Black Box Recorder

Powell in 2001: Iraq has no WMD

Via Juan Cole, we find out that John Pilger has done some more of that muckraking that he does so well:

A television report by Pilger aired on British screens last night said US Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice confirmed in early 2001 that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had been disarmed and was no threat.

But after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington on September 11 that year, Pilger claimed Rice said the US "must move to take advantage of these new opportunities" to attack Iraq and claim control of its oil.

Pilger uncovered video footage of Powell in Cairo on February 24, 2001 saying, "He (Saddam Hussein) has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbours."

Two months later, Rice reportedly said, "We are able to keep his arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt."

Powell boasted this was because America's policy of containment and its sanctions had effectively disarmed Saddam.

So sanctions "worked", in the sense that Saddam couldn't get WMD, but simultaneously, they didn't "work", because the US had to invade to prevent Saddam from using WMD against his neighbors. No, no contradiction there.

Atrios adds that the statement is up on the State Department's website:

We had a good discussion, the Foreign Minister and I and the President and I, had a good discussion about the nature of the sanctions -- the fact that the sanctions exist -- not for the purpose of hurting the Iraqi people, but for the purpose of keeping in check Saddam Hussein's ambitions toward developing weapons of mass destruction. We should constantly be reviewing our policies, constantly be looking at those sanctions to make sure that they are directed toward that purpose. That purpose is every bit as important now as it was ten years ago when we began it. And frankly they have worked. He has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors.

I wonder when members of the Bush administration will begin trotting out the Ronald "I-have-no-recollection-of-that-event" Reagan defence.

Incidentally, in Professor Cole's post, we also find this nugget:

...in his Fox News interview on Monday evening in the US, President George W. Bush admitted that he does not read the newspapers and only knows what is going on in the world from briefings given him by Andy Card and Dr. Rice.

One thing that should definitely be on the president's Christmas list: one of those "genius at work" signs.

Why I hate Bush: Reason #79 - The man would rather be playing golf than fixing that ignorance problem.