jasonrest wrote:Admittedly,
the collective response from the intelligence community was in fact, that Hussein was "continuing" his program and he's a very bad man etc.
However, did the 2002 NIE state explicitly that there were WMD's?
Furthermore, there were attempts by officials in this same community to thwart that very same claim.
Iraq's Continuing Programs for Weapons of Mass Destruction
We judge that Iraq has continued its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in defiance of UN resolutions and restrictions. Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of UN restrictions; if left unchecked, it probably will have a nuclear weapon during this decade. (See INR alternative view at the end of these Key Judgments.)
We judge that we are seeing only a portion of Iraq's WMD efforts, owing to Baghdad's vigorous denial and deception efforts. Revelations after the Gulf war starkly demonstrate the extensive efforts undertaken by Iraq to deny information. We lack specific information on many key aspects of Iraq's WMD programs.
Since inspections ended in 1998, Iraq has maintained its chemical weapons effort, energized its missile program, and invested more heavily in biological weapons; in the view of most agencies, Baghdad is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program.
2002 NIE
There are always dissenting opinions.
Hindsight is 20/20 jasonrest. Unfortunately it's not available at the time the decision is made.
