Some comments with regard to Barry Finn's post of 20 Mar 07 - 10:04 AM:

1) "There was no evidence any type of weapon found or that had existed that would have had those capabilities."

We talking nuclear here right? What you say is very true, but there again nobody said that Saddam/Iraq HAD nuclear weapons. The points that were under evaluation and that were unknown at the time were:

- Is Iraq running a secret development programme directed towards the acquisition of nuclear weapons;

- Is Iraq running a secret development programme directed towards the acquisition of delivery systems for such weapons.

I'd still love to know what it was that Dr.A.Q.Khan had smuggled out of Iraq to Syria, where it was put onboard a Pakistan Air Force Transport aircraft and flown back to Pakistan - My guess is all relevant information, computers, etc related to the first of the points given above.


2) "GTW, we are more likely to start a war of that scale that anyone else & there is evidence that we have them & are capable of using them & delivering them within a 45 minute time line."

Historical evidence runs counter to that Barry. Apart from the two weapons dropped on Japan in time of war, the US has never been to the fore in advocating first-use of nuclear weapons, they have always promoted their deterrant value. The US definitely has nuclear weapons and they would, if necessary, be fully capable of using them, no point in having them if you are not. The readiness time to fire from "cold" is, I believe, about 14 minutes depending on type and launch vehicle, not 45 minutes, which time never applied to nuclear weapons, that was the time it takes to authorise use of and arm chemical or biological weapons.


3) "You keep spouting off about what we've done to prevent events that others were not capable of bringing to the table. You're all hype. There were no WMD's, roving bio-labs or chemical plants that were to be used for the purpose of attacking US. You keep saying that but we attacked a nation without just cause & couldn't find anything to back it up after the fact. Yes, we were sure, SURE!"

Subsequent to the actions taken four years ago Barry these are the differences:
- Pre-invasion the UN suspected Iraq of possessing WMD in defiance of numerous UNSC Resolutions demanding the destruction of such weapons;
- Post-invasion, the UN now knows that Iraq does not possess WMD;
- Pre-invasion the UN suspected Iraq of running secret research and development programmes associated with chemical and biological WMD in defiance of numerous UNSC Resolutions;
- Post-invasion, the UN now knows that no such programmes are being run in Iraq;
- Pre-invasion, the UN suspected Iraq of running secret research and development programmes associated with delivery systems for WMD in defiance of UNSC Resolutions;
- Post-Invasion, the UN now knows that all such programmes have been halted;
- Pre-invasion, the UN had taken Iraq to task with regard to human rights abuses demanding that appropriate UN organisations be allowed in to monitor events within Iraq. The Ba'athist regime in Iraq refused to allow such organisations entry to the country;
- Post-invasion, the UN are now free to send whoever they want into Iraq to monitor events;
- Pre-invasion, the UN requested that Iraq return 605 Kuwaiti nationals abducted in 1990 when Iraq invaded Kuwait and whose fate was unknown;
- Post-invasion, the UN now know that Saddam Hussein had them all executed.

All hype, eh Barry? There are things that were suspected about Iraq pre-invasion Barry that were believed to be true by many. All those uncertainties have now been removed. One thing is for certain Saddam Hussein was never going to let those facts be established, not for as long as his arse pointed downwards.

The premise of the invasion was perfectly justified, 48 countries were of a like mind, more in fact than took part in the action to remove Iraqi forces from Kuwait.

Didn't matter a toss whether anything was found or not, that was not the object of the exercise, that was to make sure that Saddam and Iraq could not pose a threat to the peace of the region in the future, and that most certainly was done.