In regard to Steve Clemons' quote from Richard Perle noted earlier today, several readers have suggested that what Perle must have meant was that the UN Inspectors -- because of their alleged fecklessness and/or because they had to operate while the regime still existed -- would never find WMD and that our drive to war would thus be thwarted.

That thought occurred to me too. It was a common argument with Perle and other neo-cons in the run-up to war that the inspections process was worthless either because Saddam could too easily bamboozle the inspectors or because even finding evidence of banned weapons would only lead to a renewed game of 'cheat and retreat'.

But when I spoke to Clemons this afternoon and then again this evening, he said that this distinction (i.e., between what inspectors might find before the war and what the US might find after the war) was at least not clear in what Perle said and that he seemed to be speaking more broadly.

The feckless inspector argument is certainly one explanation. But I'm curious to hear more.