Experts Doubt U.S. Claim on Iraqi Drones

By DAFNA LINZER and JOHN J. LUMPKIN, Associated Press Writers

Huddled over a fleet of abandoned Iraqi drones, U.S. weapons experts in Baghdad came to one conclusion: Despite the Bush administration's public assertions, these unmanned aerial vehicles weren't designed to dispense biological or chemical weapons.

The evidence gathered this summer matched the dissenting views of Air Force intelligence analysts who argued in a national intelligence assessment of Iraq before the war that the remotely piloted planes were unarmed reconnaissance drones.

In building its case for war, senior Bush administration officials had said Iraq's drones were intended to deliver unconventional weapons. Secretary of State Colin Powell even raised the alarming prospect that the pilotless aircraft could sneak into the United States to carry out poisonous attacks on American cities.

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First it was non-existent nuclear weapons. Then it was Iraq's so-called ties to 9/11 and Al Qaeda. Then it was Iraq's mythological chemical and biological weapons - supposedly hundreds of tons of 'em. And then on to alleged biological weapons trailers that turned out to be used for military weather balloons. Now its the drones. The Bush hits just keep on coming. Just how many lies did this administration actually cook up in order to frighten the American public into going to war?