Iraq experts: Saddam pushing ahead with weapons program

Senators on Wednesday convene to discuss Iraq's military force

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush is justified in being concerned about Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's relentless pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, the Democratic chairman of a Senate committee said at the start of two days of hearings.

"One thing is clear: These weapons must be dislodged from Saddam, or Saddam must be dislodged from power," said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Delaware.

The hearings, during which the senators will hear from experts on Iraq from outside the administration, are "not designed to prejudge any particular course of action," Biden said.

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They also are not intended to short-circuit the administration's debate on what course to take against that nation, which Bush includes in what he has called an "axis of evil."

One option being considered is a military strike against Iraq.

Though Bush has often spoken of the need to remove Saddam from power, administration officials haven't said an invasion is inevitable.

"We don't know if the United States would exercise a military option with respect to Iraq," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday. "There are a variety of ways to address it: diplomatically, economic and military."

Biden said the committee would seek the answers to several questions: What is the threat from Iraq? What is the appropriate response? How do other countries view the Iraqi problem, and what duties will the United States have toward Iraq afterward, if it were to attack the nation successfully?

"In Afghanistan, the war was prosecuted exceptionally well, but the follow-through commitment to Afghanistan's security and reconstruction has, in my judgment, fallen short," Biden said.

"It would be a tragedy if we removed a tyrant in Iraq, only to leave chaos in his wake," the senator added.

Iraq's weapons capabilities formidable, witnesses say

The first three witnesses focused on Iraq's weapons capabilities and the wisdom of a U.S.-Iraq conflict.

Richard Butler refuted statements by Iraq that it has no weapons of mass destruction or the means to make such chemical, biological and nuclear weaponry.

"Everyone, Mr. Chairman, is being lied to," said the former chief weapons inspector for the United Nations. Iraq forced his team of inspectors -- charged with certifying that Iraq had no such weapons -- to leave the country in late 1998.

The certification is required before the United Nations will lift economic sanctions it placed on Iraq after it invaded Kuwait in 1990.

Butler said he supports arms control and disarmament before the United States considers military action against Iraq.

"It is essential that Iraq is brought into conformity with the law," Butler said. Its weapons must be removed and a long-term monitoring process must be resumed to ensure the nation doesn't rebuild its cache.

Khidar Hamza, a former Iraqi nuclear engineer, said Iraq is well into the production of chemical weapons and has enough uranium to generate several nuclear weapons by 2005.

But while agreeing that destroying the weapons and setting up a monitoring system is a worthwhile goal, Hamza noted that past inspection and monitoring efforts have not been overly successful.