Email this page to friends RSS feed About the Author Jeff Edwards is a retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer, and an Anti-Submarine Warfare Specialist. He is currently working as a civilian expert consultant to the Fleet Anti-Submarine Warfare Command, the Navy's think tank for high-tech undersea warfare. His naval career spanned more than two decades and half the globe -- from chasing Soviet nuclear attack submarines during the Cold War, to launching cruise missiles in the Persian Gulf. He puts his extensive experience as a Surface Warfare specialist to work in his new novel, TORPEDO. In a plot that could easily be ripped from today's headlines, TORPEDO combines an accident at a nuclear power plant, an illegal arms deal, and a biological warfare attack, to ignite a crisis that could draw Western Europe, the Middle East, and the United States into all-out war. TORPEDO mixes the elements of a classic sea chase novel with state-of-the-art technology to create a cutting-edge Surface Warfare Thriller. TORPEDO is the winner of the 2005 Admiral Nimitz Award for Outstanding Naval Fiction. Sound Off! Got an opinion about this article? Make your voice heard on the Jeff Edwards discussion forum. Jeff Edwards contact info: TheDeckPlate Website Email Jeff Edwards Jeff Edwards Books: Torpedo: A Surface Warfare Thriller Jeff Edwards Archives Military Opinions Index Related Links Related Column: Why Subs Matter Now by Joe Buff Military Equipment Guide Your Two Cents Submit your stories, news items, or a benefits update -- and help Military.com bring the best, most important stories to your fellow servicemembers, veterans, and family members. Contribute here

Did President Bush deliberately mislead the American public about the threat of Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq? A lot of people think he did, but I don't happen to be one of them.

I get five or six emails a week on this subject, as well as a fair number of postings in my Military.com discussion forum. I try to answer each of those emails and postings as honestly and thoroughly as I can. My goal is not so much to change the other person's point of view, as to help him or her understand how I arrived at my own position regarding WMDs in Iraq. To that end, I generally include links to the resources and documents that have been instrumental in shaping my opinion.

Having revealed the basis for my own opinions, I often ask them to share the rationale for their beliefs. I also ask them to cite the documents, evidence, or testimonies that helped them formulate their position.

The responses vary wildly. Some people break off the dialogue immediately, as though examining the thought-process behind an opinion is entirely out of bounds. A few shift instantly from conversation mode to name calling. (One of these accused me of being so tightly wrapped in the flag that I can't see anything.) And some -- a small minority -- actually provide links to the resources they consider important.

I am continually astounded by the fact that very few of the President's critics seem to have actually examined the evidence regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. Thousands of pages of unclassified (or declassified) documents on the subject have been released by the United Nations, the World Health Organization, the CIA, the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and a score of other organizations. The findings of the UN weapons inspectors, including UNSCOM and UNMOVIC reports, are available online. The deliberations and findings of the UN Security Council are just a mouse-click away, but a lot of people are too busy hating the President to review the data.

I've read as many of the reports as I can get my hands on, with particular attention to the evidence provided before the onset of military action in Iraq. In my opinion, given the information available at the time, there was every reason to believe that Saddam Hussein had an ongoing chemical/biological warfare program even as the weapons inspection teams were carrying out their UN mandate.

In the eyes of many Bush-detractors, anything that supports the position of the current administration qualifies as propaganda, and can be automatically disregarded. But many of the reports come from sources outside of the American government, and a lot of the documents predate the Bush administration. A significant number originate from sources that are overtly critical of the United States and/or the President, making it fairly difficult to dismiss their contents as Bush administration propaganda.

I'm going to quote from several of those reports. I apologize in advance, because some of what you're about to read is a little on the dry side. (Apparently, politicians are even more in love with their own words than most writers are.) So parts of this will be a bit long winded. But it's worth reading. There's a lot of important information to be gleaned -- information that might just answer the question as to whether or not the President lied about the threat of WMDs in Iraq.

Let's start with a fact that many people have apparently forgotten: Saddam Hussein's possession and use of WMDs is an established fact. We know with utter certainty that he had them, and that he used them.

The UN website contains eyewitness testimonies from people who were present when WMDs were used by Iraqi forces. This is directly from a United Nations Commission on Human Rights report on the subject:

A young man, who was a mere boy at the time, survived the Halabcha bombings in March 1988. He described to the Special Rapporteur the horror that followed the bombing of his native town with chemical weapons such as mustard gas, and the continuing effects on his health and that of hundreds of others who also survived the onslaught. Thousands of people died, including 25 members of his family, and thousands more are still suffering today from heart disease, breathing problems and eye allergies.

That same report goes on to say:

During his consultations with a Kurdish delegation in Amman in December 2003, the Special Rapporteur heard evidence on issues such as the Anfal campaign, executions and mass graves. There now exists documentary evidence inculpating the mastermind and chief executioner of these crimes, Ali Hassan Al-Majeed, alias ‘Chemical Ali,' and proves the existence, at the highest governmental level, of the criminal intent to mercilessly exterminate the Kurds and implant people of mainly Arab origin in their homes and villages, in a process that amounted to genocide.

A BBC News article from March of 2002 references both the massacre and the use of WMDs:

Iraqi aircraft shelled Halabja with chemical weapons on 16 March 1988, in an attack which left 5,000 dead and 7,000 injured or with long-term illnesses.

Saddam Hussein's infamous Anfal campaign is incredibly well documented, and there are literally thousands of eyewitnesses. Even Aljazeera (not exactly a pro-Bush organization) concedes that Hussein's regime conducted massive chemical weapons attacks on the Kurdish town of Halabja, resulting in thousands of deaths.

Of course, the Anfal campaign is classified as old news. Nearly fifteen years had elapsed between those massacres and the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom. As far as I know, there's not statute of limitations on mass murder, but Saddam Hussein's record as a homicidal despot is not the current point of contention.

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