Herodotus

The Duelfer report mentions that Saddam may have wanted to re-start his programs at some point in the future. But this supposition is based on second-hand sourcing from Saddam's advisers. Tariq Aziz said "Well, Saddam talked about it infrequently after sanctions were lifted," but Saddam had no firm plans or dates as to when he would re-start his programs. That's a major hole in the DUelfer report.

The second hole is what would Saddam do with the WMD if he did re-start his programs. Saddam and his advisers always saw Iran has the most pressing threat to Iraq. Indeed the Iran-Iraq rivalry pre-dates Saddam's tenure as president, and the presence of a Sunni government controlling Shiite holy sites sticks in the caw of the mullahs. Okay, so at worst case scenario we have Saddam using WMD as defensive weapons against a hegemonic (and not so nice to the West) power, that arguably posed a greater threat to stability in the region.

Finally the very absence of existing stockpiles, and the complete absence of any nuclear program implies that Saddam was still a long way off from an effective WMD deterrent. Defenders of the Bush administration will point to the measly 500 WMD from some pre-existing stockpile. But the problem with those 500 WMD is that they could have already been declared (as missing), could have been part of the blast pits that escaped destruction, or could have been left on the battlefield during the Iran-Iraq War. The point is we don't know.

Saddam's Iraq underwent the most intrusive and all encompassing disarmament regime since at least WWII, and his regime has basically accounted for 249,500 of 250,000 munitions. I don't expect perfection, and in fact I expected us to find more weapons, but to come within .2% of completely demolishing Iraq's WMD program is a grand achievement.