Was He Bluffing? Could We Afford to Care?

JINSA’s question remains, if all the relevant intelligence services believed Saddam had at least the precursors to WMD, and UNSCOM believed there was an enormous cache unaccounted for, what happened to it? Dr. Kay said there is some evidence that some weapons were actually destroyed in the 1990s, but the UN was not told. There is some evidence, too, he said, that stockpiles were moved to Syria.

JINSA’s question remains, if all the relevant intelligence services believed Saddam had at least the precursors to WMD, and UNSCOM believed there was an enormous cache unaccounted for, what happened to it? Dr. Kay said there is some evidence that some weapons were actually destroyed in the 1990s, but the UN was not told. There is some evidence, too, he said, that stockpiles were moved to Syria.

So let’s assume Saddam had no illegal weapons programs by 2002. Why didn’t he save himself? The “inspectors” were there to receive his evidence that the country was clean. If he had evidence, why didn’t he show it? Ambassador Dennis Ross, President Clinton’s special Middle East envoy, wrote before the war:

[Saddam] could have had sanctions lifted if he had been prepared to do what was required of him… From the beginning he failed the test… His determination… was not about avoiding humiliation… it was about preserving his ability to pursue his ambitions and designs… Many have said [he] is homicidal, not suicidal, and that when faced with the alternatives of survival or acceptance of disarmament, he will accept disarmament. Maybe, but I doubt [he] feels he is truly being faced with that choice. In his mind, he believes he has been able to maneuver inspection regimes before, and this one… ultimately will be no different. And he may be right. [He] will certainly try to create the impression that he is complying… He will count on the chief inspectors not wanting to declare he is in violation of his obligations… The temptation… will be to declare that Iraq has taken a step in the right direction and that they remain willing to work with it.

In this view, Saddam’s goal was retaining power and planning for the eventual restoration of his WMD capabilities. Maybe he maintained stockpiles believing he could survive the inspections or manipulate the UN so sanctions would be lifted without compliance. Maybe in the end he sent them to Syria. Or maybe he was just bluffing to be considered the biggest, baddest dude in the region. There was a time we might have cared which it was; then there came a time we couldn’t afford to care.

By 2001, almost everyone wanted to declare victory in Iraq and get out. Secretary of State Powell went on a regional tour to promote “smart sanctions,” hoping to find a way to “work with” Saddam. The “no fly” zones were hugely expensive and problematic, creating friction in Saudi Arabia. A Pentagon spokesman said, “Iraq is contained. It has a broken economy. It is an isolated state… that’s the fundamental accomplishment over the last 10 years.” France, Russia and Germany, interested in oil contracts, were agitating to remove sanctions. They, as much as Saddam, wanted it over.

But the largest attack on the American mainland since the War of 1812, made the Administration consider the relationship between terrorists and the states that harbor and support them. It was Saddam’s bad luck that the President decided that the region – fueled by oil money, oil-for-food money, cash payments for suicide bombers and bombastic secular and religious preachers – had become a swamp that was breeding anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-moderate-Muslim forces. We could ignore the swamp only at our ongoing peril. With WMD or without, Saddam would have to go.