Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr, and Clinton were not on the best of terms with Iran either. They don’t like us. They have not liked us for decades (have they ever liked us?). Bush did not create the dislike. He has not made it any better, I’ll readily admit, but this situation did not magically appear when he was sworn into office.
The entire middleast issue is extraordinarily complex. The problems and issues go way back.
It is too bad that we were not able to keep all other countries from gaining nuclear weapons. But that is a pipe dream. Nuclear weapons equal power. It is best for the world to keep nuclear weapons and other WMD out of the hands of those people who will use them in a preemptive attack. We should slow the spread as much as we can, particularly in countries like Iran and North Korea.
Saddam Hussein used WMD when he gassed the Kurds. He had WMD in the past, Powayseller. WMD give the holder power and influence. I am certain that if he did not currently have any, he was trying to get them. He had them in the past. This is irrefutable.
You previously stated that if he had them, he would have used them. Not necessarily. He may have thought that we would fight for a while and then give up and go away. We did it before. He may have been counting on us doing exactly what you have suggested, give up. If he had used them, we would have found them for sure. It would have been a simple matter for him to squirrel them away in Syria. Plus, it would have been much harder for him to play the martyr if we had found them.
The war happened extremely fast. It took many of his units by surprise and left them in chaos. The Iraqis had fighter jets. They did not use them. They sat on the ground. There weren’t any dogfights over Baghdad.
Do I have incontrovertible proof that he had WMD on Iraqi soil when we started Operation Iraqi Freedom? No. Do you have irrefutable proof that he did not have WMD? No. Stalemate.