Franks on the absence of WMD

Franks said in the Epilogue of his book that his greatest surprise was “The absence of weaponized WMD in Iraq.” In Parade, he insisted that “Every sign...from Arab leaders to intelligence estimates, had indicated that Saddam had them.” Again, this is something one would expect the Bush administration to jump on. Here is a certified war hero, a tough, no bullshit Army General, saying everything indicated that Saddam had WMD. Surely that provides a justification for going to war.

However, Franks once again could cause problems for Bush. The fact remains that no WMD have been found. In light of that fact, Franks’s statements that “We went to war to remove these weapons" (in his book) and WMD were “the reason we went to war” (in Parade) could be a little embarrassing to Bush (even though both Bush and Ari Fleischer said pretty much the same thing as the war started–but that should be addressed in a separate post). Due to the lack of weaponized WMD, the war has become about fighting terrorism and liberating the Iraqi people from the oppression of Saddam–and stopping Saddam’s weapons programs. Or, as President Bush said in his January 20, 2004, State of the Union Address, “weapons of mass destruction-related program activities.” Having Franks say that the reason we went to war was to get rid of weaponized WMD could make Bush look not so good since he has backed off that claim.

Furthermore, I do not understand how Franks can claim every sign indicated that Iraq had WMD. This simply is inaccurate. I will address this in detail in subsequent posts, but will say a few things about it here. The now infamous NIE (National Intelligence Estimate) of October 2002 actually contained caveats and qualifiers. Indeed, as George Tenet noted in a February 5, 2004 speech, the NIE never said Iraq was an imminent threat. The Defense Intelligence Agency issued a report in September 2002 saying there was no reliable evidence of whether Iraq was producing or stockpiling chemical weapons. The State Department expressed that there was not enough evidence to conclude that Iraq had a comprehensive approach to acquiring nuclear weapons. Experts in the Department of Energy did not think that Iraqi aluminum tubes were designed to produce weapons grade nuclear material. The Air Force disputed that Iraq’s unmanned aerial vehicles were intended to be used as weapons delivery systems. And there was more. In the Epilogue to his book, Franks elaborates on his claim, but not once does he acknowledge anything that indicated that Iraq did not have stockpiles of WMD. Not once does he address any of the caveats and qualifiers in any of the intelligence reports.

Moreover, as has been pointed out in tremendous detail by the Senate Intelligence Committee Report, much of our intelligence was wrong. Again, this is a fact that causes some embarrassment, so saying that all our intelligence indicated there were WMD is really not very helpfulto the Bush administration.

I am not saying that there was no evidence before the war that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or weapons programs. What I am saying is that NOT “every sign indicated” Iraq had weaponized WMD. Because of that, Franks saying that the reason we went to war was to get rid of weaponized WMD puts the Bush administration in a difficult position.