03-12-2004, 11:57 PM
"I never quite understood this line of reasoning. If I may ask, when were they destroyed?"
They destroy themselves. Chemical weapons typically have a shelf-life of only a few years before deteriorating beyond a usable state. Biological weapons are even more fragile. uclear weapons, well, he would need to have them to destroy them.
In absence of any way to rebuild these weapons they would have been useless by the mid-90s, at the latest. Use 'em or lose 'em, and he lost 'em. Any pretense to the contrary was (apparently) just a terribly misguided attempt to preserve his fearsome reputation, that "Hussein Cachet" with his neighbours and people.
Jester
They destroy themselves. Chemical weapons typically have a shelf-life of only a few years before deteriorating beyond a usable state. Biological weapons are even more fragile. uclear weapons, well, he would need to have them to destroy them.
In absence of any way to rebuild these weapons they would have been useless by the mid-90s, at the latest. Use 'em or lose 'em, and he lost 'em. Any pretense to the contrary was (apparently) just a terribly misguided attempt to preserve his fearsome reputation, that "Hussein Cachet" with his neighbours and people.
Jester