Over the past few days, in the wake of the bombings in Karbala and the ideological disputes that delayed the signing of Iraq's interim constitution, there have been reports that U.S. forces have unloaded a large cargo of parts for constructing long-range missiles and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the southern ports of Iraq.

A reliable source from the Iraqi Governing Council, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the Mehr News Agency that U.S. forces, with the help of British forces stationed in southern Iraq, had made extensive efforts to conceal their actions.

He added that the cargo was unloaded during the night as attention was still focused on the aftermath of the deadly bombings in Karbala and the signing of Iraq's interim constitution.

The source said that in order to avoid suspicion, ordinary cargo ships were used to download the cargo, which consisted of weapons produced in the 1980s and 1990s.

He mentioned the fact that the United States had facilitated Iraq's WMD program during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq and said that some of the weapons being downloaded are similar to those weapons, although international inspectors had announced Saddam Hussein's Baath regime had destroyed all its WMD.

The source went on to say that the rest of the weapons were probably transferred in vans to an unknown location somewhere in the vicinity of Basra overnight.

Most of these weapons are of Eastern European origin and some parts are from the former Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc. The U.S. obtained them through confiscations during sales of banned arms over the past two decades, he said.

This action comes as certain U.S. and Western officials have been pointing out the fact that no weapons of mass destruction have been discovered in Iraq and the issue of Saddam's trial begins to take center stage.

Now, there's no particular reason to put much credence in this particular news source, but there's also no harm in keeping an eye out to see if any other evidence of this pops up elsewhere. Obviously, the concern is over a possible "October Surprise" in which WMDs are suddenly discovered in Iraq. (We also have Rumsfeld's recent comments to arouse our suspicions.)

Unlike the "capturing Osama bin Laden" October Surprise scenario -- which I think is moot because there's good circumstantial evidence that OBL is dead -- this is the kind of thing that Bush might well be tempted to pull, and against which the Democrats had better be prepared. But I have to wonder how effective such a gambit on Rove's part would really be.

Consider that Bush was the recipient of a very large bump in his approval ratings right after 9/11, but it eventually died down over the course of a year and a quarter. Then he bumped up again, but not nearly so far, after launching the Iraq war, but that increase starting falling off almost immediately, and at a far faster rate. (See graphs here and here.) What about Bush's bump on the capture of Saddam? There was one, but it was small, and dissipated very quickly.

What, then, would be the bump Bush would receive from a "discovery" of WMDs in Iraq? The pattern would indicate that it would be quite small and last only a very short time.

Which creates a dilemma for Bush -- or, rather, for Rove. There's no point in going through the bother (and risk) of staging an October Surprise if it doesn't serve to win you the election, but if the expected bump is small and ephemeral, it means you have to make it happen as close to the election as possible, but the closer you get to the election, the more that people are going to suspect that it's a fake, because the timing is just too damn convenient.

And there's another thing, which relates to the probable reason why Bush didn't get a real significant bump from the capture of Saddam. Finding WMDs in Iraq doesn't do anything except provide an apparent justification for the invasion of Iraq, but Bush has already received his cheers for that, in the approval spike he got at the time, and after the "Mission Accomplished" flattop landing fiasco (which is the little bump in May of 2003). He can't keep going to the well again and again and expect the result to be significant each time he does, all he'll get is diminishing returns. It's a definite case of "What have you done for me lately".

Altogether, I think that adds up to a "discovering WMDs" October Surprise scenario being a big bust for Georgie and Karl. The Democrats should certainly be investigating any evidence that it's being planned, but I don't think they, or we, should fear it all that much.

[Thanks to Shirley for the cite.]

Update (3/21): Eliot Gelwan has some thoughts on my argument.