The Washington Times reported on a recent Harris poll which asked American opinions regarding WMD in Iraq:
Half of Americans now say Iraq had weapons of mass destruction when the United States invaded the country in 2003 -- up from 36 percent last year, a Harris poll finds. Pollsters deemed the increase both "substantial" and "surprising" in light of persistent press reports to the contrary in recent years.
The survey did not speculate on what caused the shift in opinion, which supports President Bush's original rationale for going to war. Respondents were questioned in early July after the release of a Defense Department intelligence report that revealed coalition forces recovered 500 aging chemical weapons containing mustard or sarin gas nerve agents in Iraq.
"Filled and unfilled pre-Gulf War chemical munitions are assessed to still exist," said Sen. Rick Santorum, Pennsylvania Republican, during a June 21 press conference detailing the newly declassified information.
All well and fine for scoring debate points on a reductionist question of "WMD or no WMD?", but it has little to do with why the USA went to war.
Senior U.S. intelligence officials said Thursday they have no evidence that Iraq produced chemical weapons after the 1991 Gulf War, despite recent reports from media outlets and Republican lawmakers...
Pentagon officials told NBC News that the munitions are the same kind of ordnance the U.S. military has been gathering in Iraq for the past several years, and "not the WMD we were looking for when we went in this time."
No smoking gun. The pollster thus asked the wrong question. Whether the WMD were pre- or post-Gulf War is important. Being correct on an irrelevant technicality is not. It is flawed logic to conclude that the opinion poll either supports or does not support the U.S. administration rationale to go to war.
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