More comments but less sense from Bush on Iraq and WMD

Before a White House cabinet meeting on Monday, Bush took three quick questions from reporters. One reporter asked, “Sir, is U.S. credibility on the line over weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?”

“I’m not exactly sure what that means,” Bush said. “I mean, Iraq had a weapons program. Intelligence throughout the decade showed they had a weapons program. I am absolutely convinced with time we’ll find out that they did have a weapons program. The credibility of this country is based upon our strong desire to make the world more peaceful and the world is now more peaceful after our decision; the strong desire to make sure free nations are more secure — our free nations are now more secure; and the strong desire to spread freedom. And the Iraqi people are now free and are learning the habits of freedom and the responsibilities that come with freedom.”

I think there are two interesting aspects to this answer.

First, it’s not a major point, but Bush is wrong when he says the “credibility of this country is based upon our strong desire to make the world more peaceful.” This doesn’t even make a lot of sense. I’m sure many countries around the world respect America’s historical commitment to peace, but our government’s international credibility is predicated on us keeping our word, not on our desire for peace (which frankly, I think a lot of countries are a little skeptical about).

As the New Republic noted yesterday, “[T]he credibility of this country is based upon the same thing the credibility of any other country — or anyone else for that matter — is based upon: that the things it says turn out to be true.”

Second, and far more important, was Bush’s use of the word “program.” Bush was talking about Iraq and referencing the WMD we went to war over. Before the war, Bush and other administration officials spoke with certainty about an arsenal of WMD.

Colin Powell told the United Nations in February, “We know that Saddam Hussein is determined to keep his weapons of mass destruction, [and] is determined to make more.” Bush told the nation in March, “Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.”

But this week Bush said, “Iraq had a weapons program. Intelligence throughout the decade showed they had a weapons program. I am absolutely convinced with time we’ll find out that they did have a weapons program.” [emphasis added]

Why the repeated use of the word “program”? This struck many as a subtle attempt to back away from earlier assurances about existing stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons towards a statement about Iraq’s potential ability to create these weapons.

Bush said “with time we’ll find out that they did have a weapons program.” But what time frame is he referring to? We already know that after the first Gulf War Iraq had a WMD program. U.N. inspectors found it and Hussein’s government admitted to starting it. Those weapons, and that program, were reportedly destroyed years ago. Bush couldn’t possibly suggest that proof we found 10 years ago of a WMD program served as a causus belli this year, could he?

I realize that Bush has a tendency to make certain verbal mistakes when speaking without a prepared text. When he’s coming up with his own remarks off the top of his head, as he was on Monday when answering the reporter’s question, Bush often makes grammatical and substantive errors. I’m used to that.

The question then becomes, however, when it comes to Bush’s beliefs, is there a difference between weapons of mass destruction and a weapons of mass destruction program?

This is not a silly game of semantics. After all, Bush boasted less than two weeks ago that the U.S. has “found the weapons of mass destruction” because we discovered two trailer trucks that may have used as mobile biological weapons labs. We hadn’t, of course, found WMD, though Bush was suggesting we had.

Now Bush is saying Iraq had a WMD program that justified our invasion. If he meant in 1991, of course Iraq had a WMD program.

As Salon’s Jake Tapper wrote today, Bush’s emphasis on Iraq’s WMD program may be a way for the administration “to argue that the president never meant that there were WMD pointed at the U.S., just WMD programs.”

Bill Clinton became infamous for parsing the definition of “is.” Will Bush be equally vilified for parsing the definition of “weapons of mass destruction”?