The Bush administration and its allies are getting a little anxious about the failure to find the huge arsenal of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction that necessitated a full-scale invasion over two months ago.
There are multiple reports from the U.S. and around the world that the Bush administration “grossly manipulated intelligence” in order to convince the American public and a handful of willing allies that war was necessary and unavoidable.
With pressure mounting, Bush made a startling announcement over the weekend: We’ve found the proof we were looking for.
This was a fascinating development because after over 10 weeks of thorough searching, U.S. forces haven’t found any of the bio and/or chem weapons that were allegedly threatening western civilization.
Bush was citing two trailer trucks our forces have found that the administration believes were used as mobile biological weapons labs. Their discovery led Bush to declare that we have “found the weapons of mass destruction” used as a justification for war and that suggestions that we’ve failed to find WMDs are “wrong.”
“You remember when Colin Powell stood up in front of the world, and he said Iraq has got laboratories, mobile labs to build biological weapons?” Bush said. “They’re illegal. They’re against the United Nations resolutions, and we’ve so far discovered two. And we’ll find more weapons as time goes on. But for those who say we haven’t found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they’re wrong. We found them.”
This was an interesting statement, which carefully (or carelessly, depending on how you look at it) merged two ideas into one. Yes, the administration said in advance of war that Iraq had mobile laboratories that could be used to develop biological weapons. And yes, under U.N. sanctions on Iraq, these mobile labs are illegal. But the labs aren’t weapons of mass destruction, they’re believed to be capable of developing them.
Bush said we’ve found the labs “and we’ll find more weapons as time goes on.” That’s a classic non sequitur. In order to find “more weapons” we have to first find “some weapons.” Bush is running a shell game and hopes we won’t keep our eye on the ball.
He said those who argue we haven’t found “banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons” are “wrong.” But he’s still playing fast and loose with the truth. Critics are saying the administration hasn’t found banned weapons — and on that point, we’re right.
After all, what exactly is a weapon of mass destruction? Biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons count, sterile mobile laboratories don’t.
And as Slate’s Fred Kaplan explained late last week, the Iraqis shouldn’t have had these labs, but they hardly represent “airtight proof” that the administration was right about Hussein’s arsenal.
Kaplan notes that the CIA believes the labs contain the components for an “ingeniously simple, self-contained bioprocessing system.” The same CIA report, however, “reveals considerable ambiguity about the nature of these vehicles. For example, it notes that Iraqi officials — presumably those currently being interrogated — say the trailers were used to produce hydrogen for artillery weather-balloons. (Many Army units float balloons to monitor the accuracy of artillery fire.)”
Nevertheless, the White House keeps saying the labs’ only use is for producing bio weapons.
Blogger Demagogue noted Ari Fleischer’s press briefing from last week, at which the White House press secretary said, “[W]e have found the bio trucks that can be used only for the purpose of producing biological weapons. That’s proof-perfect that the intelligence in that regard was right on target. ”
Except it’s not proof-perfect. The White House isn’t releasing reports about what we’ve found in Iraq, they’re spinning wildly to try and justify the fact that they exaggerated intelligence reports before the war began.
The incomparable Paul Krugman at the New York Times explains just how outrageous this is in his column today.
“The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat,” Krugman writes. “If that claim was fraudulent, the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history — worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra. Indeed, the idea that we were deceived into war makes many commentators so uncomfortable that they refuse to admit the possibility.”
Krugman’s right, of course, on each point, especially the fact that no one in the so-called liberal media seems willing to consider the fact that the president was intentionally dishonest about his motivations for war.
On Meet the Press three days ago, the issue of the elusive WMD came up. The Washington Post’s David Broder noted that the administration claimed that Iraq had the arsenal and the proof the arsenal exists.
“[T]he reality is that if it had not been for that, you could not have justified either to the American public or to the United Nations or Tony Blair to his own people going in with a pre-emptive war,” Broder said. “What gave this urgency, what gave it the plausibility to go ahead and act on our own against Saddam Hussein was the assertion that he had amassed these weapons of mass destruction.”
The New York Times’ Bill Safire, a former speechwriter for Richard Nixon, immediately stepped in. “But it was a truthful assertion,” Safire said. “You’re not suggesting that he lied about it.”
No, Mr. Safire, no one seems to be suggesting that Bush lied about it. But maybe we should be.