"The US intelligence services withheld information from George Bush that Iraqi WMD programmes had been abandoned, to justify their prewar contention that Saddam Hussein possessed banned weapons, according to the New York Times."

Only one thing wrong with the above, it wasn't the CIA's contention that Iraq possessed WMD and was continuing programmes aimed at further developing their capability - it was the UN.

On revelations by relatives, I believe it was a son-in-law of Saddam Hussein who defected and told the world about an ongoing Iraqi chemical/biological development programme in, I think it was 1995. Acting on that information UNSCOM inspectors found that what was stated was true. That was one programme, is it possible, even probable, that there were others, British intelligence evaluation and UNMOVIC discovered the missile developement programme that, although prohibited and not mentioned in Iraq's declaration of December 2002, had been run in spite of UN sanctions.

Regarding the munitions found recently - it doesn't matter a jot when they were "left over from", it doesn't matter what their condition was. In December 2002 Iraq was required to make a declaration to the UNSC regarding what WMD it possessed and report the status of previously known WMD development programmes. The baseline for comparison for this declaration was the 1999 UNSCOM and IAEA reports to the UNSC, those reports having been compiled based on the inspectors findings and on information supplied by Iraq. In the December 2002 declaration the Iraqi authorities stated that they did not possess ANY WMD, munitions and that all developement programmes had been halted. Dr. Hans Blix expressed his disappointment with the content of the declaration as it did not in any way attempt to explain what had happened to the items, identified by UNSCOM, that remained unaccounted for. The appearance of those munitions is an indication that Iraq's declaration of December 2002 was indeed false and that the UNSCOM report of 1999 was correct.

The "hiding" of the weapons. Russia, France, Germany and China bought Saddam Hussein more than sufficient time for him to conceal whatever he wanted to. Remembering that 1441 required full pro-active co-operation on the part of the Iraqi authorities, I certainly would like to know the reason that the required surveillance flights by U2 aircraft were denied by Iraq. The Iraqi's could not guarantee getting anything out to the North, they most certainly would not send anything East into Iran, or South into Saudi Arabia. That only leaves the route West into Syria and Jordan, over flight by U2 aircraft would have been able to monitor that traffic - I believe that is why those flights were refused permission.

Was anything smuggled out through Syria in the run up to March 2003 - according to A.Q. Khan there was. On his instruction a Pakistani Air Force transport aircraft was diverted on it's return journey and ordered to fly to Damascus take on Iraqi cargo and return to Pakistan. There has never been any disclosure as to what that cargo was and I don't know whether there ever will be - my guess, and it is purely that, based on the parties involved and their area of expertise, is that what was smuggled out was evidence that Iraq was in the process of re-activating it's nuclear programme.

Nerd, to commit US ground forces, yes the President would have to go to Congress, as he did indeed do. The terms of the Safwan ceasefire had been broken, therefore the ceasefire was invalid freeing any coalition member to resume hostilities. By the way did Bill Clinton go to Congress to get their sanction to launch "Desert Fox"? Did he go to Congress to get their sanction to intervene in Kosovo? The difference between those and Iraq 2003 was that in the latter US ground troops were involved. Off-hand I cannot remember any great debate in Congress being reported with regard to "Desert Fox" or Kosovo - could well be wrong on that as I am based on the wrong side of the pond.