Iraqi Weapons: The Confusion among Disarmament Specialists
By Yann Laurent
Le Monde
Wednesday 16 July 2003
Several strategic analysis centers declared themselves convinced of the existence of weapons of mass destruction in the autumn of 2002. Today they’re investigating themselves, reconsidering their work, and denouncing the “use” to which they’ve been put by Washington and London.
Where are the weapons of mass destruction that justified going to war against Iraq? Accused of lies and manipulations, George Bush and Tony Blair are summoned to explain. And their intelligence services are on the hot seat. But the question is also asked of the community of disarmament specialists. Autumn 2002, several strategic analysis centers concluded that there existed a deadly arsenal in Iraq. Their diagnostics converged with those of the CIA and of the British Joint Intelligence Committee.
“Biological and chemical weapons exist for good and for sure and their use is altogether possible in the case of war", asserted François Heisbourg, President of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in Le Monde on September 10. The day before, the IISS made a noted report on Saddam Hussein’s armament public. The IISS estimated that the Baghdad regime was not in a position to develop nuclear arms rapidly, but that its chemical and biological weapons capacities remained.
This report would inspire the British government to constitute its September 24 dossier on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Certain researchers did not disguise their opinion : “It would be better to act militarily against Iraq while its capacities are still far from its goals, rather than wait until they’ve got nuclear weapons”, declared IISS Research Director, Gary Samore, to CNN, on September 9.
Today, the same experts are compelled to painful revisions. Those who were the most convinced of the existence of WMD don’t hide their “problem” given the “mystery” of the Iraqi arsenal. Three months after Baghdad’s fall, no proof has been found of the existence or destruction of WMD.
“It’s a strange thing” admits François Heisbourg, who, apart from his functions at IISS, is Director of the Foundation for Strategic Research (FSR). However, he immediately adds: “The Americans find nothing, but the Iraqis have still not proven the elimination of their Iran-Iraq war stocks.” The IISS has not completely changed its views: one of its specialists, John Chipman, assured the BBC, last week: “We’ll find the proof of a program of weapons of mass destruction.”
Why then, this inability of American-British forces to find them in Iraq? “There’s something that escapes me, something I don’t understand”, Jacques Beltran, who worked at the Institut français des relations internationales (IFRI) last autumn, confessed. "Hans Blix –then UN Chief Inspector-himself asked the question in his pre-war reports about the fate of the thousands of liters of toxins that have never been found. Unless they’ve evaporated, we’ll end up finding them”, he reckons.
Disarmament specialists are reduced to hypotheses. François Heisbourg imagines one scenario: perhaps the weapons were destroyed before the war, shortly after the Nov. 8 Security Council adoption of resolution 1441 which organized the disarmament inspectors’ return.
"The Iraqis didn’t want to show that they no longer had weapons of dissuasion” and the Americans can’t “admit having failed to find out” imagines the IISS President before concluding: "My only certitude is that there were WMD.” “And, besides, in any case there was the threat of proliferation”, adds Jacques Beltran.
However these experts also reconsider the range of their work and explain that it must be considered in context. They note that their “means of investigation are limited”. “We based ourselves on UNSCOM (UN commission on Disarmament in Iraq) logic and reports- which only indicated a partial destruction of Iraqi weapons. If nothing is found, my problem will persist and the professionalism of the disarmament inspectors could be called into question”, warns Jacques Beltran. “The WMD are, in any case, a secondary problem now”, insists Philippe Moreau-Desfarges, expert in “questions of global governance” at IFRI, acknowledging that “some mistakes had been committed”. “We’ve become more cautious”, he reassures us.
Once close to American-British positions, these researchers hold an unexpected opinion of the coalition. They unanimously denounce London and Washington’s “usage” of which they have been victims. “The politicians have clothed the facts they had available according to their own fancy and even facts that weren’t available…” summarizes François Heisbourg. The Niger uranium is a “characteristic lie”; “the famous mobile laboratories have never been seen by independent experts”, he enumerates. Britain’s September 24 dossier is described as “a mish mash of the work of eighteen year-old thesis writers” by the IISS president, who concludes, “The British were creatively inspired.”
The debate also turns to a settling of accounts between researchers. "I’m surprised by the IISS’ new position. It’s either bad faith or incompetence”, fumes Pascal Boniface, Director of the Institute for International and Strategic Relations (IISR). “In September, they recommended immediate military intervention. Anyone who didn’t take up the dominant Americano-British line was immediately described as an Iraqi agent, a Gaullo-Mitterrandist with blinkers on”, remembers Mr. Boniface.
A part of the scientific community has violently criticized the IISS report. "The Institute gave Blair his argument. The report was politically oriented and justified military intervention” concludes Jacques Beltran. “The IISS is based in London, but breathes in Washington. Its report fell exactly where it was needed in American strategy. We were no longer in the realm of making technical statements, but of political recommendations”, asserts Pascal Boniface.
“It’s the vocation of an organization like mine to contribute to the debate. I take total responsibility for this superb work, the only serious work on this subject in the public domain”, François Heisbourg defends himself. A new battle is underway between WMD experts. But nothing and no one has so far come to contradict Hans Blix and Mohammed ElBaradei’s conclusions before the United Nations Security Council March 7: “We have found no proof of forbidden activities-…-No installation for the production or storage of chemical or biological products has been found.”
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Translation: TruthOut French language correspondent Leslie Thatcher.
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