FM, I hear what you're saying, but the decision to invade Iraq was made at a totally different level than the decision to take the potential battlefield NBC threat seriously, so I don't think they have much to do with each other. In other words, just because Gen. Franks and his staff (or whoever) decided to take that potential threat very seriously, and to pass down the word to unit commanders, that doesn't mean that the senior civilian officials of the Bush administration necessarily made their decision to invade based on fear of Iraqi WMD programs.

That said, I do agree that the decision was significantly influenced by WMD fears, albeit fears stemming from bad intelligence that Bush and his crew uncritically accepted because it squared up with their pre-existing desire to invade Iraq (something neocons have been wanting to do since 1991). And yeah, Saddam's stubborn refusal to comply fully with UN inspections certainly helped those fears to be trumped up, too.