President Bush pledged again on Wednesday to rid Iraq of ‘‘weapons of terror,’’ but coalition forces have so far failed to find proof of Iraqi biological or chemical weapons. Pentagon pointed to the discovery Tuesday of Iraqi chemical protection suits at a hospital near Nasiriyah as evidence that Iraq’s military had prepared for a chemical attack. Yet, the absence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction has remained a notable feature of the military campaign so far.Teams of weapons ‘‘hunters’’ acting on intelligence tips found no banned weapons during extensive searches of ammunition dumps near the port city of Umm Qasr. Earlier, another team scoured a factory near Najaf that was initially thought to be a chemical-weapons plant.Numerous other sites identified as storage areas for biological or chemical weapons were searched by Special Forces units in the opening hours of the conflict, US officials have acknowledged. No unconventional weapons were found anywhere.Washington has maintained that such weapons would eventually be discovered. In his speech at McDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Bush sought again to frame the Iraqi campaign as a bid to ‘‘prevent the Iraqi regime from using its hidden weapons of mass destruction.’’ But in recent days officials have faced questions from reporters and open scepticism from other governments.Secretary of State Colin Powell was confronted about the US failure to find weapons in an interview with an Abu Dhabi TV reporter. Powell said he was ‘‘quite confident’’ that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction would be found, but ‘‘right now we’re trying to finish these battles, and that’s our priority.’’Some speculated that Saddam had decided to hold in reserve his most lethal weapons and had entrusted them to elite units closest to him in the Iraqi capital. Others suggested that he may have smuggled chemical and biological weapons out of the country for safe-keeping.Joseph Cirincione, director of the Non-Proliferation Project of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the Bush administration had consistently emphasised the high end of UN estimates for the amount of weapons Saddam might still possess.‘‘It is possible that Iraq has few biological or chemical weapons—we just don’t know,’’ Cirincione said. ‘‘It could be that Saddam destroyed all or almost all of his munitions but left scientific teams and core assets intact so these programmes could be reconstituted later. But President Bush has to deliver a large number of weapons to prove not only that Saddam was lying, but also that his weapons pose such an eminent threat that war is necessary.’’ (LAT-WP)
