[Peace-discuss] Assume they find WMDs

[John Fettig]

* Chuck Minne <mincam2 at yahoo.com>: 
>  Put differently, what do we say when the evidence is discovered? And
>  shouldn't we be saying it now?

Sorry for replying twice, but I can't help it.  There are just too many
arguments against the war.

Tell the people you are talking to that we are in violation of 1441:

" 10.     Requests  all Member States to give full support to UNMOVIC
and the IAEA in the discharge of their mandates, including by providing
any information related to prohibited programmes or other aspects of
their mandates, including on Iraqi attempts since 1998 to acquire
prohibited items, and by recommending sites to be inspected, persons to
be interviewed, conditions of such interviews, and data to be collected,
the results of which shall be reported to the Council by UNMOVIC and the
IAEA;"

Now it has been pointed out to me that the first word means a lot:
"requests".  I need a lawyer to clear this up for me, but I guess this
means "pretty pretty please, with sugar on top" but does not mean that
we have to comply.

But take the argument that divulging the information that we have about
Saddam's arsenal (and it seems what Powell presented was the tip of the
iceberg) would compromise our intelligence sources.  My answer to that
is: won't sending hundreds of thousands of troops and dropping 800 bombs
compromise the lives of a hell of a lot of american soldiers, iraqi
soldiers, and iraqi civilians?  When these people took their jobs in the
intelligence business, they knew full well the risks of being a spy.
It's just like being a soldier.  Why do we treat them like they are
untouchables?

Put it another way, why can't we move our intelligence sources to a safe
location, divulge the information, and then get new intelligence
sources?  Is this so much more difficult than starting a war and killing
1/2 million people?  It would seem that the answer to this question is
trivial, but since the Bush administration doesn't think it is, that
leads me to believe that he has his wittle heart set on war, and
nobody's gonna make him stop.

Another argument:  Saddam is a nutcase, that's confirmed.  He believes
that he won the first gulf war.  It is also confirmed that if backed
into a corner, he will use everything in his arsenal to kill as many
people as possible.  Now, if we don't know where his arsenal is, how are
we going to destroy it before he has a chance to use it?  This sounds
like a suicide mission, with the entire armed services participating,
not to mention all of the people living in Israel.  So why are we so
hell bent on backing him into the corner that will prompt him to use his
arsenal of WMD's?

John