I thought this was a good presentation of the argument that Bush didn't "lie" about WMD. Maybe you can find the original article on the NRO site. I just decided to condense the article and post it for comment. AIK

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Précis of a National Review article: “Why We’re There” by David B. Rivkin and Lee A. Casey, partners in the DC law firm Baker and Hostetler, served in Reagan’s and Bush, Sr.’s Justice Dept.

The Law
The legal case for war against Saddam’s regime still stands. The actual existence of WMD has nothing to do with 1) the US’s inherent right to defend its security, 2) the unrepealed UN Security Council Resolution 678 authorizing force against Iraq in 1991 to… restore peace and security in the region, and 3) the 2002 Security Council Resolution 1441 finding Iraq to be in “material breach” of its obligations under various preceding resolutions.

It was never the responsibility of the UN inspection teams or the US or its allies to establish Iraq’s WMD capability; “the onus of proving that he had fully disarmed was always on Saddam.” This was one of the prices of the armistice. Saddam failed to meet this burden.

Living with Saddam
The threat assessment was fundamentally sound, based on the best intelligence at the time. The threat was so serious that pre-war planning, timing, and combat operations were conducted with the full expectation that Saddam would unleash at least chemical weapons. Troops carried gas masks and chemical suits into battle. Furthermore, politically it would make no sense to decry Saddam’s WMD if the administration knew there weren’t any, just to be found out after Saddam was gone.

WMD were only one of aspect of the threat. Other critical elements: Saddam was an aggressive and unpredictable actor in an important and vulnerable area; he had WMD capabilities previously (including a mature nuclear-weapons program) used against the Kurds and Iran; he had sheltered terrorists and aided active terrorist organizations; and never cooperated with the UN inspection teams. He was a dangerous man behaving as if he had something to hide.

No allies ever claimed that Saddam had met his obligations and was not a threat. But only the US and Britain patrolled the no-fly zones. The UN sanctions regime was crumbling against the US’s and Britain’s wishes: commercial reasons, reflexive anti-Americanism, the Oil-for-Food bribes, and diplomatic exhaustion caused France, Russia, and China to fold. And it was evident that sanctions hurt only the Iraqi people, not Saddam, who along with his allies used the people’s suffering as propaganda against the sanctions.

The fact that Saddam was still there after 10 years, to be reckoned with, raised his influence and prestige in the Middle East, meaning that the US/Britain were getting less cooperation from other Arab countries. A survival of Saddam would have worsened that situation, and spread a wave of fear throughout the area. He had spent billions of dollars developing chemical, biological, and nuclear programs for a reason, and once Saddam was thoroughly reestablished without sanctions, his undisguised ambitions to rule the Middle East would have undoubtedly have been realized.

And Then Came September 11
The Bush administration did not claim Saddam was directly involved with attack; he had supported global terrorist activities and harbored known terrorists (Abu Abbas and Abu Nidal) and Iraqi officials had numerous contacts with Al-Qaeda operatives. The idea that Baathist and Islamists wouldn’t cooperate against the US is fantasy: the US represents a common enemy for them, as it did for Nazi Germany and Japan, who cooperated with each other just fine.

Saddam’s decade-long resistance to his victors gave UBL the impression that the US was weak and would have no will against his attack. Once that attack was successfully carried out, to have left Saddam crowing would have been a highly dangerous strategic error. Regime change, always on the table, became vital. …..

Losing Iraq at this stage would light the way for every one of America’s future enemies. And US allies, like India and Japan with China hanging over their shoulder, would think twice about their friendship with us. So, obviously, winning the war in Iraq is imperative. Victory will be based on the physical war in Iraq and the verbal war in Washington. If the president wins the war of public opinion, there is little doubt that the US forces will win on the ground.