Well into the war that was supposed to rid
Iraq of its alleged stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, a senior
British official
admitted on Saturday that no chemical,
biological or nuclear weapons of mass destruction may after all be found.
Making the startling confession in a radio
interview, British Home Secretary, David Blunkett, added in the same breath
that he
would in any case rejoice the “fall” of
Saddam Hussein and his regime — regardless of whether any WMD were found
in Iraq or not.
The confession reconfirms the worst fears
of opponents of the war that “weapons of mass destruction” is only a ruse
for the US
and the British to go to war against Iraq.
At the very least the admission certainly deals a serious blow to the moral
legitimacy
that the US and the British have been seeking
in prosecuting the war.
Soldiers of the British 7th Armoured Brigade patrol the road leading to the southern Iraq city of Basra
Critics of the war across the world have
been accusing the US and the British of aiming for regime change in Baghdad
under the
guise of “unearthing and dismantling
weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.” There have been constant accusations
that the US and the
British are eyeing Iraq’s huge oil wealth,
promoting Israeli interests, and that its campaign against WMD is only
a convenient cover-up.
Even countries like Germany, Russia and
France had been less than impressed with the US-led war against Iraq saying
all along
that the task of unearthing weapons of
mass destruction, if any, is better left to UN weapons' inspectors.
In making the confession
in an interview with BBC radio, the British
Home Secretary however admitted that the non-discovery of any WMD would
“lead to a very interesting debate” about
the war.
“We will obviously have a very interesting
debate if there are no biological, chemical, radiological or nuclear weapons
or facilities
to produce them found anywhere in Iraq
once Iraq is free,” the home secretary added.
The US-led forces stand to face a huge global
uproar if no weapons of mass destruction are found in Iraq. US-led
forces moving
across the Iraqi deserts have been under
pressure since the start of the war to find evidence of Iraq’s weapons
of mass destruction.
But instead of solid evidence, the they
have so far raised only false alarms.
From time to time, the US-forces have claimed
to have unearthed “suspicious” substances. And each time, the claim has
turned
out to be without substance. Today
Saturday 5 April, US Marines were reported to be digging up a suspected
chemical weapons
hiding place in the courtyard of a school
in the southeast of Baghdad.
Western media reported that the US Marines
were digging after being tipped off by an Iraqi informer. “We don’t have
a clue now
but we are going to dig it up and check,”
said General James Mattis, the commander of the Marine division at the
scene.
Iraq has always insisted that it does not possess any weapons of mass destruction.
UN weapons inspectors, who scoured the country
for several months until the US asked them to leave last month, had repeatedly
certified that they had found no credible
evidence of Iraq possessing any WMD.