4) haven't made up my mind on this - I'm sceptical that anything could be done to inforce a ban.

That's why the US backed off on this one. Basically, Iraq showed that even with pretty much free run of a country and surpise inspections, it's almost impossible to nail someone building this kinda stuff if they're trying to do it in secret. We never got anything good on Iraq until a defector actually showed us where the stuff was.

The impossibility of effective enforcement, coupled with the fact that attempted enforcement would open up Pharma's and other companies to basically giving away intellectual property, made this deal a bad treaty to begin with.

Keep in mind that this 'treaty' was basically put together by the guy leading the effort for the treaty after 7 years of negotiations had not gotten very far