# Anonymous Scientist :Iraq destroyed own WMD?! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 21, 2003, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085 "2003-04-21T18:13:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![OliverH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/278dde/32.png) [@OliverH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OliverH)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/21 "2003-04-22T12:57:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shodan \* > \*\* > > Indeed. Why would someone involved with the Iraqi weapons program know anything about the Iraqi weapons program? > \*\* We’re not talking about anything. We’re talking about precisely the information provided. But thanks for demonstrating that rather than judging based on evidence, you are willing to jump at anything confirming your opinion. It is funny that you would even go as far as to use my point that there is no such thing as ‘a scientist’ as an argument. May I ask what your scientific qualifications are to assess such an issue? > [@](#): > > \*\* > Let’s be up front with what we think here. What evidence would the anti-war contingent accept as proof that Iraq had been developing WMD? The testimony of high-level Iraqi officials? The existence of precursor chemicals, and directions on how to produce WMD? The presence of chemical munitions shells? \*\* The existence of WMD material. It’s very easy. You see, there happen to be scientific detection methods which can show even traces of WMD material, and which can even allow to draw conclusions as to where it came from. Unfortunately, all ‘proof’ for WMDs so far turned out to be fabricated. > [@](#): > > \*\* > I am asking if this is going to be like the creationist arguments, where since the conclusion is _a priori_ unacceptable, all evidence must be assumed to be false. > \*\* That is precisely your line of argumentation. You are willing to accept even proof from sources that have been demonstrated of misrepresenting evidence and using forged documents. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/22 "2003-04-22T14:36:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shodan \* > Why would someone involved with the Iraqi weapons program know anything about the Iraqi weapons program? For exactly the same reasons that I, a mid-level Department of Commerce statistician, wouldn’t know diddly about policy decisions that the Secretary of Commerce was considering. > [@](#): > > Let’s be up front with what we think here. What evidence would the anti-war contingent accept as proof that Iraq had been developing WMD? The testimony of high-level Iraqi officials? The existence of precursor chemicals, and directions on how to produce WMD? The presence of chemical munitions shells? Actual weapons of mass destruction would be nice. Or banned bio/chem substances that could be turned into practical mass weapons with generally available knowledge and technology. Other than that, who knows? I can hardly foresee what permutations of evidence _might_ be produced, so it’s kind of hard for me to say which ones I’d find convincing. But from my POV, it’s up to the Administration to produce clear and convincing evidence that Saddam recently had a functioning WMD program. This was our _casus belli_, our skimpy fig leaf of semi-legitimacy under pre-Bush Doctrine standards for starting a war, which our Administration claimed to have piles of evidence about. Now that we have Iraq, put-up-or-shut-up time is on its way. ---
**Author:** ![AZCowboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@AZCowboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AZCowboy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/23 "2003-04-22T15:35:23Z")
From today’s Washington Post: > [@](#): > > _[Hunt for Iraqi Arms Erodes Assumptions](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7310-2003Apr21.html)_ > CAMP DOHA, Kuwait – With little to show after 30 days, the Bush administration is losing confidence in its prewar belief that it had strong clues pointing to the whereabouts of weapons of mass destruction concealed in Iraq, according to planners and participants in the hunt. > > After testing some – though by no means all – of their best leads, analysts here and in Washington are increasingly doubtful that they will find what they are looking for in the places described on a five-tiered target list drawn up before fighting began. Their strategy is shifting from the rapid “exploitation” of known suspect sites to a vast survey that will rely on unexpected discoveries and leads. > … > If such weapons or the means of making them have been removed from the centralized control of former Iraqi officials, high-ranking U.S. officials acknowledged, then the war may prove to aggravate the proliferation threat that President Bush said he fought to forestall. > … > One such example came over the weekend, officials here said, when investigators interviewed an Iraqi scientist south of Baghdad. They said the scientist told them he took part in chemical weapons development and that Iraq had destroyed some weapons only days before the war began. He led them to samples of chemicals that the U.S. search team described as ingredients for lethal agents. But military officials would not identify the scientist, the lethal agents or the ingredients that were found. They did not permit a New York Times reporter, who was accompanying the search team and was the first to report the discovery, to interview the scientist. > > Without further details of the find, experts said, its significance cannot be assessed. > … > Wing Cmdr. Sebastian Kendall, a British Royal Air Force officer who leads the site exploitation planning center at Camp Doha, said “there has been no conscious decision to reduce the number of teams devoted to weapons of mass destruction.” But, he added, “it’s true to say that the environment is changing based on reality.” And this quote specifically for **elucidator** > [@](#): > > “There’s a common assumption that if you know they have chemical or biological weapons, then your intelligence should be good enough to know where they are,” said Feith. As to **Shodan’s** valid question, as I posted in another thread previously, certainly a “smoking gun” cache of bio/chem tipped missles would suffice as proof. But I will even acknowledge the far-fetched possibility that all such weapons have been (recently) destroyed or transferred outside the country. For acceptable proof, I would expect to see multiple independent corroborated interviews with Iraqi scientists, conducted by a neutral third party. To be effective, the US needs to quickly sequester these individuals, and bring in a neutral third party (the UN or even France could meet this criteria) and begin these sorts of interviews. Too much time in US military control will begin to dilute the effectiveness of such an approach. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/24 "2003-04-22T15:43:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ElJeffe \* > \*\*Ya know, I saw a headline which was actually pretty close to this over the weekend. I can’t remember which tabloid, but I do know that Saddam and some Bat-creature were prominently mentioned. Hey, maybe it’s true… > \*\* That wouldn’t happen to have been the Gotham Tribune, would it? ---
**Author:** ![AZCowboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@AZCowboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AZCowboy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/25 "2003-04-22T16:25:33Z")
More from today’s Washington Post: > [@](#): > > _[Security Council Set To Debate Blix Role](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8139-2003Apr21.html)_ > Blix said today that he is willing to return to Iraq if the council grants its blessing. But he said that he would require “independence” from the U.S. military and the same freedom he possessed during inspections he led from November until shortly before the start of the war in March, including the authority to go anywhere in the country and interview any Iraqi specialists he chooses. “I can’t be on a leash,” he said in an interview. Seems reasonable to me… > [@](#): > > The United States, meanwhile, has stepped up the recruitment of current and former U.N. inspectors from the United States, Britain and Australia to participate in an American inspection unit that will verify any discoveries of banned weapons by U.S. military forces. U.S. forces to date have not uncovered any proscribed weapons. Recipe for disaster… > [@](#): > > The effort has generated friction between the United States and its closest ally, Britain. The British government has discouraged civilian British specialists from joining until their role has been more clearly defined, according to diplomatic sources and former inspectors. “We need to have some element of independent verification,” Britain’s junior foreign minister, Mike O’Brien, said today. Mark me down as supporting the Brits on this one. ---
**Author:** ![AZCowboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@AZCowboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AZCowboy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/26 "2003-04-22T16:38:41Z")
And from Reuters: > [@](#): > > _[U.S. Still Confident It Will Find WMD in Iraq](http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=2604731)_ > Numerous suspect substances have been tested but so far none have been found to be illicit weapons, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks told a news briefing at Central Command’s war headquarters in Qatar. > > “We’ve not found any weaponized chemicals, biological agents or any nuclear devices at this point. That work is ongoing,” Brooks said. > > “We remain confident that we’ll find evidence of the program that’s been in place in Iraq for some time.” This is beginning to sound more like fundamentalist faith than reasoned opinion based on credible evidence. Could any of the hawks offer reasoning why the US would not want independent third party (UN or otherwise) weapons inspectors in Iraq? If we are so confident that WoMD evidence remains, why wouldn’t we want third party verification? As I understand the situation, Iraq is losing billions of dollars each day that oil production is curtailed. In an interview I heard yesterday, the reason that production hasn’t restarted is based mostly on the UN sanctions. That is, the oil wells could be pumping, but right now all the storage facilities and pipelines are full, and until the flow outside the country begins, the pumps can’t be restarted. It would appear to me that the quickest way to restore the wealth of Iraq would be to quickly accommodate UN inspectors in order to remove the UN sanctions. Why isn’t this being done? What’s the downside? ---
**Author:** ![RandySpears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/858c86/32.png) [@RandySpears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RandySpears)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/27 "2003-04-22T17:23:12Z")
**AZ** : Those questions are worthy of a thread of their own! “Why should not the inspectors be allowed to return?”, or sumthin. ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/28 "2003-04-22T17:46:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by AZCowboy \* > \*\*From today’s Washington Post: > > And this quote specifically for **elucidator** > > “There’s a common assumption that if you know they have chemical or biological weapons, then your intelligence should be good enough to know where they are,” said Feith. > \*\* Am I wrong in thinking that you do Feith and the author of the article an injustice in taking that quote out of context? > [@](#): > > “There’s a common assumption that if you know they have chemical or biological weapons, then your intelligence should be good enough to know where they are,” said Feith. “But you may hear people talking, referring to specific substances or items, so you know from that that they have those substances or items but may not know where the items are.” If you read only the quotes you took from the article, one might get the impression of an administration that is losing faith that WMDs exist. But if you read the article, the impression is more that “it’s pretty clear that this stuff is not where it was, so we’re probably going to have to spend a lot of time interviewing people and sifting through documents to figure out what happened to it.” As for your question about why not allow third-party UN inspectors – I’m not particularly a hawk, but if you’re sifting through evidence, do you really want another group competing with you for this evidence unless it’s clear that they will coordinate well with your teams? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/29 "2003-04-22T17:53:28Z")
> [@](#): > > if you’re sifting through evidence, do you really want another group competing with you for this evidence unless it’s clear that they will coordinate well with your teams? Well, there is not really a need to compete. If the U.S. simply stood out of the way and let Blix and company do all the work, there would be no competition–and no need for the U.S. to expend their energy in looking. ---
**Author:** ![AZCowboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@AZCowboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AZCowboy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2003, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/30 "2003-04-22T17:53:50Z")
**Randy** , point taken, for any further responses to the issues I’ve raised, please refer to this thread, [“Why not use third party verfication for WoMD hunt?”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=178973) **Finagle** , if you don’t mind, I will respond to you in that thread. ---
**Author:** ![OliverH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/278dde/32.png) [@OliverH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OliverH)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2003, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/31 "2003-04-23T05:51:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Finagle \* > \*\* > > As for your question about why not allow third-party UN inspectors – I’m not particularly a hawk, but if you’re sifting through evidence, do you really want another group competing with you for this evidence unless it’s clear that they will coordinate well with your teams? \*\* Simple: Because people with a specific intent to generate a certain result are the worst possible people to search for evidence, and because regardless how well they coordinate, the result should be the same as any other group would receive. Scientists are used to compete with other groups for evidence, and they are also used to providing the evidence they found to others. It’s how the scientific community works. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2003, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/32 "2003-04-23T18:50:53Z")
The way things are standing whether WOMD are found or not is a moot question and the answer is also of no value. With the USA having an interest in finding them in order to justify its actions and having barred Blix and any independent observers, if and when the USA says it has found the WOMD the whole worrld will laugh and snicker and no one save the US fundamentalists will believe the US government. OTOH, it may be that the US government really _is_ preaching to the choir and could not care less about the reast of the US population or the rest of the world. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/33 "2003-04-24T03:07:31Z")
> [@](#): > > OTOH, it may be that the US government really _is_ preaching to the choir and could not care less about the reast of the US population or the rest of the world. Bingo! Turn out the lights! The party’s over. We have a winner! ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/34 "2003-04-24T11:51:40Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shodan \* > \*\* Let’s be up front with what we think here. What evidence would the anti-war contingent accept as proof that Iraq had been developing WMD? \*\* A name, for starters. “An anonymous guy said _this_” is not evidence of anything. ---
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/35 "2003-04-24T12:23:35Z")
\> Let’s be up front with what we think here. What evidence \> would the anti-war contingent accept as proof that Iraq had \>been developing WMD? If the world ended and God said so?..oh wait, that’s just the result of a government conspiracy to plant evidence. Never mind, move along now… ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085/36 "2003-04-24T12:30:21Z")
A near perfect drive by, **Athelas**! Loaded with sarcasm and devoid of content. For my part, I would be quite happy to accept the existence of WMD’s as proof of development. Such is not, as you may have noticed, forthcoming. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-scientist-iraq-destroyed-own-wmd/170085.md?page=1)