Craig links to Davids Medienkritik, which posits the notion that Bush is being blasted for violating international law when, ironically, the whole point of the Iraq war was to uphold international law.

The Iraq War was actually triggered by Saddam Hussein’s refusal to fully comply with over a dozen United Nations Security Council resolutions on WMD over the course of twelve years, not by Mr. Hussein’s alleged possession of WMD.

Except that those dozen UN resolutions required Iraq to disarm itself of WMDs. So, if Hussein still had WMDs, then he hadn’t complied with the UN’s demands. If he didn’t have them, then he had complied.

Mr. Guessgen, himself a self-proclaimed advocate of international law, fails to recognize that the United States went to war to uphold international law as expressed in numerous documents (including UN Resolution 1441)

1441 was Hussein’s last chance to submit to UN inspections and disclose his banned weapons programs. According to Blix, Iraq in 2002-2003 was relatively cooperative with UNMOVIC. Unfortunately, Washington neocons and Chalabists were periodically sending Blix’s people on wild goose chases.

Blix was informing the UN not only that Iraq was cooperating, but also that they didn’t have any WMDs or WMD programs, but that his group needed more time to conduct inspections.

For his inability to find WMDs that didn’t exist, domestic right wing commentators called Blix a feckless Saddam lackey. The US invaded before UNMOVIC had completed its mission.

and was repeatedly rebuffed by other member nations including France, Russia, China and Germany who refused to hold Saddam accountable with anything more than a flimsy, ineffective regime of inspections.

I’m interested to know what was so “flimsy” and “ineffective” about UNMOVIC’s inspections. After all, they found out what we learned after invading and occupying Iraq. Blix was telling the Security Council that he needed more time to inspect. France, Russia, etc. were willing to give the guy that chance. The US had convinced itself that the lies of an influential, politically convenient exile were more trustworthy than those of a Swedish UN technocrat.

Craig adds that Bush also proved the UN’s uselessness.

With Bush’s crowd, the UN never had a chance.

Please feel free to read this piece from August 2003. A taste:

The US has officially been in Iraq for 115 days.

UN weapons inspectors were in Iraq for 111 days, ending March 18, 2003 when the Bush Administration said, “They’ve had enough time.”

Unless we’re going to accept that an Iraqi scientist, who on his own, decided to bury some pieces of a uranium-extracting centrifuge in his backyard TWELVE YEARS AGO as evidence of Saddam Hussein’s having WMD at the ready, we have officially now spent more time not finding WMD in Iraq than the UN inspectors did.

So, any time soon will we be hearing the following from the White House?

“We’ve had more than enough time,” declares President Bush. “I’m giving us 48 hours to get out of Iraq there or we’re going in.”

I’m not holding my breath.

If I remember it right, Hans Blix and approximate 250 inspectors were deemed by many as inept. The number of “coalition” forces now in Iraq numbers around 150,000.

If I remember it right, AM radio added “incompetent”, “bungling”, “sloppy” and in some cases “in bed with Saddam” to the damning list.

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