One bit of confusion on the Iraq war and WMD.

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Okay, this has been playing on my mind lately and I've come to get an answer.

Now, the U.S, and indeed the U.K among a few other nations, claim Iraq have WMD. Putting aside the whether that's the truth or not, the thing that confuses me is how the U.S and co can invade when they possess these very weapons.

I mean, I'm not going to say I know a huge amount about the Iraq War. But it just strikes me as odd how nations with the some of the largest stockpiles of these weapons can start a war specifically over that.

maybe we know from experience what they can do, being the only ones who have used them.

now granted, before the 1st Gulf War, Saddam was buying up every strange idea you can think of, including cannons that could shoot hundreds of miles. But after that, he had more important things on his plate.

Granted, the WMDs were gone (either dismantled, trucked out, no one can prove it one way or the other... after the end of the first war.

It was worse than a mistake, it was a blunder...

The "justification" was that the "world community" imposed sanctions prohibiting Iraq from having the technology to develop WMDs. USA claimed to have evidence that Saddam was in violation of UN mandates.

It isn't bad to have WMDs if you would only use them as an absolute last resort. Other leaders wouldn't hesitate to use them as a first strike weapon. It's a tad hypocritical, but it's akin to saying there's nothing wrong with owning lots of guns if you'd only use them in self-defense as compared to someone who would start a street gang and start robbing people if he had guns.

Sorta non-sequitur, but just reminded me of a hilarious bit of the great bit Emo Phillips, that he did on the cold war and the US' borrowing of money from Japan during it.

Japan - You know, the cold war's over, you borrowed billions from us, are we gonna set up a repayment plan?
US - huh, what? i'm sorry, did you say something?
Japan - uh, yah, do you have that money, you know, we kinda lent it to you, not gave, what did you do with it?
US - oh ya, that, well, we spent it on all these nuclear weapons and new military technology and putting together the largest military stock pile in history, its right over here if you wanna take a look at it, we'll show you how huge it is and what a military force to be reckoned with it's made us.
Japan - err, uhh, thats ok, we'll just go ahead and write that off.


It kinda illustrates that the US is, what most would consider, a bully.

But like stated above, It was, in theory, not about other countries having them, but that the UN and majority of the world agreed Saddam should not have them. And he did start refusing to allow inspectors. Did that mean he was hiding some? i think history has kinda said no, it didnt, there is no tangible evidence.
The better question is, did it mean going to war over it? Nope. The country needed new leadership pretty bad, I think pulling saddam out is a small beacon of light in a s**t pile of garbage. But now the US and UNs meddling has set that countries progress back 30 years.

I think that Bush thought if they nuke us, we can just nuke them back and everything will be ok.

No country with WMD's will be invaded if the would-be invading countries believed the WMD's would be used. The fact that iraq had no WMD's would have been one of the reasons to invade.