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An inspection team was sent by the United Nations and the team could not verify existence of any WMDs. These weapons were suspected to be used in nuclear, biological and chemical warfare against the coalition and also the surrounding region.3 The claims made by the US have still not been verified. Iraq was suspected of having cruise missiles as a mean to deliver these weapons. Saddam Hussein was accused of war crimes and the country was suspected of harboring Al Qaeda. To support all these accusations and to convince the world the US demonstrated evidence of their claims.
The evidence provided by the US was not considered by many of the member states of the United Nations to be sufficient for an invasion. The evidence and claims made by the US will be analyzed in detail. Arguments will be made as to how convincing the evidence was. Before starting with the evidence, keep in mind that the evidence provided is the basis to invade a country. This means that the evidence must be solid enough to form basis of occupation and destroying the complete infrastructure of a country.
To take such a step intelligence must be spot on and confirmed by on field sources. The evidence provided in the United Nations meeting is as follows; Evidence Signals Intelligence Few of the intercepted telephone calls were presented as evidence. These included mention of a modified vehicle that required to be hidden from the inspection teams. Others included hiding and cleaning out “forbidden ammunition”.4 The evidence was aimed at convincing the world that Iraq had been distracting and misguiding UN inspectors to check sites for presence of WMDs.
Measures were taken to hide data indicating Iraq’s counter measures against the UN inspection teams. Satellite Imagery Satellite imagery was shown to indicate chemical munitions bunkers. These bunkers were magnified and it was argued that the presence of “security” and a truck standing nearby, which was identified as a decontamination vehicle, were signs of presence of unconventional weapons.5 The bunkers were shown to be cleared and abandoned before the inspection in the next imagery. Furthermore, a missile site was shown before the inspections to be active by the presence of trucks and cranes in the area.
The site was shown to be cleared just before the inspection. Human Intelligence Sources were referred that Saddam Hussein had threatened people if information was given to the inspectors. Interviews held outside Iraq would be considered as treason. People were not allowed to leave the country. Training was imparted to mislead and perform counter intelligence activities against the inspection teams.6 Workers were under house arrests. These claims were aimed at convincing the world that Iraq has been hiding information and misleading the inspection teams.
Furthermore, an Iraqi engineer was sited to refer to mobile biological weapons production facility and a civil engineer confirmed the production of these mobile factories. In a similar way Al Qaida was suspected to be growing in the country as per the sources. Analysis The evidence presented by signals intelligence is not convincing. Signals intelligence is always a source to register a possible threat. They are confirmed by ground reports. Signals intelligence in different wars needs to be thoroughly filtered and must present the evidence at multiple occasions
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