WMD conspiracy

WMD stands for weapons of mass destruction, and that stands for war, and that means Iraq, and that stands for the conspiracy to take over Iraq's oil. See how that works?

As everyone knows the rationale for the 2nd Iraq War was that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction and this was reason George W. Bush wanted to invade Iraq, using the authority for the Afghanistan War as the pretext for a new war.

As we now know, the U.S. army didn't find any WMD's in Iraq. Was this because Saddam Hussein got them out of the Iraq before the invasion? Or, was it because of faulty CIA intelligence? Or, was it because they really wanted the oil?

I think there's an element of truth in all three reasons. I will dismiss the usual political rhetoric about this and concentrate on the technical possibilities.

Obviously, Saddam Hussein shipped his chemical and biological weapons to Syria. We see that Syria has been using them against the rebels in the current civil war, a despicable act that gained Assad a United Nations' rebuke. I don't believe that Iraq had nuclear weapons. If they had, they would have gone to Iran. Maybe some Iraq nuclear technology ended up there as we see in Iran's current capability that led up the recent treaty with the U.S. However, this technology could have been acquired from the Russians. I believe that Iraq's only WMD's were anthrax and sarin. Saddam had used these against enemies before the invasion, and it only makes sense that he shipped them out before the U.S. invasion.

The fact that the CIA provided the Bush administration with faulty intelligence about Iraq's WMD's is well documented. The CIA was relying on Iran and Syrian intelligence and should have realized that it was not reliable. In the rush to go to war, Bush quickly accepted this faulty intelligence as being solid evidence for action. Congress was not able to resist the call to war because of the danger to the United States, especially since Saddam Hussein was supposedly known to be aiding terrorists, even though it wasn't true. Linking Hussein to Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden provided a lighting rod to spur congress to action, especially in the aftermath of 9/11. What surprises me is the fact that Britain went along with this.

The possibility that the Bush administration was concerned about Iraq oil is real. The United States fought the first Iraq war to protect Kuwaiti and Saudi Arabian oil from Saddam Hussein. The loss of Middle East oil would have been disastrous, especially if it would have fallen into Al Qaeda hands. Despite the fact that Tony Blair said that the idea of fighting for oil is only a conspiracy, it was a reality. Most wars are fought for territory or resources. That's a fact of life, and this was no exception.

Thanks for reading.