"Evidence of WMD"

[The American]

I am hoping the title will bring your attention. I know you are setting there rolling your eyes, thinking, "here we go again". Fact is, I have some interesting details to share with you. I would not have you uninformed.

Thos eof you who have not registered with the New York Times, I will post the article, which I do not normally do.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/13/in...st/13loot.html Looting at Weapons Plants Was Systematic, Iraqi Says Published: March 13, 2005 AGHDAD, Iraq, March 12 - In the weeks after Baghdad fell in April 2003, looters systematically dismantled and removed tons of machinery from Saddam Hussein's most important weapons installations, including some with high-precision equipment capable of making parts for nuclear arms, a senior Iraqi official said this week in the government's first extensive comments on the looting. The Iraqi official, Sami al-Araji, the deputy minister of industry, said it appeared that a highly organized operation had pinpointed specific plants in search of valuable equipment, some of which could be used for both military and civilian applications, and carted the machinery away. Dr. Araji said his account was based largely on observations by government employees and officials who either worked at the sites or lived near them. "They came in with the cranes and the lorries, and they depleted the whole sites," Dr. Araji said. "They knew what they were doing; they knew what they want. This was sophisticated looting" The threat posed by these types of facilities was cited by the Bush administration as a reason for invading Iraq, but the installations were left largely unguarded by allied forces in the chaotic months after the invasion. Dr. Araji's statements came just a week after a United Nations agency disclosed that approximately 90 important sites in Iraq had been looted or razed in that period. Satellite imagery analyzed by two United Nations groups - the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, or Unmovic - confirms that some of the sites identified by Dr. Araji appear to be totally or partly stripped, senior officials at those agencies said. Those officials said they could not comment on all of Dr. Araji's assertions, because the groups had been barred from Iraq since the invasion. For nearly a year, the two agencies have sent regular reports to the United Nations Security Council detailing evidence of the dismantlement of Iraqi military installations and, in a few cases, the movement of Iraqi gear to other countries. In addition, a report issued last October by the chief American arms inspector in Iraq, Charles A. Duelfer, told of evidence of looting at crucial sites. The disclosures by the Iraqi ministry, however, added new information about the thefts, detailing the timing, the material taken and the apparent skill shown by the thieves. Dr. Araji said equipment capable of making parts for missiles as well as chemical, biological and nuclear arms was missing from 8 or 10 sites that were the heart of Iraq's dormant program on unconventional weapons. After the invasion, occupation forces found no unconventional arms, and C.I.A. inspectors concluded that the effort had been largely abandoned after the Persian Gulf war in 1991. Dr. Araji said he had no evidence regarding where the equipment had gone. But his account raises the possibility that the specialized machinery from the arms establishment that the war was aimed at neutralizing had made its way to the black market or was in the hands of foreign governments. "Targeted looting of this kind of equipment has to be seen as a proliferation threat," said Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, a private nonprofit organization in Washington that tracks the spread of unconventional weapons. Dr. Araji said he believed that the looters themselves were more interested in making money than making weapons. The United Nations, worried that the material could be used in clandestine bomb production, has been hunting for it, largely unsuccessfully, across the Middle East. In one case, investigators searching through scrap yards in Jordan last June found specialized vats for highly corrosive chemicals that had been tagged and monitored as part of the international effort to keep watch on the Iraqi arms program. The vessels could be used for harmless industrial processes or for making chemical weapons.

Now isn't this something, also confirming parts of the Duefler Report. I have questions now. Where has this stuff been taken? Wasn't this stuff not supposed to be in Iraq?


Wait there is more.......

[The American]

Losses at Enrichment Site As examples of the most important sites that were looted, Dr. Araji cited the Nida Factory, the Badr General Establishment, Al Ameer, Al Radwan, Al Hatteen, Al Qadisiya and Al Qaqaa. Al Radwan, for example, was a manufacturing plant for the uranium enrichment program, with enormous machine tools for making highly specialized parts, according to the Wisconsin Project. The Nida Factory was implicated in both the nuclear program and the manufacture of Scud missiles. Al Qaqaa, with some 1,100 structures, manufactured powerful explosives that could be used for conventional missile warheads and for setting off a nuclear detonation. Last fall, Iraqi government officials warned the United States and international nuclear inspectors that some 377 tons of those explosives were missing after the invasion. But Al Qaqaa also contained a wide variety of weapons manufacturing machinery, including 800 pieces of chemical equipment. The kinds of machinery at the various sites included equipment that could be used to make missile parts, chemical weapons or centrifuges essential for enriching uranium for atom bombs. All of that "dual use" equipment also has peaceful applications - for example, a tool to make parts for a nuclear implosion device or for a powerful commercial jet turbine. Mr. Hussein's rise to power in Iraq culminated in his military building not only deadly missiles but many unconventional arms. After the 1991 gulf war, international inspectors found that Baghdad was close to making an atom bomb and had succeeded in producing thousands of biological and chemical warheads. Starting in 1991, the United Nations began destroying Iraq's unconventional arms and setting up a vast effort to monitor the country's industrial infrastructure to make sure that Baghdad lived up to its disarmament promises. The International Atomic Energy Agency, based in Vienna, was put in charge of nuclear sites, and Unmovic, based in New York, was given responsibility for chemical and biological plants as well as factories that made rockets and missiles.

The job was never finished.

A Western diplomat familiar with satellite reconnaissance done by the International Atomic Energy Agency said it confirmed some of the Iraqi findings. For instance, he said, it showed that the Nida Factory had been partly destroyed, with some buildings removed, and some rebuilt. He added that the Badr General Establishment was almost entirely dismantled. By contrast, he said, the agency's photo analysts found Al Ameer untouched, but only as seen from overhead. "The buildings could be totally empty," he said. The diplomat added that the atomic energy agency's reconnaissance team found that Al Radwan was "significantly dismantled" and that Al Qadisiya had almost vanished. At the sprawling Hatteen base, he said, "parts are untouched, and parts are 100 percent gone." Before the invasion, the United Nations was monitoring those kinds of sites. Two senior officials of the monitoring commission said in an interview that their agency's analysis of satellite reconnaissance photos of Iraq showed visible looting and destruction at five of the seven sites that had been cited by Dr. Araji. The officials cautioned that the agency zeroed in on certain buildings of special interest in its monitoring work on unconventional weapons and that other structures or warehouses at a particular identified site might still be intact. "You might have a place with 100 buildings but we'd have an interest in only 3 of them," an official said. Officials at the United Nations monitoring agency said some areas of the sprawling Qaqaa installation involved in chemical processing had been wrecked by fire and possible extensive looting. Unknown is the fate of such equipment there like separators, heat exchangers, mixers and chemical reactors, all of which can be used in making chemical weapons. The Badr General Establishment, they said, had been systematically razed. "It's fairly significant," one official said of the looting and disappearance of important buildings. The Radwan site has been dismantled, they said, with the destruction quite extensive. And the Qadisiya small arms plant has been razed, they said, as have the buildings the agency monitored at the sprawling Hatteen installation. The two officials said the agency had no information on the condition of the Nida Factory or the Ameer site. No Saudi or Iranian Replies The recent monitoring agency report said Unmovic had asked Iraq's neighbors if they were aware of whether any equipment under agency monitoring had moved in or through their countries. Syrian officials, it said, replied that "no relevant scrap from Iraq had passed through Syria." The agency, the report added, had yet to receive a response from Iran and Saudi Arabia. Dr. Hasani, the Iraqi industry minister, said the sites of greatest concern had been part of the Military Industrialization Commission, a department within the ministry until it became a separate entity in the 1990's. The commission, widely known as the M.I.C., was dissolved after the fall of Baghdad, and responsibility for its roughly 40 sites was divided between the ministries of industry and finance, Dr. Hasani said. "We got 11 of them," he said. Dr. Araji, whose tenure with the ministry goes back to the 1980's, is now involved in plans to use the sites as manufacturing centers in what the ministry hopes will be a new free-market economy in Iraq. He said that disappointment at losing such valuable equipment was a prime reason that the ministry was determined to speak frankly about what had happened. "We talk straight about these matters, because it's a sad thing that this took place in Iraq," Dr. Araji said. "We need anything that could support us here." "When you have good factories that could support that move and that transformation," he said, "it would be good for the economy of the country." In an interview, a senior atomic energy agency official said the agency had used the reconnaissance photos to study roughly 100 sites in Iraq but that the imagery's high cost meant that the inspectors could afford to get updates of individual sites only about once a year.

Did Bush and this administration lie? Did the experienced world intelligence lie as well? That is now for you to prove.

The rest.........

In its most recent report to the United Nations Security Council, in October, the agency said it "continues to be concerned about the widespread and apparently systematic dismantlement that has taken place at sites previously relevant to Iraq's nuclear program." Alarms to Security Council Agency inspectors, in visiting other countries, have discovered tons of industrial scrap, some radioactively contaminated, from Iraq, the report noted. It added, however, that the agency had been unable to track down any of the high-quality, dual-use equipment or materials. "The disappearance of such equipment," the report emphasized, "may be of proliferation significance." The monitoring commission has filed regular reports to the Security Council since raising alarms last May about looting in Iraq, the dismantlement of important weapons installations and the export of dangerous materials to foreign states. Officials of the commission and the atomic energy agency have repeatedly called on the Iraqi government to report on what it knows of the fate of the thousands of pieces of monitored equipment and stockpiles of monitored chemicals and materials. Last fall, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, put public pressure on the interim Iraqi government to start the process of accounting for nuclear-related materials still ostensibly under the agency's supervision. Iraq is obliged, he wrote to the president of the Security Council on Oct. 1, to declare semiannually changes that have occurred or are foreseen. In interviews, officials of the monitoring commission and the atomic energy agency said the two agencies had heard nothing from Baghdad - with one notable exception. On Oct. 10, the Iraqi Ministry of Science and Technology wrote to the atomic agency to say a stockpile of high explosives at Al Qaqaa had been lost because of "theft and looting." During the American presidential election last fall, news of that letter ignited a political firestorm. Privately, officials of the monitoring commission and the atomic energy agency have speculated on whether the political uproar made Baghdad reluctant to disclose more details of looting.

That is enough information to dwell on at this time. Continue to make accusations, and I will have to ask, where is this crap, and make proof Bush has told a lie. Be back later to see your reactions.

[Lou Minotti]

It's up to us to prove the Bush admin has even an ounce of credibility???? Wow, times have surely changed.

[rmnunez]

Yes, I saw that and wondered about how long it would take to surface in discussions over the quality of the claims made by the US prior to intervention. How does the critical left merge assertions stuff got looted from "a manufacturing plant for the uranium enrichment program... implicated in both the nuclear program and the manufacture of Scud missiles" with those that hold any Saddamite efforts in this regard are concocted, fictitious and even crafted to deceive and justify intervention? How could tons of sophisticated machinery of the sort described here, not be evidence of some WMD efforts?

[Gorgo]

Maybe you should summarize your case. What is it you're saying? You have an article that shows that it was stupid to invade Iraq, because it opened up military arsenals for looting. I'm not seeing any evidence for stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, and even if there were some small amounts of some kind of weapon of mass destruction, that does not make attacking other countries legal.

Why was this attack not a criminal enterprise, and at the very best, a very dumb idea?

What am I missing? I must be missing something.

[RickSp]

This is getting tedious. I'm sure it is a waste of time but, here are a few basic points:

1. No one claims that Saddam did not have WMD. Indeed Rumsfeld assisted Saddam in getting helicopters he used to drop chemical weapons onthe Iranians and the Kurds. He also ran diplomatic interference to downplay Saddam's use of WMD. The Iraqis also recieved a complete set of plans for nuclear weapons and technology for nuclear processing from the US.

2. After the Gulf War Saddam destroyed his stockpiles of chemical weapons supervised by UN inspectors. Saddam was not fully cooperate surprise, surprise, but no WMD have been located in Iraq and no evidence has been found of WMD being moved out of the country, at least according to the US inspectors. All the claims regarding WMD made by Bush and his minions were either simply wrong, deceptions or outright lies. Can you say "50 tons of mustard gas in a turkey farm?"

3. All chemical plants are dual use. Anyone who can make fertilzer can make chemical weapons.

4. The point of the NYTimes article, which you so obviously missed, is that the US invasion resulted in lots of nasty hardware being left in the hands of insurgents. And not addressed by the article, but a serious point nevertheless, is that 250 million tons of conventional arms is missing and believed to be in the hands of the insurgents. Bush's war has done what he claimed he was trying to prevent - it has turned Saddam's weapons over the terrorists.

[OberonDOtherseid]

Quote by: Lou Minotti It's up to us to prove the Bush admin has even an ounce of credibility???? Wow, times have surely changed.

Yes, Louie, just like when gra8fulconspiracy offers his take on reality, you all tell us who are not followers to PROVE it wrong. Whats wrong, don't want to play?

[Lou Minotti]

We're supposed to believe some establishment spin doctor when he or she tells us Bush and Co. aren't the equivalent of an international crime syndicate? Give me a break. This isn't even the same thing. Not even close. Yeah, only brown people conspire....keep thinking that.

[rmnunez]

lots of nasty hardware

This must be the stuff of fiction since it has been established there was no evidence of any wrongdoing, is this dual-use stuff too? Could it be in Syria?

[OberonDOtherseid]

Quote by: Lou Minotti We're supposed to believe some establishment spin doctor when he or she tells us Bush and Co. aren't the equivalent of an international crime syndicate? Give me a break. This isn't even the same thing. Not even close. Yeah, only brown people conspire....keep thinking that.

Yea, only white people conspire, keep thinking that.

[The American]

Before the invasion, the United Nations was monitoring those kinds of sites. Two senior officials of the monitoring commission said in an interview that their agency's analysis of satellite reconnaissance photos of Iraq showed visible looting and destruction at five of the seven sites that had been cited by Dr. Araji.

I apologize once again for posting the very long aticle. I have found in my experience some do not wish to register to receive and view articles. My summary? We waited too late. We did not act fast enough. Evidence shows WMD had been there. Satellite images have shown looting taking place. If my memory serves me correctly, I remember Powell standing before us on television trying to explain what we thought the images displayed. This may explain the urgency of pushing these acts. Hussein's past acts, and evidence of previous residence in Iraq of known terrorists, training camps to the north, where he had no control, did present a problem.

"Iraq has declared that it produced about 8,500 litres of this biological warfare agent [Anthrax], which it states it unilaterally destroyed in the summer of 1991. Iraq has provided little evidence for this production and no convincing evidence for its destruction. There are strong indications that Iraq produced more anthrax than it declared, and that at least some of this was retained after the declared destruction date. It might still exist." Hans Blix, Report to UN Security Council, January 27, 2003

Thing is, we were getting no evidence this stuff was destroyed. Hussein kept them running in circles, in and out of the country, and not even allowing them to investigate sites at times. What we do know now, is he had them. Our biggest concern, is where are they now? There is no evidence of their destruction, no records. Now, what do we do?

This thread is presented to get you people thinking. Was this war pre-emptive? Or did we not act soon enough?

http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/

The Dulfer Report, indicated that while Saddam did not have the capacity to launch or establish a WMD program immediately, he did have the resources in place, a lot of the intellectual capital and a lot of the ingredients in place, so when sanctions were lifted he "could turn on a program" within months or years. It just makes me wonder................ http://www.newshounds.us/2005/03/14/...cting_bush.php

http://www.americanthinker.com/artic...rticle_id=4308

Check these out as well. very interesting reading people.

[Gorgo]

No imminent threat. No weapons of mass destruction. What explosives there were disappeared thanks to the invasion.

Why are you supporting these criminals again?

[The American]

Quote by: Gorgo No imminent threat. No weapons of mass destruction. What explosives there were disappeared thanks to the invasion. Why are you supporting these criminals again?

Read my previous post. It said five out of seven sites were looted before invasion.


/....................Explosives?

Why are you supporting these criminals again?

Your rhetoric is unproductive. Please refrain to intelligent debate.

[Gorgo]

Intelligent debate? Are you attempting an insult?

Where is your evidence that refutes the fact that this is a criminal enterprise?

[The American]

Quote by: Gorgo Intelligent debate? Are you attempting an insult? Where is your evidence that refutes the fact that this is a criminal enterprise?

Where is your proof? You have yet show that. Your past attempts have failed. It is rhetoric, and not productive. This subject is getting popular in larger forums. People from all sides of the political sidewalk are getting involved. You seem interested in public matters, and it seems to matter to you what others think. Others are taking this on a serious level. The truth is being searched for. Whether you like it or not, this subject if proved to be true, threatens not only this country, but others as well. I urge you to stop with the "criminal BS". It is rhetoric only, and gets you nowhere.

[The American]

PatrickHenry, what do you make of this? Elections is over, Elections have taken place in Iraq. I cannot see a political motivation for posting this piece in the media, from a source that has been bias against Bush. It is a concern that the Security Council is involved as well. The interum government in Iraq was questioned to the whereabouts of equipment and machinery at the end of last year. The Iraqis seem to be hunting it as well, they have stated for economic developements. To tell you the truth, I would like to see a press conference on this information and have questions answered. Just curious on your opinion.

[bishop]

Now isn't this something, also confirming parts of the Duefler Report. I have questions now. Where has this stuff been taken? Wasn't this stuff not supposed to be in Iraq?

was there any proof at all that saddam was developing wmd? sure, the reports say that he could have been developing said weaponry - but was he? "could have been" is MUCH different than "was". therein lies the bullshit lies that some people believe, and others see rightly as lies. despite all the allegations, including those after the war, saddam WAS NOT developing wmd. there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever of any wmd program that was operating up to and including the time of the inspections.

most relatively advanced missiles are capable of attaching wmd warheads on them - that doesn't instantly mean that such a warhead is, in fact, attached.


the allegations about wmd will forever be the gulf of tonkin as far as iraq is concerned.. there was no factual basis for the war, and there never will be. i suggest you come to terms with reality and simply admit that bush sent us to war on an incorrect hunch - rather than endlessly wishing and hypothesizing that wmd's will miracululously surface in syria or iran (as worldnetdaily says).


*edit* check the signature - it could apply.

[Zeebadee]

"Dr. Araji's statements came just a week after a United Nations agency disclosed that approximately 90 important sites in Iraq had been looted or razed in that period."

So you're implying that the UN inspectors completely missed every one of these sites during their inspections before the invasion? One of them had 1100 structures! Can you name a single site that the inspectors were denied access to?

"But American officials have said in the past that while they were aware of the importance of some of the installations, there was not enough military personnel to guard all of them during and after the invasion."

The entire point of the invasion was to negate these so-called WMD production sites, and now they are telling us they didn't even send enough military personnel to accomplish this primary mission?? Who can possibly believe this?

"Dr. Araji, whose tenure with the ministry goes back to the 1980's, is now involved in plans to use the sites as manufacturing centers in what the ministry hopes will be a new free-market economy in Iraq. He said that disappointment at losing such valuable equipment was a prime reason that the ministry was determined to speak frankly about what had happened."

If this guy had planned to use the missing equipment for his manufacturing centers, then that equipment wasn't solely designed for weapons building.

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: The American PatrickHenry, what do you make of this? ... Just curious on your opinion.

Yeah, TA, there do seem to be a few unanswered questions.

What I am wondering about is why the US Military, who are reportedly commanded by Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, couldn't at least PROTECT all of those WMDs. Especially since Rumsfeld told us that their locations were known: http://www.stopdubya.com/WMDeception.htm

We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat

Why not send a few guys over with a fifty cal mounted on a Humvee, just to make sure that the dang terr'ists on slimy ol' Saddam's payroll couldn't sneak off with stuff to hurt the innocent? And didn't US forces have 100% air superiority? Couldn't they just keep an air lookout on the places that have now been emptied of all the nukey things?

Geez, I guess we'll just have to glumly wait till that dang Zarkawwy pops off a nuke in some poor US city. Then maybe we can get the martial law going in America that will REALLY put a stop to all that terror...

Seriously, TA, I am profoundly suspicious of everything in the mass media, and the lies from Washington don't actually help to put me back to sleep.

I don't subscribe to the official story of anything. Not 9/11, not OK City, not Waco, not Ruby Ridge. Not the CIA, the rupublic, the elections in America, the goodwill of the political elite, nada. Well, okay, the moon landing was real, heh.

But my opinion of the players in Washington is that they are chess players of some accomplishment. Meaning that they scope out moves far in advance of their opponents (us, the "little people"). But... their hubris sometimes may lead to over-reaching and hopefully to a downfall at some point. Because if their calculations are accurate to the endgame, Joe and Jane Sixpack are checkmated, and they don't even know that they're in the game...

Me, I am just hoping for a little pickup sidegame of Chinese Checkers...

[bishop]

why take what rummy said as if it where the truth?

if he said he knew where they were, why didn't the special ops nab them? these soldiers can do almost anything imaginable - they're superhuman in some respects - surely they could've captured the wmd's from iraqi soldiers who weren't up to snuff in comparison.. they accomplished great feats during the war, they could've certainly at least nabbed at least ONE wmd. or at least found an active program.. what did they (nor the inspectors, nor our inspectors) find NOTHING. that is the salient point that must never be forgotten.

how about this - what rummy said was a sweet fascist p.r. stunt. there were no wmd's - they just had to convince the american public that there were - in order to accomplish their agenda of invading iraq. after that, months would pass, and the campaign team would reshape the issue into "well, what do we do now?"... americans are notorious for their lack of attention, and this was proven in the election results. people were apparently more moved by the arguments about what to do next, rather than whether/not we were lied to.. (not to mention their cynnicism/hatred of europe)