As for Ritter, I used the word “few” WMD instead of “no” WMD. To my knowledge, Ritter didn’t say that there were absolutely no WMD’s. He thought something may have been left over from the early 90’s. His point was that (1) the bulk of the weapons were destroyed by the UN, and (2) Iraq’s WMD’s were a false pretext for the invasion. The second claim is admittedly still debatable, but I think the evidence for it now is extremely strong.

Nobody else, neither Democrat nor Republican, had the courage to state these two truths when it mattered most, i.e. in the months leading up to the invasion. To me, this matters a lot, because countless lives were lost in Iraq, beginning with those of many draftees in Saddam’s army, and because some cities were destroyed, like Falluja.

If you are trying to convince me that Dr. Blix said there was “spying” going on with the sanction of UNSCOM, you havent done it. I will refer you to Dr. Blix himself for any further discussion on this matter.

If you want to respect Mr. Ritter for saying there were no WMDs in Iraq, that is fine with me too. I would just mention that if a person says enough different things he will eventually be right.

Also, in context, he is being critical of inspection practices in the 90’s, so what he says about spy agencies is by no means “uncontroversial.” He disapproves of people from US and British intelligence having been involved. Why? Probably because they did what spies do. Click on the link to see the negative context of his remarks.

Finally, his remarks came after Ritter’s whistle-blowing. So, he seems to implicitly confirm Ritter’s criticism. He certainly says nothing that distances him from Ritter’s accusations.

I respect your choice not to discuss Ritter. As for me, he has my respect for his courage in saying before the invasion that there were few WMD’s in Iraq. For that, he was painted as crazy by CNN, New York Times, etc. Yet, no other expert spoke the truth to power at that time.

Best wishes,
Bahram

As for Ritter, even this is taking too much time on that subject.

(1) “Hans Blix, chief UN weapons inspector, argues that UN credibility was badly hurt by disclosures about covert CIA, British MI6 and Israeli Mossad operations with the former UN inspection teams… Some of the intercepts and other data were used to help identify and target President Saddam’s suspected hideouts when US and British bombers launched the Desert Fox air strikes in December, 1998, after the UN inspectors were withdrawn, former inspectors say.” (From http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/10/23/1034561546457.html
)

(2) Quote form Blix: “I thought that in the ’90s sometimes the inspectors from New York had been a bit too Rambo-like, and of course inspectors from the teams often had people from the intelligence side, both from the U.S. and the U.K.” (http://bostonreview.net/BRwebonly/blix.php)

(3) “Although the accusations were denied at the time, the involvement of at least the CIA was later confirmed by the UN, by the US administration and by former weapons inspectors.” (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/nov/11/iraq.ewenmacaskill)

I’m curious about the point you make about Ritter. I know he has political opinions. But is Ritter known as somebody who falsifies things? He seems to have been the one person who was right about the absence of WMD in Iraq.

Halabcha occurred BEFORE the 1991 Gulf War. The gassing I was referring to occurred AFTER. To conflate the two just proves my point.

I don’t really feel like I have to address anything Scott Ritter says.

I am unaware of any statements by Dr. Blix that would support that assertion.

Saddam’s gassing of the Kurds was not ever really a secret. The world had knowledge of it while it happened, including video documentation (e.g. video of Halabcha) and reports of witnesses.

* * *

What about Scott Ritter’s statement that if Saddam stopped the inspections it was because the inspections were exceeding the legal mandate by allowing intelligence services to spy on Saddam’s security apparatus? Richard Butler denied that, but Hans Blix confirmed this in 2003. I think Blix is a credible tie-breaker.

All this makes me cynical about the credibility and legitimacy of the United Nations as far as its dealings with states like Iraq and Iran are concerned. Rather than being a just arbiter of conflicts, I feel that the UN is just another instrument the big powers manipulate in order to have their way in the world.