Iraqi WMD Update: How the Media Has Changed Its Story

A recent report by the liberal media suggested that Saddam Hussein had lied that he had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in order to deter an attack from Iran. The media suggests that its report proves that Iraq did not have WMDs at the time of its Liberation in 2003, or at least that the threat from Iraqi WMDs was exaggerated. However, this report validates some of the concerns about Iraqi WMDs.

Iraq under Hussein was not allowed to possess WMDs by United Nations resolutions because it had used them both against foreigners and its own citizens, as well as its history of aggression. Iraq was obligated to prove that it had destroyed its WMDs and terminated WMD production programs, much like a parolee is no longer be permitted to have firearms and must submit to inspection to prove he no longer has them.

Iraq violated those UN resolutions by failing to submit to full inspections, which gave rise to suspicion that it was hiding something. Indeed, Iraq failed to account for hundreds of chemical weapons, which are a kind of WMD, it was known to possess. It never submitted evidence that it had destroyed these WMDs, as required, (e.g. the destroyed WMDs themselves, or photographs or video of their destruction), even though Hussein insisted that Iraq had destroyed them. Therefore, it was reasonable to believe that Iraq still had WMDs at the time of its Liberation, and not reasonable to believe that it did not. Although it was not necessary to find WMD in order to believe that Iraq still had them, most of those Iraqi chemical weapons have, in fact, since been found by Coalition forces over the years, scattered about Iraq.

The media and other liberal commentators insisted that Hussein was telling the truth that Iraq did not have WMD because no large stockpiles of them or new ones have been found. But the finding of the hundreds of chemical weapons Iraq was known to have possessed proves that Iraq still had WMDs at the time of its Liberation in 2003 and also proves that Hussein had lied when he claimed to have destroyed them. After citing Hussein’s denials that he still had WMDs as proof that he no longer possessed them, the liberal media now also cites the recent report that Hussein had lied about possessing WMDs as proof that he no longer had them.

But even the new liberal media’s theory that Hussein was bluffing the Iranians by exaggerating his possession of WMDs proves that his failure to submit to proper inspections and to prove that he had destroyed his WMDs enabled him to continue to bully his neighbors, which is a concern I have been raising since before the Liberation of Iraq. As I have noted in other posts, a terrorist-sponsoring regime, like Hussein’s Iraq, that possesses WMDs or bluffs that it possesses WMDs is committing terrorism against anyone within range of its missiles, let alone against anyone who is a potential victim of any militant groups it sponsors. Hussein cleverly hid his WMDs just enough so that his neighbors still had to fear him while Western liberals and isolationists could believe his lies that Iraq no longer had them and act accordingly. The latest liberal attempt to dismiss the threat posed by Saddam Hussein’s Iraq cannot change the fact that Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction did represent a serious threat to his neighbors and to the interests of the United States.