Joseph M. Grieco: Testifying to Iraq's WMDs
International relations expert writes in the (Raleigh) News & Observer that the verdict is still out on Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction
Monday, June 16, 2003
DURHAM--The charge is that, last winter, President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair oversold Saddam Hussein's program of weapons of mass destruction. Were there grounds to be worried about Saddam and such weapons at that time?
Let's imagine we had ignored everything Bush and the British prime minister said about Iraq and WMD during that period, and had listened only to two other key people in the Iraq saga, U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix and French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin.
Blix is now dismissive of Anglo-American claims that Iraq constituted a major WMD threat. But we should remember his report of Jan. 27 to the U.N. Security Council.
Blix began that day by emphasizing to Security Council members that "The nerve agent VX gas is one of the most toxic ever developed." He then recalled for the council that, after the first Gulf War, the Iraqis claimed they only had a pilot project for VX, that the quality of the gas they produced was low, and that they could not determine how to turn it into weapons. But Blix said at the Jan. 27 Security Council meeting that "There are indications that Iraq had worked on the problem of purity and stabilization and that more had been achieved than has been declared," and that "There are also indications that the agent was weaponized."
A few moments later, Blix reported that "I might further mention that inspectors have found at another site a laboratory quantity of thiodiglycol, a mustard gas precursor."
Then Blix talked about anthrax. He recalled that Iraq had admitted to producing 8,500 liters of that deadly material, but claimed also to have destroyed all of it. The problem, Blix said, was that "Iraq has provided little evidence for this production and no convincing evidence for its destruction." Moreover, he said, "There are strong indications that Iraq produced more anthrax than it declared, and that at least some of this was retained after the declared destruction date. It might still exist."
Finally, Blix talked about Iraq's missile programs. He reported that "Iraq has refurbished its missile production infrastructure." In particular, Iraq had rebuilt casting chambers that "could produce motors for missiles capable of ranges significantly greater than 150 kilometers," that is, the limit Iraq had accepted in the 1991 Gulf War cease-fire agreement.
We all remember Secretary of State Colin Powell's dramatic Feb. 5 presentation to the Security Council on Iraq's WMD programs. But French Foreign Minister Dominique De Villepin also spoke to the council that day.
He made it clear then, as on other occasions, that he differed with the United States on war with Iraq, and wanted as an alternative an enhanced Iraq inspections regime.
But de Villepin, according to the word-by-word translation of his remarks that appeared Feb. 5 in the online version of The Washington Post, also said there were "unresolved questions in the ballistic, chemical, and biological areas."
What was he talking about? "First, "Regarding the chemical area, we have indications about a capacity to produce VX and mustard gas." Second, "In the biological area, our evidence suggests -- the evidence suggests that there are significant stocks -- there is the possible possession of significant stocks of anthrax and botulism toxins and the possible -- possibly a production capacity today." Finally, Iraq at present had no long-range missiles, "but we have disturbing indications about the continued determination of Iraq to acquire ballistic missiles with a range exceeding the authorized range of 150 kilometers."
De Villepin made a cryptic comment to his Security Council colleagues that day: "In the nuclear area, we need to fully clarify any attempt by Iraq to acquire aluminum tubes." Many would later say that the Anglo-American fears that such tubes could be used in fabricating weapon-grade uranium were misplaced. But that was not the French view, at least in February.
Recently, the Financial Times, citing U.S. officials, reported that, prior to the Feb. 5 Security Council meeting, French intelligence had acquired some of the tubes in question and, after testing them, had concluded that "they were too sophisticated to have alternative uses."
In sum, if we had listened only to Blix and de Villepin this past winter, we would have had to fear that Saddam already possessed or was trying actively to acquire VX gas, mustard gas, anthrax, botulism toxins, uranium-based atomic bombs and long-range missiles.
Bush and Blair, Blix and de Villepin, were most probably all telling us the truth in January and February: Iraq had built a serious WMD program.
In time, we will learn where it is or what became of it.
