Untitled Document
In the pre-Iraq invasion period, one common tactic used to discredit Iraq was
to talk of its “deception”. One example used was to cite the defection
in August 1995 of the Iraqi official, Hussein Kamel. George Bush told the United
Nations on 12 September 2002 that Iraq, between 1991 and 1995, maintained it had
no biological weapons, but that the defection of the Iraqi official (Hussein Kamel)
in 1995 unveiled this lie and uncovered Iraq’s biological weapons program.
The allegation extrapolated from this was that Iraq was now hiding WMD because
of this past deception. However, Bush’s statement was also an example of
deception as it was false and misleading.
While this story was largely true, what was never mentioned was that the defector
also stated that Iraq destroyed all its WMD in 1991.1 Even though this vital
news was broken in some sections of the media before the invasion, its significance
never really gained widespread traction.2 The selective use of information by
the Bush administration was another part of its deceptive tactics. This is what
Bush told the United Nations on 12 September 2002: “From 1991 to 1995,
the Iraqi regime said it had no biological weapons. After a senior official
in its weapons program defected and exposed this lie, the regime admitted to
producing tens of thousands of litres of anthrax and other deadly biological
agents…”2 Dick Cheney gave a similar deception during his major
speech on Iraq on 26 August 2002.
As mentioned, Bush is referring to the defection of Hussein Kamel, who defected
in August 1995. However, the fifteenth quarterly report of the United Nations
Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, dated 26 November 2003,
states, “In July 1995, under pressure from the Special Commission, Iraq
finally admitted the production of bulk biological warfare agents”.3 So
in other words, Iraq made the admission the month before Kamel’s defection,
whereas Bush avoids mentioning this, choosing instead to give the impression
it was Hussein Kamel who exposed the whole issue. Following Kamel’s defection,
Iraq did provide further information as to its biological warfare activities
and weaponisation, although as mentioned, the admission of bulk production of
biological agents had already been made.
Incredibly, the British government’s report on Iraq’s alleged WMD
released in September 2002 gave an accurate account of these events. However,
the major Bush speech received far more coverage, while the more accurate British
information (on this point at least) remained hidden in the report’s detail.4
To the FLM’s knowledge, this point has not been noted by anyone else,
although we would be happy to be informed otherwise.
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