Talking Sweet About Nothing

by Eric Martin

Rodger Payne makes a good point regarding the further erosion of the already imprecise-to-a-fault term "WMD."  Bottom line: lumping chemical, biological and nuclear weapons into a single category is more misleading than it is illuminating.  The lethality varies greatly, as does the countermeasures and feasibility of use, and allowing politicians and policymakers to use the term to refer to all three interchangably is conducive to the hyping of threats and misallocation of resources - both deliberate and accidental. 

Iraq is perhaps the poster child of this pitfall.  While it is common to hear supporters claim that "everyone thought Iraq had WMD," the truth is that there was a pretty strong consensus that Iraq did NOT have nuclear weapons, but rather some outdated and hard to deliver chemical weapons and, perhaps, biological agents.  The latter would be very hard to use in a terrorist attack, and the lethality often less than conventional explosives (see, ie, the use of sarin gas in the subway attack in Japan). Yet when selling the war, the Bush administration and its allies made constant reference to the threat of "mushroom clouds" and were meticulous in their efforts to avoid differentiation between the intel regarding the various WMD.

But with the new expansion and overuse of the term, the potential for skewed priorities and policies is increasing:

What does the term "weapon of mass destruction" mean to you? A few years ago, I was part of a team of academics involved in a project examining the implications of the so-called "Bush Doctrine" of preventive use of force. The editors of the book we produced, William Keller and Gordon Mitchell of the University of Pittsburgh, wanted us to avoid using the phrase "WMD."

In their introductory chapter, Keller and Mitchell noted that the phrase WMD misleadingly linked together chemical and biological weapons with nuclear weapons:

This semantic leveling obscures the fact that each class of weapons falling under the “WMD” umbrella varies significantly with regard to potential lethality and destructive power; the feasibility of protection and defenses; and potential missions. When dimensions of threat are blurred in this fashion, inaccuracies are easy to introduce. For example, the rhetorical flexibility afforded by the omnibus category “weapons of mass destruction” enabled Bush administration officials to support claims of an Iraqi “WMD” threat (replete with ominous “mushroom cloud” imagery) by pointing to evidence of possible Iraqi chemical weapons development. Obviously, chemical weapons lack the capacity for nuclear destruction, yet as Wolfgang Panofsky points out, “Linking these three classes of weapons in a single WMD category elevates the status of both biological and chemical weapons.”

Yet, despite this reasonable critique, federal law enforcement officials are even now stretching the term WMD to a point well beyond the breaking point.

I refer specifically to the arrest of the so-called "Hutaree militia" in late March. Time, April 12:

federal authorities charged nine alleged Hutaree members with seditious conspiracy and attempted use of weapons of mass destruction.

Did the Michigan Christian Fundamentalist group have chemical or biological weapons -- or perhaps nuclear materials to build a "dirty bomb"?

No.

The group planned horrible crimes, but none involved what any reasonable person would consider "weapons of mass destruction," unless you are the kind of person who would consider even a simple weapon like a machete a WMD:

The group's alleged plot appears to have required killing a cop at a traffic stop, or after a faked 911 call. Then, the group planned to attack the funeral of that officer — in order to wreak further havoc by killing even more government and law-enforcement officials who would have gathered to mourn.

Payne's snark aside, the Hutaree militia were also, allegedly, planning to use conventional explosives.  Which, by virtue of them being conventional explosives and all, should not be considered WMD.  However, we see the same WMD allegations against the Times Sqaure bomber for his failed attempt at detonating a conventional bomb.  Actually, it's quite the pervasive pattern these days.

Comments

[wades]

I seem to remember a time back in the '70s when "weapons of mass destruction" was considered purely a Soviet propaganda term, and would never have been used by any self-respecting US official.

I found it striking when the Bush administration started using the term indiscriminately to mean "anything dangerous that doesn't rely solely on conventional explosives."

[Jim Henley]

Ah, 2002. It was a very good year.

[Jim Henley]

Previous comment proving, "Within each of there dwells, oftimes, a mighty raging Gary Farber . . . "

[efgoldman]

Wait...

The Bush2 administration did something mendacious?

Shocked, shocked I say!

[Brett Bellmore]

Technically, at this point, they're alleged to have planned horrible crimes. At some point the government may actually prove this allegation, after which it would be appropriate to say that they "planned' horrible crimes, minus the "alleged to have".

The way the government handles "conspiracy' charges has to be kept in mind. All it takes is *one* person with a plan, (Sometimes the government's own informant.) and other members of the group doing anything which can be argued in court to further that plan, even if they are legal in an of themselves, and arguably done for some other reason.

IOW, if you're ever a member of a group the government wouldn't like, and one of your group starts raving about his nefarious plans, don't roll your eyes. Strip search him looking for the wire... It may be your only chance to stay out of jail.

[KM]

Hilarious. I wonder if Brett had such magnanimous concern for the technicalities of legal appellation when it came to Saddam's "weapons-of-mass-destruction-related programme activities".

[KM]

Robin Cook -- one of the many supposedly non-existent people to have voiced scepticism about "WMD" claims prior to the war -- made exactly the right distinction in his resignation speech in the British House of Commons in March 18, 2003:

Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target.

It probably still has biological toxins and battlefield chemical munitions, but it has had them since the 1980s when US companies sold Saddam anthrax agents and the then British Government approved chemical and munitions factories.

Why is it now so urgent that we should take military action to disarm a military capacity that has been there for 20 years, and which we helped to create?

Why is it necessary to resort to war this week, while Saddam's ambition to complete his weapons programme is blocked by the presence of UN inspectors?

[Nell]

The reason the government keeps on using the term is how wonderfully well it worked before to stifle most rational discussion, and to tie everyone opposing govt action to "defending WMD".

Just as footage of some passengers on the boat attacked by Israeli commandos fighting back with knives will succeed with much of the Israeli and U.S. public in making the passengers into the terrorists... and therefore "having it coming."

[sapient]

Actually, the reason the government uses the term is because it's used in 18 U.S.C. 2332a (describing the crime of "Use of weapons of mass destruction") in which it is defined (in part) as including any "destructive device" under 18 USC 921:

"(4) The term “destructive device” means—
(A) any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas—
(i) bomb,
(ii) grenade,
(iii) rocket having a propellant charge of more than four ounces,
(iv) missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce,
(v) mine, or
(vi) device similar to any of the devices described in the preceding clauses;"

Not that I'm defending the use of the term in the statute, but it's not a vague term - it's carefully defined. It just doesn't mean what it used to mean.

[Nell]

Thanks for that, sapient; I didn't realize that the defining-down of 'weapons of "mass" destruction' was official. For us non-lawyers, when was that passage of the code added (i.e., what legislation is it part of)?

[sapient]

Nell, I don't have a very comprehensive legislative history but it appears that the statute was first enacted in 1980, but substantially reworked in 1994. Although some changes were made in 2004, it seems that the section used the term "weapons of mass destruction" at least since the Clinton years and maybe before.

As I said, I have sketchy resources at the moment, so my information is less than reliable. I was surprised to see that the section predated Bush though.

[J.]

Sapient, correction to your last comment. The statute was enacted in 1994, after the first WTC bombing, and increasingly referenced after the Oklahoma City bombing and Tokyo in 1995. It was developed to target extremist groups who use large amounts of high explosive as well as CB hazards. Only the FBI uses the Title 18 definition.

The DOD has official definitions for WMD that specifies only nuclear, biological, and chemical munitions that are "capable of a high order of destruction or causing mass casualties." But that's not in public law.