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BASIC SPECIAL REPORT

BASIC Special Report 2004.1 · January 2004

Unravelling the Known Unknowns:
Why no Weapons of Mass Destruction have been found in Iraq

By David Isenberg and Ian Davis

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Appendix 1: Lest We Forget: US Claims of Iraqi WMD Capabilities

August 23, 2002 "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction." Vice President Dick Cheney, speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Nashville, Tennessee.¹⁴⁸

September 13, 2002 "Growing stockpiles of Iraqi weapons, toxins and delivery systems have accumulated". Sen. Joseph Lieberman on the Senate floor. ¹⁴⁹

October 7, 2002 "Iraq possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons." President Bush in a nationally televised speech. ¹⁵⁰

January 7, 2003 "There's no doubt in my mind but that they currently have chemical and biological weapons." Donald Rumsfeld, Pentagon news briefing. Pressed by a reporter, Rumsfeld made clear that he was not basing his assertion on the fact that Iraqis had used chemical weapons in the past. ¹⁵¹

January 9, 2003 "We know for a fact that there are weapons there." White House spokesman Ari Fleischer. ¹⁵²

February 8, 2003 President Bush said in his weekly radio address: "We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons the dictator tells us he does not have." No such weapons were used against American troops during the fighting. ¹⁵³

March 16, 2003 "We believe he [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." Vice President Cheney on NBC's "Meet the Press".¹⁵⁴

March 17, 2003 "…intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. The regime has already used weapons of mass destruction . . . ." President Bush, speech to the nation in which he also said that Saddam had 48 hours to leave town. ¹⁵⁵

March 30, 2003 "We know where they are." Donald Rumsfeld on ABC's "This Week With George Stephanopoulos," referring to "weapons of mass destruction".¹⁵⁶

According to Sen. Bill Nelson (D) of Florida, the Bush administration last year told him and 75 other senators that Iraq not only had WMD, but they had the means to deliver them to East Coast cities. Nelson said the senators were told Iraq had both biological and chemical weapons, notably anthrax, and it could deliver them to cities along the Eastern seaboard via unmanned aerial vehicles, commonly known as drones.¹⁵⁷

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