The Weapons and the Candidates
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The Democratic presidential contenders are leaping — selectively — on this weekend’s disclosures about weapons of mass destruction and Iraq. Howard Dean put out two statements over the weekend, reacting to comments by an American weapons inspector, David Kay, and the secretary of state, Colin Powell. “Today’s comments by David Kay further undermine this President’s repeated claims that Iraq posed an imminent threat to America with weapons of mass destruction,” Dr. Dean said Saturday. Later, Dr. Dean added, “Coming on the heels of David Kay’s assertion that there were no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Secretary Powell’s statements today again raise the serious question: Why did this President mislead the American people into an unnecessary war in Iraq — a war that has cost the American people more than 500 lives — 5 more today alone — as well as thousands injured and more than $160 billion?” Senator Kerry weighed in as well. He said on Fox News Sunday, “We were misled — misled not only in the intelligence, but misled in the way that the president took us to war. …When they talked about weapons of mass destruction that could be deployed in 45 minutes — there were none.” Attuned as they are to Mr. Kay’s statements, it’s interesting that neither Mr. Kerry nor Dr. Dean has so far seen fit to react to Mr. Kay’s comment, in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, “We know from some of the interrogations of former Iraqi officials that a lot of material went to Syria before the war, including some components of Saddam’s WMD programme.” Mr. Kerry couldn’t even be bothered to show up to vote in the Senate on November 11, 2003, when the Syria Accountability Act passed on a vote of 89 to 4. The more Mr. Kerry and Dr. Dean go on in this vein, the more they set themselves up for embarrassment when and if Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction are found — in Syria, Lebanon, Iran, or Iraq — in the months before the general election.