> Was it so hard to believe that Saddam might have had something, esp
> given
> his track record? I never thought he had the tons and tons of shit
> that many
> alleged, but it seemed probable that he kept some weapons or weapon
> components from the inspectors. I mean, wouldn't he at least try?
Weapons, no -- weapon components, yes. In fact, we already know Iraq was hiding those centrifuge pieces in the scientist's rose garden.
I always thought there were only two possibilities in terms of actual weapons -- either Iraq would have a lot, or it wouldn't have any. That's just common sense. There would be no reason for Iraq to keep small amounts of weapons around, because (1) they would be militarily useless in small quantities while exposing Iraq to attack by the US, and (2) biological and chemical weapons aren't that hard to make if you have the infrastructure, but apparently don't keep very well -- that is, they decay and become useless fairly quickly, particularly the crude ones Iraq was able to make.
Far better, if you were Saddam Hussein, to destroy the actual weapons while trying to hide what was more important: the infrastructure. However, it was always pretty clear that UNSCOM had done an excellent job destroying the physical infrastructure of Iraq's weapons programs. Still, Iraq probably did hold onto some of the intellectual infrastructure -- documents, etc. -- and perhaps tiny bits of the physical infrastructure, like the centrifuge parts. I suspect various documents have already been found, since Bush and Blair both are now talking about finding weapons "programs," rather than actual weapons. The documents won't be actual programs, of course, but they'll try to spin it that way.
Anyway, I sure hope I'm right, because I just bet someone $1000 that no significant amounts of weapons will be found.