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Tons of Explosives Missing in Iraq

 
 
Dookiestix
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 12:08 pm
cjsha:

It IS on the front page of the NYTimes web site under "Washington."
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McGentrix
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 12:10 pm
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/10/25/iraq/main651082.shtml

Quote:
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Dookiestix
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 12:14 pm
Quote:
From the end of the 1991 Gulf War until the March 2003 U.S. invasion, the explosives had been under seal by the International Atomic Energy Agency because they could have been used to trigger nuclear weapons under Saddam's dormant bomb program.

The material might have fallen into the hands of insurgents, who've killed hundreds of coalition soldiers and civilians with roadside mines and car bombs since the fall of Saddam Hussein.

0 Minutes Correspondent Ed Bradley reports the U.N. says it warned the U.S. government the munitions site might be looted shortly after the invasion.


Way to go, Bush.
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 12:41 pm
bookmark
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 12:41 pm
bookmark
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 01:07 pm
While Kerry and company are exploiting a phony story for all they can get out of it, CBS (yes the same CBS of forged documents) is shelving their story on this same subject planned for Sunday night. Why? Because the story is phony and they can't afford a third phony story within 60 days.

Meanwhile, looking at all that is being said and all the evidence that preceded it, it would appear that any explosives that existed at al Qa Qaa were stolen out from under the nose of Hans Blix, not George Bush.

Are you on the left SURE you want the U.N. running the show? It will be if Kerry is elected.

1995
Quote:

However, Al Atheer lacked the capability to synthesize or fabricate high-explosive components. The components were produced at the enormous Al Qa Qaa ammunition plant, which was located nearby. Inspectors had many clues pointing to Al Qa Qaa's involvement in the weapon program early on, but the Iraqis successfully stonewalled attempts to link it to the nuclear program. Only after Kamel defected did Iraq admit its high-explosive work at Al Qa Qaa.
http://www.bullatomsci.org/issues/1995/nd95/nd95.albright.html


December 2002
Quote:
Iraqi officials said the inspectors also revisited a large nuclear complex Sunday. The site, al-Qa'qaa, drew inspectors Saturday and last week, and had been under U.N. scrutiny in the 1990s. Al-Qa'qaa, just south of Baghdad, was involved in working on the final design for a nuclear bomb.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com/old_editions/12_16_02/for2.htm#f21



Quote:
At Tuwaitha, a team continued to take a physical inventory of nuclear materials from Iraq''s past nuclear programme. This work should be completed by the end of Thursday.
A team investigated an outlying site of the Al Qa Qaa explosives plant. (The main Al Qa Qaa complex was inspected on Monday.) The outlying site, called Sumood-4, is near the city of Mussayib and was associated with a past program. Sumood-4 is co-located with the Sadda Cement Factory. The cement plant was also inspected for dual-use capabilities. The same team inspected the Al Furat State Company for Chemical Industries in Mussayib. The Al Furat plant is a large chemical production site that produces large quantities of industrial chemicals, as well as some food items.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/WO0212/S00077.htm


Quote:
In addition, an UNMOVIC chemical team inspected two facilities within the Al Qa Qaa complex: a high concentrated (oleum) sulpheric acid plant and the main storage area. ""Equipment and chemicals present at both sites were verified,"" Mr. Ueki said, reporting that ""the inspection went smoothly.""
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/WO0212/S00088.htm


Summary Inspection January 2003 -
Detail of noncompliance by Iraq


January 15, 2003

Quote:
•• a nuclear team went to Hoptain Company, and Al Qa'qaa Company -- a large complex housing several sites about 40 kilometers south of Baghdad;
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/01/15/sproject.irq.inspections/


January 22, 2003
Quote:
Chemical weapons inspectors also were believed to be headed to Qa Qaa.
Previously, Iraq's nuclear program used the site for the production of high-explosive lenses, detonators and propellants for nuclear weapons.
Teams have gone to the complex at al Qa Qaa more than a dozen times, including several consecutive days since last week. Tuesday's visit was from a chemical inspection team.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/01/22/sprj.irq.inspectors/


Summary of Inspection March 2003


March 9, 2003
Quote:
•• A missile team visited Al Qaa'qa site south of Baghdad in Yousefiya that had been used by Iraq's nuclear program for the production of high explosive lenses, detonators and propellants for nuclear weapons, according to a dossier of weapons of mass destruction facilities released by the British government last year.
The site belongs to the Iraqi Military Industrialization Commission.
The British dossier, released in September, alleged that parts of a phosgene production plant at al Qaa'qa had been rebuilt after being dismantled under U.N. supervision in the 1990s. Phosgene, the dossier said, has industrial uses, but "can also be used by itself as a chemical agent or as a precursor for nerve agent."
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/03/09/sprj.irq.missiles1130/
0 Replies
 
Dartagnan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 01:09 pm
It's not Bush's fault. It's never Bush's fault.
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McGentrix
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 01:16 pm
I am glad you are finally coming around to understand that D'artagnan.
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 01:17 pm
And then there are those who want it to be Bush's fault so badly, they completely change the subject.
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Acquiunk
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 04:54 pm
cjhsa wrote:
Fine Dooks, you got me there. But I couldn't find it. You'd think it would be page one stuff, not buried in the politics pages.


Cjhsa, the Times web site does not replicate the print version. To see the Times front page go to the home page and click on NYT front page on the side bar on the left under the heading new. The missing explosives was front page news for the times for today (10/26).
0 Replies
 
McGentrix
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 05:05 pm
Excellent work Foxfyre, mind if I take advantage of your hard work?
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 05:05 pm
Be my guest McG.
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squinney
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 05:37 pm
I must have missed something in all of those links, Foxy. All I saw were reports of frequent visits. No indication the explosives were or weren't there, just that inspectors went to the sight.

How do you conclude that the explosives were "lost" under the noses of UN inspectors?
0 Replies
 
Foxfyre
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 06:43 pm
Because by the time we got there they were apparently 'gone'. So logically if they were ever there in the first place, they got ripped off during the UN inspections.

The other interesting thing about the inspection reports is that no huge stockpile of illegal and/or mega dangerous explosives were mentioned.
0 Replies
 
ehBeth
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 06:58 pm
No one seems to know they were gone when the U.S. invaded - they didn't look for them.

Quote:


link

Something's definitely amiss ...

Quote:
some US media reports have queried if the theft happened before US troops arrived at the base at al-Qaqaa.

NBC television reported that one of its correspondents was embedded with the 101st Airborne Division which temporarily took control of the base on 10 April 2003 but did not find any of the explosives.

However, other US outlets, including NBC's own news website, quoted Pentagon officials who said a search of the site after the US-led invasion had revealed the explosives to be intact.


link

So - either they were there at the time of the invasion - and then disappeared, or maybe they weren't there - but nobody was told to look.

Given that we're told that satellites can 'see' stretchers, it looks like it's amazingly easy for 380 tons of munitions to disappear. Fascinating.


edited to try to fix the first link
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ehBeth
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 07:01 pm
Quote:
The explosives had been housed in storage bunkers at the facility. U.N. nuclear inspectors placed a fresh seal over the bunkers in January 2003. The inspectors visited Al-Qaqaa for the last time in March 2003 and reported that the seals were not broken - therefore, the weapons were still there at the time. The team then pulled out of the country in advance of the invasion later that month.



Quote:
Lt. Gen. William Boykin, the Pentagon's deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, said that on May 27, 2003, a U.S. military team specifically looking for weapons went to the site but did not find anything with IAEA stickers on it.

The Pentagon would not say whether it had informed the IAEA that the conventional explosives were not where they were supposed to be. Boykin said that the Pentagon was investigating whether the information was handed on to anyone else at the time.



there in March 2003, invasion in April 2003, missing at the end of May 2003
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 07:12 pm
Ah okay then. If the inspectors said the stuff was there, but it wasn't there at the time of the invasion, then it logically follows it was moved between the last inspection and the invasion. If Bush hadn't spent all that time 'rushing to war' during weeks of negotiations with the U.N., maybe we would have gotten there in time to intercept them. As it was, Saddam had an awful lot of trucks and an awful lot of time to move an awful lot of stuff.
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ehBeth
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 07:15 pm
Not quite, Foxfyre.

They don't know if it was there or not at the time of the invasion. They didn't have instructions to look for it.

Think about the intense monitoring the U.S. claimed to be doing of Iraq in the weeks prior to the invasion. 350 metric tons of explosives - on the move. You can't really believe that wouldn't be spotted. I don't think anyone thinks the U.S. satellites are that feeble.
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JustWonders
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 07:41 pm
CBS has pulled the story and selected something else to air in its place.
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 26 Oct, 2004 08:01 pm
I have a question that might sound a little dumb, and maybe it's even off the topic of this thread, but I'm truly not sure. Wouldn't these weapons be considered Weapons of Mass Destruction by this administration?
0 Replies
 
 

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