- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Regardless
of whether Iraq had stockpiles of banned weapons, Washington would probably
have decided to invade Iraq anyway because of its "intent" and
its weapons-making ability, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell says.
-
- "I think it was clear that this was a regime with
intent, capability and it was a risk the president felt strongly we could
not take and it was something we all agreed to and would probably agree
to it again under any other set of circumstances," Powell told reporters
on Tuesday.
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- The United States' main justification for invading Iraq
in its first pre-emptive war was to eliminate the threat from President
Saddam Hussein's banned weapons.
-
- But the man President George W. Bush appointed to lead
the search for the weapons, David Kay, said late last month he believed
there were in fact no stockpiles of weapons.
-
- Powell, who made Washington's keynote presentation before
the United Nations to detail pre-war intelligence about Iraq's weapons
program, said, "The only thing that is even being discussed right
now is what stockpiles were out there."
-
- He noted that the intelligence surrounding the existence
of those weapons was to be investigated by a commission Bush is setting
up.
-
- "But the bottom line is this: The president made
the right decision. He made the right decision based on the history of
this regime, the intention that this leader -- terrible, despotic leader
-- had, and the capabilities at a variety of levels," Powell said.
-
- In his remarks, the top U.S. diplomat appeared to back
away from comments in an interview published earlier on Tuesday with the
Washington Post.
-
- Asked if he would have recommended an invasion knowing
Iraq had no prohibited weapons, Powell was quoted as saying, "I don't
know, because it was the stockpile that presented the final little piece
that made it more of a real and present danger and threat to the region
and to the world."
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