[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Pages 15410-15411]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                  IRAQ

  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I rise to talk about the intelligence we had 
prior to going into Iraq and the decision that was made 
overwhelmingly--by I believe 77 votes in this body--to authorize the 
use of force against Iraq. Today we have received the copy of the 
Butler report in Great Britain talking about their intelligence 
failures as well. Lord Butler examined the intelligence the British 
Government had and found there were problems in their intelligence as 
well. But they did an in-depth assessment of what they knew then and 
what they know now.
  I thought it was very interesting, since yesterday on this floor a 
question had been raised about the statement President Bush made in his 
address to a joint session of both Houses of Congress that Saddam 
Hussein had sought uranium from Africa.
  Conclusion No. 499 in the Butler report is as follows:

       We conclude that, on the basis of intelligence assessments 
     at the time, covering both Niger and the Democratic Republic 
     of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy uranium 
     from Africa in the Government's dossier and by the Prime 
     Minister in the House of Commons, were well-founded.

  By extension, we also conclude that the statement in President Bush's 
State of the Union Address of 28 January, 2003, that the British 
Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant 
quantities of uranium from Africa was well-founded.
  In other words, an examination by the committee, headed by Lord 
Butler, to examine intelligence produced by the British Intelligence 
Service was accurate, that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa as part 
of its nuclear weapons program. So much for the charges by many--some 
in this body--that there was no basis for this statement that President 
Bush made, based on British intelligence that Iraq was seeking uranium 
from Africa and that it was not well-founded. It was. And on that, we 
now have a conclusion from Lord Butler that was the case.
  I think the issue was more fully discussed, obviously, in the 
conclusions of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and in the 
separate opinion, separate findings produced by Chairman Roberts, to 
which I and other members of the committee signed off.
  Today, as I came to work, I heard on the radio a very regrettable and 
unfortunate opinion piece by a writer from the Washington Post, saying 
that, obviously, President Bush should not have gone into Iraq, saying 
in effect that taking down Saddam Hussein was wrong. He was telling our 
troops, who are on the ground risking their lives--and too many who 
have given up their lives--we are fighting in vain. That is absolute 
nonsense. It is regrettable that we have forgotten during a time of war 
that, generally, politics stops at the water's edge.
  As I have mentioned before on the floor, there seems to be a 
concerted effort by our friends in the other party to contend that, 
because the intelligence was not as good as it should have been, we 
should not have gone in and deposed the murderous tyrant who had not 
only slaughtered tens of thousands of his own people, the Kurds, 
invaded Kuwait, and threatened Saudi Arabia, but also provided a harbor 
for terrorists such as al-Qaida and Abu al-Zarqawi's group.
  I have had the opportunity to talk to some of the young men and women 
who have put their lives on the line in Iraq. I would trust their 
judgment far more than I would trust a political hatchet job by a 
writer who is trying to score political points against the President 
and the Vice President.
  Let me go back to a couple of conclusions from the Senate Select 
Committee on Intelligence.
  Conclusion 92, on page 345, says:

       The CIA's examination of contacts, training, and safe haven 
     and operational cooperation as indicators of a possible Iraq/
     al-Qaida relationship was a reasonable and objective approach 
     to the question.

  Conclusion 95, on page 347, says:

       The CIA's assessment on safe haven that--that al-Qaida or 
     associated operatives were present in Baghdad and 
     northeastern Iraq in an area under Kurdish control--was 
     reasonable.

  In other words, judgments were reasonable that this was a country 
harboring terrorists. Thinking back, do you know what the President 
said? He said that we are going to carry the war to the terrorists. We 
are going to go after them where they hide, where they take refuge. We 
wiped them out in Afghanistan and we had to go into Iraq where they 
were also gaining safe haven.
  To say we are not significantly safer in the United States, or people 
around the world, our allies, and free people are not safer as a result 
of deposing Saddam Hussein is pure nonsense. Unfortunately, we are at 
war with the terrorists. The terrorists were in Iraq. They had access 
to the weapons of mass destruction that Saddam Hussein had produced in 
the past and was willing to produce in the future.
  Over the last few days, we all have heard briefings on recent 
increased threats in the United States. Today, had we not acted in 
Iraq, we would be even more at risk to the possibility of terror, and 
the likelihood that those terrorist attacks would have included 
chemical or biological weapons would have been far greater.
  Our examination of what happened, what was going on in Iraq, 
conducted after the war found there were significant production 
capabilities for chemical and biological weapons in Iraq. There were 
terrorists there who were seeking to gain access to these weapons. Did 
we find large stockpiles? No. Did we expect to find large stockpiles? 
No. At best, they said the amount of chemical and biological weapons 
would be less than would fill a swimming pool.
  But the problem with these chemical and biological weapons, whether 
they be ricin, sarin gas, anthrax, or smallpox, very small amounts can 
cause significant death, damage, and destruction to the United States. 
The potential to kill people with these deadly biological and chemical 
weapons was terrific, and we are safer because we took him out.
  Do we know if we have captured all of the weapons of mass destruction 
that he produced? No. We cannot know that. We will find out more, I 
believe, as the Iraqi Government takes steps, through its own security 
forces, to go after the known and suspected terrorists, to find where 
they are. We have heard reports about chemical and biological weapons 
being dispersed. We cannot confirm where they are. We only hope and 
pray they are not in the hands of terrorists who have made their way to 
the United States. But only time will tell.
  Conclusion 97, which is on page 348 of the Intelligence Committee 
report, concluded:

       The CIA's judgment that Saddam Hussein, if sufficiently 
     desperate, might employ terrorists with global reach--al-
     Qaida--to conduct terrorist attacks in the event of war, was 
     reasonable.

  And of course it was reasonable; after all, we already knew Saddam 
Hussein was supporting terrorists such as the Arab Liberation Front, 
and he was offering money to the families of suicide bombers, 
particularly Hamas. We know he had the ability to turn his 
manufacturing capabilities, with the scientists he had, into the 
production of chemical and biological weapons.
  We know how tragic the terrorist attack of 9/11 was on our soil. We 
lost over 3,000 people. They used unconventional weapons--airplanes 
loaded with fuel--to cause those deaths. I tremor to think about what 
could happen if chemical or biological weapons were used in large areas 
where unsuspecting civilians are gathered in the United States.
  After what happened on 9/11, we had many investigations saying why 
didn't we put all of those elements together?

[[Page 15411]]

They were very fragmentary. We had walls that prevented us from sharing 
that information among our intelligence agencies. It would have been 
almost impossible, even in hindsight, to connect all the dots and know 
what was going to happen on 9/11.
  After that, intelligence analysts were under great pressure to try to 
identify potential attacks on the United States, or the potential use 
by terrorists of weapons of mass destruction and they overstated many 
of those conclusions. But what we know from our own experience is that 
Saddam Hussein consistently engaged in a pattern of denial and 
deception. He made it very difficult to find out what he was doing. We 
know from his actions what a deadly, murderous terrorist he was. By 
removing the Saddam Hussein regime, we eliminated yet another front 
from which terrorists could operate safely; most importantly, we 
eliminated the possibility that Saddam's weapons programs in the future 
could be leveraged by terrorists who seek to destroy us.
  Finding huge stockpiles of weapons was not the objective of going 
into Iraq. The failure to do so should not be taken as a measure of the 
lack of success in Iraq. Prime Minister Tony Blair today said, on 
receiving the Butler report, that we were right to go into Iraq. He has 
been a steadfast ally, and we commend him.
  We also have the interim report of the Iraqi Survey Group. We spent a 
long time listening to Dr. David Kay in our closed sessions, but he has 
issued an interim report that we can quote. That interim report noted 
finding ``dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant 
amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during 
the Inspections that began in late 2002.''
  Some of these included, for example:

       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 
     research.

  That is chemical and biological weapons research.

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

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator's time has expired.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, is there any time remaining on our side?
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. No.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I ask for 1 more minute to conclude.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. I believe the Senator has 49 seconds 
remaining.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I will do the best I can with the time 
remaining to conclude.
  Dr. David Kay said he thought ``it was absolutely prudent'' going 
into Iraq. He went on to say:

       In fact, I think at the end of the inspection process, 
     we'll paint a picture of Iraq that was far more dangerous 
     than even we thought it was before the war. It was a system 
     collapsing. It was a country that had the capability in 
     weapons of mass destruction areas and in which terrorists, 
     like ants to honey, were going after it.

  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Graham of South Carolina). The Democratic 
leader is recognized.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I will use my leader time and reserve the 
time left under morning business for my colleagues.

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