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The Lie: "Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction." (Dick Cheney Speech to VFW 8/26/02)

The Truth: Iraq had no inventories of WMD's after Saddam Hussein ordered their destruction in 1991, according to the definitive report by Charles Duelfer.

Rightwing Red Herrings:

1. WMD's were found in Iraq.

• In 2003, a small number of chemical weapons shells were found. These shells had deteriorated from age and were no longer usable. The Iraqi military did not include them in their weapons inventory and did not know they existed.

2. Iraq secretly moved its WMD's to Syria.

• The Duelfer Report concluded that was false.

3. Iraq "acted like" it had WMD's by not disclosing everything to UN inspectors as required under U.N. Resolution 1441.

• Under intense pressure from the U.S. and the U.N., Iraq allowed U.N. inspectors to inspect wherever they wanted and to interview whoever they wanted.
• In January 2003, Iraq gave UN inspectors a CD that included every document it could find about its WMD's. The White House immediately deleted 2/3 of the CD.

4. In 2003, every intelligence service in the world believed Iraq had WMD's.

• There have been no reports published by foreign intelligence services about what they "believed" in 2003.
• The Bush Administration could not persuade a majority of the U.N. Security Council to support a U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
• Most of the world's nations (including France, Germany, Russia, and China) opposed the U.S. invasion and supported continuing U.N. inspections to determine whether any WMD's still existed in Iraq.

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