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U.S. hunt for Iraqi banned weapons slows
(Dafna Linzer, Associated Press, June 9, 2003)
U.S. military units assigned to track down Iraqi weapons of mass destruction have run out of places to look and are getting time off or being assigned to other duties, even as pressure mounts on President Bush to explain why no banned arms have been found. . . . "It doesn't appear there are any more targets at this time," said Lt. Col. Keith Harrington, whose team has been cut by more than 30 percent. "We're hanging around with no missions in the foreseeable future." . . . Over the past week, his and several other teams have been taken off assignment completely. Rather than visit suspected weapons sites, they are brushing up on target practice and catching up on letters home. . . . The slowdown comes after checks of more than 230 sites - drawn from a master intelligence list compiled before the war - turned up none of the chemical or biological weapons the Bush administration said it went after Saddam Hussein to destroy. . . . But without evidence of weapons, the CIA and other intelligence agencies have begun reviewing the accuracy of information they supplied to the administration before the March invasion of Iraq. Government inquiries are being set up in Washington, London and other coalition countries to examine how possibly flawed intelligence might have influenced the decision for war. . . . With prewar intelligence exhausted and senior figures from the former regime insisting Iraq hasn't had chemical or biological weapons in years, Dayton's staff will be starting from scratch. . . . U.N. inspectors spent years learning the names and faces of the Iraqi weapons programs. But in postwar Iraq, the Bush administration cut the organization out of the hunt because of recent assessments that conflicted with Washington's portrayal of Saddam's weapons.
posted by Lorenzo 3:41 PM
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