The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
396.
The
discussions with the US about President Bush’s speech to the UN
General
Assembly on
12 September are addressed in Section 3.4. Key points from the
speech
are set out
in the Box below.
In his
speech to the UN General Assembly on 12 September, President Bush
set out his
view of the
“grave and gathering danger” posed by Saddam Hussein and challenged
the
UN to act
to address Iraq’s failure to meet the obligations imposed by the
Security Council
President
Bush made clear that, if Iraq defied the UN the world must hold
Iraq to account
and the US
would “work with the UN Security Council for the necessary
resolutions”.
But the US
would not stand by and do nothing in the face of the
threat.
President
Bush set out Iraq’s failure to meet those obligations imposed by
the UN,
including:
•
“Right now,
Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for
the
production
of biological weapons.”
•
UN inspections
had revealed that Iraq “likely maintains stockpiles of VX,
mustard
and other
chemical agents, and that the regime is rebuilding and
expanding
facilities
capable of producing chemical weapons”.
•
Iraq continued
“to withhold important information about its nuclear
program”;
employed
“capable nuclear scientists and technicians”; and retained “the
physical
infrastructure
needed to build a nuclear weapon”. It had “made several attempts
to
buy
high-strength aluminium tubes used to enrich uranium for a nuclear
weapon”.
If Iraq
acquired fissile material, “it would be able to build a nuclear
weapon within
a
year”.
•
Iraq’s “state
controlled media” had “reported numerous meetings
between
Saddam
Hussein and his nuclear scientists, leaving little doubt about
his
continued
appetite for these weapons”.
•
Iraq also
possessed “a force” of SCUD-type missiles with greater than
permitted
range and
was “building more … that can inflict mass death throughout
the
region”.
•
Iraq had
“subverted” the Oil-for-Food programme “to buy missile technology
and
military
materials”.
•
Despite the
UN’s demands for the return of inspectors, Iraq had had “four years
…
to plan and
to build and to test behind the cloak of secrecy”.
Challenging
the UN to act, President Bush stated:
“We know
that Saddam Hussein pursued weapons of mass murder even
when
inspectors
were in his country. Are we to assume that he stopped when they
left?
The history,
the logic and the facts lead to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein’s
regime
194
The White
House, 12 September 2002, President’s
Remarks to the United Nations General Assembly.
188