The debate on Iraq: What's next?

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(CNN) -- After Congress passed a resolution to condone use of force in Iraq, what will President Bush's next move be?

Former U.N. Chief Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter and Rep. John Shadegg, R-Arizona, stepped into the "Crossfire" with hosts Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson to debate the issue.

BEGALA: Congressman Shadegg, let me bring you into this. Before we get started on a new war with Iraq, let me ask you about the war that I think we all agree we must fight and we have not yet won: the war against al Qaeda. In the last few days, al Qaeda allegedly bombed a French oil tanker. They are rumored to be behind the murder of an American soldier in Kuwait.

Now we have a new tape from the No. 2 man, Dr. Zawahiri. [According to] The Associated Press: "Counterterrorism officials have said two top bin Laden lieutenants, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Abu al-Rahim al-Nashiri, are continuing to organize strikes. Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the September 11 attacks, has been tied to the April bombing of a synagogue in Tunisia. And al-Nashiri is suspected of organizing plots against U.S. and British warships."

Why risk diverting a single bullet until every one of these SOBs in al Qaeda is in hell?

SHADEGG: Look, we clearly have to deal with al Qaeda. There's no question about it. But let's go back and talk about what Mr. Ritter just said. He was one time a hero...

BEGALA: Come on, they killed 3,000 of our people. I just don't want to let you go with dismissing it with, "Well, yes, we've got to deal with al Qaeda." Don't we have to deal with al Qaeda first, sir?

SHADEGG: No, we don't have to deal with al Qaeda first. By dealing with Saddam we are, in part, dealing with al Qaeda. And we are sending a message.

But you need to hear what Mr. Ritter just said. He said go in under the existing inspection regime. He knows darned good and well there are hundreds of acres of presidential palaces which are off bounds.

A regime where we inspect, and we're excluded from hundreds of acres, is no inspection regime at all. That's a fraud. And when Scott Ritter was there, and when I thought he was a hero, he was saying he needed unqualified access. The guy stood with a gun at his head saying we've got to get in there. And now he says we should inspect without the conditions of being able to get in?

And, on top of that, he knows right now they have mobile production facilities. You can't inspect a country effectively; you cannot have meaningful inspections if they have mobile production facilities, which they will not disclose to us. It is clear that he's already made a decision, he says, well, the president's already going to war.

That's dead wrong. The president needed this resolution to force the U.N. to act, and he needed this resolution to build an international coalition. And the guy that can change all of this is Saddam Hussein. [He] can come forward and do precisely what you asked in your first question. And that is, let us have access to everything.

CARLSON: Well, Scott Ritter, it is true that over four years ago you said it in a lot of places. I can [get] the quote [but] I won't bore you with it, because you know what it is. You said that we know that we didn't find all the weapons of mass destruction within Iraq. And isn't it just what the congressman said, that some of them may be in these massive presidential so-called palaces? Is that not true?

RITTER: Let's deal with the facts here, OK? It is true. I said that we hadn't disarmed Iraq. And I didn't just say that four years ago, Tucker. I'm saying it right now. You're damn right.

Now I'm telling you we have to get inspectors in. But we have to get the inspectors in the country. We've got to let them do the work. And, first of all, you know I hope Representative Shadegg certainly didn't vote to go to war based on the concept of mobile laboratories. Because, Mr. Shadegg, I'm here to tell you right now, those are a construct of inspector's imaginations that came out in 1993 to try and figure out why we couldn't find anything.

So we made it up. They don't exist.

SHADEGG: That's not true.

RITTER: Oh, it is true.

SHADEGG: Every single authority that exists says that those mobile weapons production facilities exist. But let's not duck the issue. What about the palaces?

RITTER: No, let's talk about that, Tucker. Where do they exist? How do they exist? What is the intelligence? Because we're going to war based upon this information. Come on, Tucker, let's be fair.

RITTER: We have the intelligence in every other defense.

BEGALA: Just a second. Let Congressman Shadegg answer your question. Congressman Shadegg, how do we know that they have these mobile facilities, sir?

SHADEGG: We know we have those mobile facilities because our -- every other intelligence source we have from the CIA and on down the line, the DIA, you name it, confirms that they have these facilities. But beyond that, I was in Bahrain within days of when the weapons inspectors were first kicked out. They were kicked out, I believe, on November 13, 1997. I was there on the 20th, and I met with five different weapons inspectors.

You have a photo of me meeting with them. Those weapons inspectors told me face to face back then, that every time they got close to getting to the weapons, every time they were really hot on something, they were blocked, they were frustrated, they got no chance to go in. And they told us back then that they would be stalled at the front door, for an hour, hour and a half, two hours, three hours, and they would watch trucks carrying equipment going out the back door.

This is nothing new and nothing secret. This is something we have known for a long time. And I would appreciate it if Mr. Ritter would discuss the palaces.

I agree with him, we need an inspections regime. But as recently as yesterday, Saddam Hussein said he will not agree to any new inspections. That means he will not agree to inspection of the palace grounds. And that means we simply will never know if they have the weapons.

RITTER: That simply shows your ignorance, sir. They have agreed to a resolution that says that palaces can be inspected. It's in the memorandum of understanding.

SHADEGG: No they have not.

RITTER: Look, you're lying to the American public if you're saying that. They have said they will agree to inspections under existing Security Council resolutions. And Resolution 1154 clearly states that the memorandum of understanding, that it was agreed upon between Kofi Annan and the Iraqi government, allows inspectors in.

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