Defiance of Tyranny

Posted 2:21 AM by Steve
You want to know what smart is? Smart is framing a debate in a way in which you can't lose. The whole "Bush lied about WMD as a justification for going to Iraq" argument is the work of sheer, linguistic genius by the left. Here's why: Even accepting and responding to that argument at face value does two things: A) It implies that Iraq had no Weapons of Mass Destruction programs B) Obscures the two other main reasons that the United States of America liberated 25 million people in Iraq from a despotic and totalitarian regime. Those reasons are

1. Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq was, in fact, a state-sponsor of terrorism. 2. Human rights atrocities and a record of genocide in addition to the willful subversion and (two-sided) corruption of U.N. humanitarian efforts.

Republicans make the mistake of trying to reason with people who are more concerned with obfuscating the facts and realities of the situation rather than finding out what is real and acting to solve any real problems. Going back to issue "A" or weapons of mass destruction: Within six months of investigation in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein dozens of WMD-related program activities were discovered along with significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG has discovered that should have been declared to the U.N.

Examples of concealment:

Let me just give you a few examples of these concealment efforts, some of which I will elaborate on later:

A clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment subject to U.N. monitoring and suitable for continuing CBW (chemical biological weapons) research.

A prison laboratory complex, possibly used in human testing of BW (bioweapons) agents, that Iraqi officials working to prepare for U.N. inspections were explicitly ordered not to declare to the U.N.

? Reference strains of biological organisms concealed in a scientist's home, one of which can be used to produce biological weapons.

New research on BW-applicable agents, brucella and Congo Crimean hemorrhagic fever, and continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin were not declared to the U.N.

Documents and equipment, hidden in scientists' homes, that would have been useful in resuming uranium enrichment by centrifuge and electromagnetic isotope separation.

A line of UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) not fully declared at an undeclared production facility and an admission that they had tested one of their declared UAVs out to a range of 500 km, 350 km beyond the permissible limit.

? Continuing covert capability to manufacture fuel propellant useful only for prohibited SCUD-variant missiles, a capability that was maintained at least until the end of 2001 and that cooperating Iraqi scientists have said they were told to conceal from the U.N.

? Plans and advanced design work for new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1,000 km Â? well beyond the 150-km range limit imposed by the U.N. Missiles of a 1000 km range would have allowed Iraq to threaten targets throughout the Middle East, including Ankara, Cairo, and Abu Dhabi.

Folks, considering that it is a proven fact that Saddam Hussein was a state sponsor of terrorism both within his country and abroad, the discovery of these weapons of mass destruction programs, materials and efforts alone is a valid, legitimate reason to depose him.