<blockquote> <a href=http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/iraq/14879521.htm>WASHINGTON</a> - A new, partially declassified intelligence report provides no new evidence that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the U.S.-led invasion, as President Bush alleged in making the case for war, U.S. intelligence officials said Thursday.
The report, made public in the midst of a partisan debate in Congress, says that about 500 munitions containing degraded chemical weapons, including mustard gas and sarin nerve agent, have been found in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.
But the intelligence officials said the munitions dated from before the 1991 Persian Gulf War and were for the most part badly deteriorated. <b>"They are not in a condition where they could be used as designed,"</b> one intelligence official said.
"There is not new news from the coalition point of view," one official said, noting that <b>chief U.S. weapons inspector Charles Duelfer predicted in a March 2005 report that such vintage weapons would continue to be found.</b> (<i>emphasis mine</i>) </blockquote>
WMD's which are unusable do not constitute the active weapons programs the Bush administration cited as the rationale for invading Iraq. They pose no threat except to anyone who might actually be foolish enough to try and use them.
But don't let inconvenient facts like that intrude on your blind, unquestioning support for President Bush.