The questions mount:
Pressure builds on U.S. to explain lack of Iraq weapons

European criticism harsh as teams prepare to begin stepped-up search

DAFNA LINZER THE ASSOCIATED PRESS The Olympian Online

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- The CIA is reviewing its intelligence, British agents are reportedly doubting their own assessments, and Saddam Hussein's enemies are being accused of manufacturing evidence.
Now, senior politicians on both sides of the Atlantic want answers to what is becoming the most-asked question since major combat ended in Iraq: Where are the unconventional weapons the coalition said it went to war to destroy?

President Bush said this weekend that weapons already had been found. As evidence, though, he pointed to two suspected biological laboratories, which both the Pentagon and U.S. weapons hunters have said do not constitute arms.

For a war fought without the backing of the international community, evidence of the weapons Iraq claimed it no longer had would bolster U.S. credibility around the world.

Now that 11 weeks have passed without such proof, international pressure is mounting on Bush and his coalition partners.

The Pentagon is sending a new group of weapons hunters to Iraq beginning Monday.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who visited Iraq last week, said he's certain unconventional weapons will be discovered eventually.

But as he and the president express confidence, members of Bush's Cabinet are offering up alternative theories that have drawn deep concerns both at home and abroad.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld speculated last week that the weapons were destroyed on the eve of fighting. His deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, said in an interview with Vanity Fair magazine that weapons of mass destruction became a war banner because it was the only reason everyone in the administration could agree upon when citing why they were going after Saddam.

The comments caused a stir in Europe, where lawmakers from such coalition countries as Britain and Denmark demanded their governments open inquiries into the matter. At home, members of Congress are also questioning the war motives. And in countries that opposed the war, the comments are being used as fodder to justify those positions.

Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung interpreted Rumsfeld's comments as a sign the United States was losing the credibility battle. "The charge of deception is inescapable," the paper said.

And the leading French daily Le Monde called the weapons of mass destruction claim "the greatest lie told by statesmen in recent years."

U.S.-led teams, made up of Special Forces, unconventional weapons experts, military intelligence and scientists began visiting suspected sites in the opening days of the war. Since the fighting broke out March 20, most U.S. and British intelligence leads have been exhausted. Teams are now chasing tips from local Iraqis, none of which have panned out so far.

What's ahead

This week, the weapons hunters will begin working for a new Pentagon-led group of some 1,400 people, including American weapons experts who once served as U.N. weapons inspectors. The group is moving into Baghdad to oversee the weapons search and other investigations of Saddam's regime.

The Iraq Survey Group will be led by Keith Dayton, a two-star general. Troops involved in the search hope the ISG will be able to provide the effort with better intelligence and analysis.

Dayton, a top official in the Defense Intelligence Agency, said he remains convinced his team will find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He said Friday that he continues to believe prewar intelligence claims that Iraq had recently had unconventional weapons.

Those assessments were doubted by many members of the U.N. Security Council, which last fall agreed to send international inspectors back to Iraq to verify the country no longer had the weapons it was prevented from producing after the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

The quality of that intelligence is now being reviewed by the CIA. British intelligence is reportedly taking stock of its own assessments as well.

Thursday, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported that agents were unhappy with a dossier Blair's office released on Iraqi weapons last year -- particularly its claim that Saddam was able to launch such weapons on 45 minutes' notice.

The network quoted an unidentified intelligence source who said intelligence agencies added that charge at the behest of the prime minister's office, but now believe it was wrong.

There have also been reports that the Bush administration relied heavily on information provided by Saddam's enemies, including Ahmad Chalabi, an Iraqi exile and banker who has enjoyed years of Pentagon support.

Chalabi returned to Iraq from London after Saddam's overthrow and has been trying to build a support base. But few Iraqis seem interested in backing his leadership bid.