< >>>Assuming we can still pull back from an assault on Iraq...how do we then proceed? Are inspections meaningful?

--Yes



Nonsense. It is physically impossible for a team this size to locate a weapons program in a nation the size of California that is actively trying to conceal it. I cannot believe people are still buying this after all of what has happened in the past weeks.

>>>If American firepower is withdrawn from the region, will Saddam simply kick the inspectors out?



--No, the world would immediately know about it.



And then they would do what, exactly? Write Saddam a nasty letter? Maybe...IMPOSE SANCTIONS? That works like a charm. American firepower is the only reason inspectors are in there at all.

>>>If the threat of attack on the US has been exagerrated, then approximately where does the level of threat lie?



--Inside Iraq itself, but that's not the UN role to solve it.



Iraq has actively attacked and invaded bordering nations with the intent of taking them over. This is not speculation, or a prediction of Saddam's behavior. He did it, and had to be pried out of Kuwait, burning as he went, by massive military force. To state that Iraq is a threat only to its own citizens, even making the rather bizarre assumption that this is irrelevant, is to deliberately ignore a proven pattern of behavior. The combination of this pattern of behavior with weapons of mass destruction is not tolerable.

>>>Can we afford to trust that absence of evidence is, in fact, evidence of absence?



--And what about other countries with dictators? Same applies everywhere.



Not all dictatorships are aggressive expansionists. If they are, we'll get back to them.