- How the United States should react if Iraq acquired WMD.
"The first line of defense...should be a clear and classical statement
of deterrence-if they do acquire WMD, their weapons will be unusable because
any attempt to use them will bring national obliteration."
-
- --Condoleeza Rice
- US National Security Advisor
- January/February 2000 issue of Foreign Affairs
- 2/1/2000
-
- We are greatly concerned about any possible linkup between
terrorists and regimes that have or seek weapons of mass destruction...In
the case of Saddam Hussein, we've got a dictator who is clearly pursuing
and already possesses some of these weapons.. A regime that hates America
and everything we stand for must never be permitted to threaten America
with weapons of mass destruction.
-
- --Dick Cheney
- Vice President
- Detroit, Fund-Raiser
- 6/20/2002
-
- Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein
now has weapons of mass destruction.
-
- --Dick Cheney
- Vice President
- Speech to VFW National Convention
- 8/26/2002
-
- Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities
that were used for the production of biological weapons.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Speech to UN General Assembly
- 9/12/2002
-
- Iraq has stockpiled biological and chemical weapons,
and is rebuilding the facilities used to make more of those weapons. We
have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi
field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons the dictator
tells us he does not have
-
- --George W. Bush
- Radio Address
- 10/5/2002
-
- The Iraqi regime . . . possesses and produces chemical
and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons. We know that the
regime has produced thousands of tons of chemical agents, including mustard
gas, sarin nerve gas, VX nerve gas.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Cincinnati, Ohio Speech
- 10/7/2002
-
- Iraq could decide on any given day to provide biological
or chemical weapons to a terrorist group or to individual terrorists,...The
war on terror will not be won until Iraq is completely and verifiably deprived
of weapons of mass destruction.
-
- --Dick Cheney
- Vice President
- Denver, Address To Air National Guard
- 12/1/2002
-
- If he declares he has none, then we will know that Saddam
Hussein is once again misleading the world.
-
- --Ari Fleischer
- Press Secretary
- Press Briefing
- 12/2/2002
-
- We know for a fact that there are weapons there.
-
- --Ari Fleischer
- Press Secretary
- Press Briefing
- 1/9/2003
-
- Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein
had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and
VX nerve agent.
-
- --George W. Bush
- State of the Union Address
- 1/28/2003
-
- We know that Saddam Hussein is determined to keep his
weapons of mass destruction, is determined to make more.
-
- --Colin Powell, Secretary of State
- Remarks to UN Security Council
- 2/5/2003
-
- We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently
authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons
the dictator tells us he does not have.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Radio Address
- 2/8/2003
-
- In Iraq, a dictator is building and hiding weapons that
could enable him to dominate the Middle East and intimidate the civilized
world -- and we will not allow it.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Speech to the American Enterprise Institute
- 2/26/2003
-
- If Iraq had disarmed itself, gotten rid of its weapons
of mass destruction over the past 12 years, or over the last several months
since (UN Resolution) 1441 was enacted, we would not be facing the crisis
that we now have before us . . . But the suggestion that we are doing this
because we want to go to every country in the Middle East and rearrange
all of its pieces is not correct.
-
- --Colin Powell
- Secretary of State
- Interview with Radio France International
- 2/28/2003
-
- So has the strategic decision been made to disarm Iraq
of its weapons of mass destruction by the leadership in Baghdad? . . .
I think our judgment has to be clearly not.
-
- --Colin Powell
- Secretary of State
- Remarks to UN Security Council
- 3/7/2003
-
- Let's talk about the nuclear proposition for a minute.
We know that based on intelligence, that [Saddam] has been very, very good
at hiding these kinds of efforts. He's had years to get good at it and
we know he has been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons.
And we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.
-
- --Dick Cheney
- Vice President
- Meet The Press
- 3/16/2003
-
- 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.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Address to the Nation
- 3/17/2003
-
- Well, there is no question that we have evidence and
information that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical
particularly . . . all this will be made clear in the course of the operation,
for whatever duration it takes.
-
- --Ari Fleischer
- Press Secretary
- Press Briefing
- 3/21/2003
-
- There is no doubt that the regime of Saddam Hussein possesses
weapons of mass destruction. And . . . as this operation continues, those
weapons will be identified, found, along with the people who have produced
them and who guard them.
-
- --General Tommy Franks
- Commander in Chief Central Command
- Press Conference
- 3/22/2003
-
- One of our top objectives is to find and destroy the
WMD. There are a number of sites.
-
- --Victoria Clark
- Pentagon Spokeswoman
- Press Briefing
- 3/22/2003
-
- I have no doubt we're going to find big stores of weapons
of mass destruction. Kenneth Adelman, Defense Policy Board member
-
- --Washington Post, p. A27
- 3/23/2003
-
- We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit
and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.
-
- --Donald Rumsfeld
- Secretary of Defense
- ABC Interview
- 3/30/2003
-
- Obviously the administration intends to publicize all
the weapons of mass destruction U.S. forces find -- and there will be plenty.
-
- --Robert Kagan
- Neocon scholar
- Washington Post op-ed
- 4/9/2003
-
- I think you have always heard, and you continue to hear
from officials, a measure of high confidence that, indeed, the weapons
of mass destruction will be found.
-
- --Ari Fleischer
- Press Secretary
- Press Briefing
- 4/10/2003
-
- But make no mistake -- as I said earlier -- we have high
confidence that they have weapons of mass destruction. That is what this
war was about and it is about. And we have high confidence it will be found.
-
- --Ari Fleischer
- Press Secretary
- Press Briefing
- 4/10/2003
-
- Were not going to find anything until we find people
who tell us where the things are. And we have that very high on our priority
list, to find the people who know. And when we do, then well learn precisely
where things were and what was done.
-
- --Donald Rumsfeld
- Secretary of Defense
- Meet the Press
- 4/13/2003
-
- I have absolute confidence that there are weapons of
mass destruction inside this country. Whether we will turn out, at the
end of the day, to find them in one of the 2,000 or 3,000 sites we already
know about or whether contact with one of these officials who we may come
in contact with will tell us, ``Oh, well, there's actually another site,''
and we'll find it there, I'm not sure.
-
- --General Tommy Franks
- Commander in Chief Central Command
- Fox New
- 4/13/2003
-
- We are learning more as we interrogate or have discussions
with Iraqi scientists and people within the Iraqi structure, that perhaps
he destroyed some, perhaps he dispersed some. And so we will find them.
-
- --George W. Bush
- NBC Interview
- 4/24/2003
-
- There are people who in large measure have information
that we need . . . so that we can track down the weapons of mass destruction
in that country.
-
- --Donald Rumsfeld
- Secretary of Defense
- Press Briefing
- 4/25/2003
-
- We'll find them. It'll be a matter of time to do so.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Remarks to Reporters
- 5/3/2003
-
- I'm absolutely sure that there are weapons of mass destruction
there and the evidence will be forthcoming. We're just getting it just
now.
-
- --Colin Powell
- Secretary of State
- Remarks to Reporters
- 5/4/2003
-
- We never believed that we'd just tumble over weapons
of mass destruction in that country.
-
- --Donald Rumsfeld
- Secretary of Defense
- Fox News Interview
- 5/4/2003
-
- I'm not surprised if we begin to uncover the weapons
program of Saddam Hussein -- because he had a weapons program.
-
- --George W. Bush
- Remarks to Reporters
- 5/6/2003
-
- U.S. officials never expected that "we were going
to open garages and find" weapons of mass destruction.
-
- --Condoleeza Rice
- US National Security Advisor
- Reuters Interview
- 5/12/2003
-
- I just don't know whether it was all destroyed years
ago -- I mean, there's no question that there were chemical weapons years
ago -- whether they were destroyed right before the war, (or) whether they're
still hidden.
-
- --Maj. Gen. David Petraeus
- Commander 101st Airborne
- Press Briefing
- 5/13/2003
-
- We said all along that we will never get to the bottom
of the Iraqi WMD program simply by going and searching specific sites,
that you'd have to be able to get people who know about the programs to
talk to you.
-
- --Paul Wolfowitz
- Deputy Secretary of Defense
- Interview with Australian Broadcasting
- 5/13/2003
-
- Before the war, there's no doubt in my mind that Saddam
Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical. I expected
them to be found. I still expect them to be found.
-
- --Gen. Michael Hagee
- Commandant of the Marine Corps
- Interview with Reporters
- 5/21/2003
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