know for a fact that some of those weapons went into Syria, Lebanon and Iran. ... We also know that before then, they buried some of the weapons of mass destruction".

John Loftus, director of The Intelligence Summit, also saw information that led him to believe Iran had acquired illicit material. In a story on Dave Gaubatz, The Daily Mail's Melanie Phillips quoted Loftus as saying "Saddam had the last laugh and donated his secret stockpile to benefit Iran's nuclear weapons programme." Phillips followed up her report by reproducing a letter from John Loftus calling for a congressional investigation of John Negroponte, whom he accused of concealing the information. Salon Magazine columnist Glenn Greenwald wrote disparagingly of them both.

Iraqi miscalculation

Saddam lied to retain power

On 14 December Saddam Hussein was captured by U.S. forces. Time Online Edition reports that in his first interrogation he was asked whether Iraq had any WMDs. According to an official, his reply was: "'No, of course not, the U.S. dreamed them up itself to have a reason to go to war with us.' The interrogator continued along this line, said the official, asking: 'if you had no weapons of mass destruction then why not let the U.N. inspectors into your facilities?' Saddam’s reply: 'We didn’t want them to go into the presidential areas and intrude on our privacy.'" Later, through interrogations in US custody, Saddam revealed that, immediately prior to the start of the 2003 US invasion, he had announced to his generals that there were no WMDs. One theory given currency by Charles Duelfer is that Saddam sent out different signals to different people in order to keep them confused and help stay in power.

Saddam was misled

According to The Guardian in late 2003, British officials in Whitehall began circulating a theory that Saddam Hussein and his senior advisers "may have been hoodwinked" by lower-ranking officers "into believing that Iraq really did possess weapons of mass destruction." And as most of the informers for British intelligence were the same high-level advisers close to Saddam, the British were also fooled. The paper notes this hypothesis "is open to the interpretation that the government is searching for an excuse, however implausible, for failure to discover any WMD in Iraq." Commenting on the findings of the Butler intelligence review six months later, USA Today reported that Britain's Secret Intelligence Service had "shockingly few reliable human sources inside Saddam's regime." Documents since captured inside Iraq by coalition forces are reported to reveal Saddam's frustration with weapon inspections. Meeting transcripts record him saying to senior aides: "We don't have anything hidden!" In another, he remarks: "When is this going to end?" And another: "We have nothing."

See also

• Operation Sarindar

External links

• For Diehards, Search for Iraq's W.M.D. Isn't Over Scott Shane New York Times