WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Wednesday that the United States' decision to go to war with Iraq was based not on new evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime had chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, but on old evidence reinterpreted in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"The coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new evidence of Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction," Rumsfeld told the Senate Armed Services Committee. "We acted because we saw the existing evidence in a new light -- through the prism of our experience on 9/11."
In a packed hearing room, Rumsfeld fielded questions from senators who praised U.S. commanders and troops for their actions in Iraq but repeatedly questioned whether they could sustain their long and grueling deployment and whether the administration overplayed intelligence assessments of Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.
Responding to persistent questions from committee Democrats about whether the administration has a clear strategy for rotating out U.S. forces serving in Iraq, Rumsfeld said the Army's 3rd Infantry Division is starting a phased pullout of its 16,000 troops.
The division's forces are some of the longest-serving in Iraq. The secretary said other nations will soon send troops to relieve the burden on U.S. forces, but he acknowledged under questioning that the number committed by foreign governments is small. He estimated that U.S. military operations in Iraq are costing $3.9 billion a month.
Rumsfeld's testimony came a day after the White House acknowledged that President Bush's claim in his State of the Union speech that Iraq tried to buy uranium in Africa was based, in part, on forged documents. Congressional committees are investigating whether the administration may have used faulty or exaggerated intelligence on Iraq's weapons to bolster its case for war.
Bush said he stands by the central argument of his speech.
"I am confident that Saddam Hussein had a weapons of mass destruction program," the president said during a visit to South Africa on Wednesday. "I am absolutely confident in the decision I made."
Ten weeks after Bush declared that major combat operations had come to an end, no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons have been found in Iraq. As time passes and no evidence of such weapons surfaces, the administration faces intensifying questions about whether it exaggerated its claims.
