Tom says:
"it was the threat of WMD being eventually distributed to terror networks that was a main concern"
Raoul says:
"In that case, didn't any advisor or strategist warn against the pre-emptive war being the cause of that threat, rather than the sanctions and surveillance being its consequence?"

It must be remembered that if Saddam had complied with inspectors we would have not used miltary force to change the regime. And it should also be remembered that without miltary force, Saddam would not agree to any UN inspectors. If not Iraq, we would have probably used miltary force "somewhere else"- because we were on a rampage- our leadership wanted to do something/anything which could be "seen" as doing something effective against terrorism. Covert action by it's nature is mostly "unseen". If we had another major terror attack, or a series of smaller ones, the America public would have wanted US leadership's head on a pike. After 911 Saddam should have forgotten his joy at the event and realized that "things had changed" and what had worked in the past, wasn't going to work now. We were lucky that Saddam was an idiot- who knows what we would have done if Saddam hadn't screwed up.

"If those WMD's were to have been sent away, whom would Saddam trust enough to give them to?"

Some radical terror group which had the means and the will to use them against a target that Saddam wanted to hit.

"No other Arab leader had any sympathy for Saddam."

If the US and/or the UN continued to fail to effectively prevent Saddam from continuing to undermine the region by supporting terrorism, more Arab leaders would have evenually become more sympathic towards Saddam- maybe he would have had to kill a few leaders (pick any) before this happenned.