State of the Union address: on War & Peace

George W. Bush: We’ve already internationalized the war in Iraq

George W. Bush: We haven’t come this far to falter unfinished

We have faced serious challenges together, and now we face a choice: We can go forward with confidence and resolve, or we can turn back to the dangerous illusion that terrorists are not plotting and outlaw regimes are no threat to us. We can press on with economic growth and reforms in education and Medicare, or we can turn back to old policies and old divisions.

We’ve not come all this way, through tragedy and trial and war, only to falter and leave our work unfinished. Americans are rising to the tasks of history, and they expect the same from us. In their efforts, their enterprise and their character, the American people are showing that the state of our union is confident and strong.

George W. Bush: Saddam had WMD-related program activities

Had we failed to act, the dictator’s weapons of mass destruction programs would continue to this day. Had we failed to act, Security Council resolutions on Iraq would have been revealed as empty threats, weakening the UN and encouraging defiance by dictators around the world. Iraq’s torture chambers would still be filled with victims-terrified and innocent. The killing fields of Iraq, where hundreds of thousands of men and women and children vanished into the sands, would still be known only to the killers. For all who love freedom and peace, the world without Saddam Hussein’s regime is a better and safer place.

George W. Bush: Fact Check: No evidence of bio, chemical, or nuclear WMDs

BUSH: We are seeking all the facts. Already the Kay Report identified dozens of weapons of mass destruction-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the UN.

FACTCHECK: True, former UN weapons inspector David Kay, now heading the US effort to locate Saddam Hussein’s unconventional weapons, did report that last October. But Kay also told the House and Senate intelligence committees:

KAY: We have not yet found stocks of weapons. We have not yet been able to corroborate the existence of a mobile biological weapons production effort. Multiple sources say that Iraq did not have a large, ongoing, centrally controlled chemical warfare program after 1991. To date we have not uncovered evidence that Iraq undertook significant post-1998 steps to actually build nuclear weapons or produce fissile material.