Israeli Intelligence on Iraq: Sound Professional Assessment

All hope is not lost. Within the intelligence communities of the United States, Britain, and Israel, there is still hope of finding a ג€œsmoking gunג€ that would prove that Iraq did in fact possess chemical or biological warfare capability in the past few years, or that it had a significant number of long-range missiles. Finding such weapons in Iraq would extricate these intelligence communities from criticism that they were sorely mistaken in assessing the capabilities and intentions of Iraq under Saddam Hussein. Criticism has been directed primarily against American and British intelligence, which are accused of intentionally exaggerating their presentation of Iraq’s non-conventional capabilities in order to facilitate their governments’ decision to wage war on Iraq. Criticism has also been leveled at Israeli intelligence for assessing Iraq’s non-conventional capabilities and its intentions towards Israel as more serious than they really were.