Iraq arms hunt sows cynicism

A growing furor over the reasons for invading Iraq is threatening to undermine the credibility of the US-British coalition and risks shattering an uneasy truce in international relations between supporters and opponents of the war.

The conspicuous absence of a "smoking gun," despite assiduous efforts to locate Saddam Hussein's supposed weapons of mass destruction (WMD), is raising hackles in countries which supported the war - not to mention in those implacably opposed to it.

The coalition allies are this week dispatching a new, 1,300-strong team of experts to Iraq to step up the search for banned weapons. The specialists are expected to interrogate former Iraqi officials, interview key Iraqi scientists, and comb through documents which might shed light not only on weapons, but on links between Saddam Hussein's regime and terrorist organizations.

With no banned weapons unearthed so far in Iraq, accusations are escalating that pre-war intelligence was hyped to provide a cast-iron pretext for war.

International cynicism about the motives for the war is already growing. In London, a YouGov poll published Monday in The Daily Telegraph shows that only 38 percent of respondents believe that WMD provided the main reason for going to war. A full 73 percent now believe it was all about regime change.

Two of Prime Minister Tony Blair's former cabinet colleagues have suggested the public was misled over the reasons for the war. Former foreign secretary Robin Cook has called for a public inquiry, arguing that Britain was "conned" into a war by a "phantom" threat.

In Washington meanwhile, Sen. John Warner (R-Va.) chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said his panel - possibly in conjunction with the Senate Intelligence Committee - will hold hearings on the US failure to find evidence of banned weapons. In an interview with the Los Angeles Times published Sunday, Senator Warner stressed that he remains "of the opinion there has been no deception by the administration" but added that "the situation is becoming one where the credibility of the administration and Congress is being challenged."

Forced to backpedal, leaders in London and Washington have produced strikingly different responses. US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says Saddam's supposed arsenal may have been destroyed. His deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, has said WMD was chosen as a casus belli purely because it was the one factor everyone could agree on.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, however, has stuck to his guns. "I stand absolutely, 100 percent behind the evidence, based on intelligence that we presented to people," he said Monday at the G-8 summit in Évian, France, adding that it was "completely and totally false" that intelligence was doctored.

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