Argument: If not a threat then, Iraq would have become one

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Foreign Policy Initiative Executive Director Jamie Fly. “The Iraq War was worth it, and fought for the right reasons.” September 13th, 2010: “the notion that the Iraq of 2002-2003 was a harmless regime run by a weakened despot has become popular fiction. The fact is that the United Nations sanctions in place against Iraq were falling apart, with some of America’s closest allies ready to abandon them. Iraq was not contained – it was on the cusp of being allowed to again threaten its own people and its neighbors. Although after the invasion, it was concluded that Saddam had actually destroyed his stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons after the Gulf War, the 2004 Duelfer Report concluded that Saddam’s regime still possessed the elements of WMD programs that could have been easily reconstituted. Given Saddam’s apparent concern about regional perceptions of his true capabilities, it does not require a leap in faith to assume that a Saddam unchecked by international sanctions and facing neighbors such as Iran and Syria with active nuclear programs would likely have resumed his own quest for a nuclear weapon.”