n the 1980s, Iraq
developed a secret nuclear weapons program that was not detected by IAEA
inspections. This event led to a program to strengthen the IAEA safeguards
system by adding a so-called Additional Protocol to the existing safeguards
agreements between the Agency and non-nuclear weapons state members of
the NPT. This voluntary additional agreement is designed to provide
a comprehensive picture of a state's nuclear and nuclear-related activities,
including nuclear-related imports and exports, and to give the Agency
more tools to detect undeclared nuclear-related activities.
Following the 1991 Gulf War, the UN Security Council assigned the IAEA
responsibility for dismantling Iraq's nuclear weapons program. The IAEA Iraq
Action Team (renamed the Iraq Nuclear Verification Office on December 1, 2002) cooperated with UNSCOM
to eliminate Iraq's WMD. Ongoing monitoring and verification activities
took place throughout the 1990s. IAEA and UNSCOM inspectors were sometimes
refused access to sites, limiting their ability to verify Iraqi compliance.
In December 1998, UNSCOM and the IAEA withdrew all personnel from Iraq because of
Iraqi unwillingness to grant them access to suspect weapons sites.
After intense negotiation in the UN Security Council, UNSCOM was
replaced in 1999 by the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and
Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC).
During the period from 1998 and 2002, no inspections were taken
under UNMOVIC. The IAEA was restricted to conduct regular NPT related
safeguards inspections in January 2000 and 2001 at sites declared to the
Agency. It was unable to pursue its more far-reaching responsibilities
under relevant UN Security Council Resolutions. IAEA
Director General ElBaradei stated on April 24, 2000, that since the
cessation of IAEA inspections in Iraq on December 16, 1998, the Agency
had not been in a position to provide any assurance of Iraq's compliance
with its obligations under UN Security Council
Resolutions 687 (1991) and 707 (1991).
Based on intelligence reports (US
National Intelligence Estimate,
UK Government Dossier) detailing the threats of Iraq's WMD program,
the United Sates and many other countries continued to emphasize after
1998 the need for the resumption of inspections and disarmament in Iraq.
These calls for Iraq to comply with its disarmament obligations
intensified after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The Bush administration
argued that Iraqi WMD posed an unacceptable threat. U.S. and U.K.
intelligence reports concluding that Iraq had revived its WMD programs
after 1998 were one of the reasons that the U.S. Congress authorized the
use of force against Iraq in October 2002.
Responding to this growing international pressure - in particular the
threat of military intervention by a coalition of states led by the
United States and the United Kingdom - Iraq announced in November 2002
that it would accept the provisions of UN Security Council Resolution
1441, which had been adopted earlier that month. The new resolution
called for "anytime, anywhere" inspections and other provisions that
were far more demanding than the previous Security Council resolutions.
IAEA and UNMOVIC inspections based on Resolution 1441 resumed in late
November 2002. This round of inspections continued until the U.S.- and
U.K.- led coalition preparing for military action to disarm Iraq
informed the inspectors that such action was imminent. At that
time, as he was withdrawing inspection teams, the IAEA Director General,
Mohammad ElBaradei, announced that "no
evidence or plausible indication of a revival of a nuclear weapons
programme" had been found. The IAEA and UNMOVIC withdrew from Iraq
on March 18, 2003, and on March 20, the U.S.- and U.K.-led coalition
forces began military strikes against Iraq with the objective of
disarming Iraq of its WMD by force and toppling Saddam Hussein's regime.
After the US declaration of victory on May 2, 2003, the Iraq Survey
Group, a task force comprised of experts from the United States, the
United Kingdom, and Australia started searching for WMD in Iraq.
In September 2004, the Iraq Survey Group (ISG) announced in its
report
that there were no WMD in Iraq at the time of the U.S.-led invasion.
Inspectors instead found that Saddam Hussein had planned to recreate his
WMD programs after international sanctions were lifted. Even then,
though, his planning was reportedly more focused on the development of
ballistic missiles and tactical chemical warfare capabilities, rather
than nuclear weapons. The ISG’s inquiry did yield evidence, however,
that Iraq concealed elements of its nuclear program from inspectors
after 1991, including by secreting away documents, hiding technology and
attempting to maintain the brain trust of scientists who had earlier
worked on the nuclear program.
As a result of the findings
of the Iraq Survey Group, the United States Congress arranged for a
Senate Committee inquiry into the case of mistaken intelligence which
released a report on March 29, 2005 about the U.S. Intelligence
Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq. The Committee
reviewed the prewar intelligence and then determined whether or not the
conclusions the intelligence community reached were realistically based
on their prior knowledge. In most cases, including the status of
Saddam's nuclear program, the committee accused the intelligence
community of using insufficient sources, being too wedded to previous
assumptions, and failing to research the issues to a reasonable degree.
The report states the intelligence community was "almost completely
wrong" in its assumptions on the nuclear program, and distributes the
accusations widely throughout all agencies within the intelligence
community including the National Security Agency, Central Intelligence
Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, and the National
Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.