Iraq and weapons of mass destruction Miller helped persuade the American public that Iraq had WMD: in September 2002 she wrote about an intercepted shipment of aluminum tubes which the NYT said were to be used to develop nuclear material. It is now generally understood that they were not intended (or well suited) for that purpose but rather for artillery rockets. The story was followed up with television appearances by Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice all pointing to the story as part of the basis for taking military action against Iraq. Miller's sources were introduced to her by Ahmed Chalabi, an Iraqi exile favorable
United Nations Security Council and the Iraq War collaboration between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. While Colin Powell's statement to the UN may have been accepted as proof by many in the US, this was not the case in Europe. Powell himself stated later: "I, of course, regret the U.N. speech that I gave," he said, "which became the prominent presentation of our case. But we thought it was correct at the time. The President thought it was correct. Congress thought it was correct." In a February 2003 speech to the U.N. Security Council, Powell alleged that Iraq was hiding weapons of mass destruction from inspectors and refusing to