" U.N.: Explosives Missing from Former Iraq Atomic Site"

[97silverlsc]

Hey Shrub!!! This is an example of how not to stabilize the region and limit terrorist access to WMDs!!!!



U.N.: Explosives Missing from Former Iraq Atomic Site
By Louis Charbonneau
Reuters

Monday 25 October 2004

VIENNA - Nearly 380 tons of explosives are missing from a site near Baghdad that was part of Saddam Hussein's dismantled atom bomb program but was never secured by the U.S. military, the United Nations said Monday.

The head of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, Mohamed ElBaradei, will immediately report the matter to the U.N. Security Council, a spokeswoman for the agency said.

The missing explosives could potentially be used to detonate a nuclear weapon or in conventional weapons, the agency said.

"El Baradei has decided to inform the Security Council today," spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said.

The New York Times, which broke the story Monday, said U.S. weapons experts feared the explosives could be used in bombing attacks against U.S. or Iraqi forces, which have come under increasing fire ahead of Iraq's elections due in January.

The U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been barred from most of Iraq since the war and has watched from afar as its former nuclear sites have been systematically stripped by looters.

Fleming said ElBaradei informed Washington of the seriousness of the matter on Oct. 15 after learning about the disappearance of the explosives on Oct. 10.

One substance found in large quantities at the Al Qaqaa facility was the explosive HMX, which Fleming said had "a potential use in a nuclear explosive device as a detonator."

Prior to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, the HMX had been sealed and tagged with the IAEA emblem while being stored at Al Qaqaa.

Iraq was permitted to keep some of its explosives for mining purposes after the IAEA completed its dismantling of Saddam's covert nuclear weapons program after the 1991 Gulf war.

Fleming said HMX also had civilian and conventional military applications. In the months prior to the second Gulf war, the IAEA was certain that none of the dual-use materials were being used in a nuclear weapons program.

Diplomats at the IAEA have warned that materials useable in nuclear weapons could easily be shipped out of Iraq and sold to countries like Iran or terrorist groups believed to be interested in acquiring nuclear weapons.

U.S. Failed to Secure Known Nuclear Site

The New York Times report cited White House and Pentagon officials - as well as at least one Iraqi minister - as acknowledging that the explosives vanished from the site shortly after the U.S.-led invasion amid widespread looting.

The minister of science and technology, Rashad M. Omar, confirmed the explosives were missing in an interview with The Times and CBS Television in Baghdad.

A Western diplomat close to the IAEA, who declined to be named, said it was difficult to understand why the U.S. military had failed to secure the facility despite knowing how sensitive the site was.

"This was a very well known site. If you could have picked a few sites that you would have to secure then ... Al Qaqaa would certainly be one of the main ones," the diplomat said.

U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice was informed about the missing explosives only within the last month, the Times said, adding that it was unclear whether President Bush was aware.

U.S. administration officials said Sunday the Iraq Survey Group, the Central Intelligence Agency task force that searched for unconventional weapons, had been ordered to investigate the disappearance, the newspaper said.

Vienna diplomats said the IAEA had cautioned the United States about the danger of the explosives before the war, and after the invasion it specifically told U.S. officials about the need to keep the them secured.

Go to Original

A Look at Explosives Missing in Iraq
The Associated Press

Monday 25 October 2004

A glance at the destructive power of the nearly 380 tons of conventional explosives the International Atomic Energy Agency says have gone missing from a former military installation in Iraq:



HMX: High melting explosives, as they are scientifically known, are among the most powerful in use by the world's militaries today. HMX, also known as octogen, is made from hexamine, ammonium nitrate, nitric acid and acetic acid. Because it detonates at high temperatures, it is used in various kinds of explosives, rocket fuels and burster chargers.



RDX: Also referred to as cyclonite or hexogen, RDX is a white crystalline solid usually used in mixtures with other explosives, oils or waxes. Rarely used alone, it has a high degree of stability in storage and is considered the most powerful of the high explosives used by militaries.



Plastic Explosives: Experts say both HMX and RDX are key ingredients in plastic explosives such as Semtex and C-4, puttylike military substances that easily can be shaped. Libyan terrorists used just 1 pound of Semtex in 1988 to down Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people.

C-4 or its main ingredients were used in the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen that killed 17 U.S. sailors. Traces of RDX were found in an investigation of explosions that crippled two heavily fortified Israeli tanks, indicating Palestinian militants have obtained at least small quantities of the extremely potent material.

Just 5 pounds of either plastic explosive would be enough to blow up a dozen jetliners, experts say.

 

[MonsterMark]

Old news dug up by the New York Times to provide cover for the story released this morning by the Washington Times proving Kerry is beyond a doubt the biggest exaggerator (read: liar) to ever run for office.

 

[97silverlsc]

Old news or not, 380 tons of that stuff can make a lot of roadside bombs and suit up a lot of suicide bombers!!! More mismanagement by our "texas cowboy" that will cost troop lives!!!! What an idiot!!!!

 

[Kbob]

More mismanagement by our "texas cowboy" that will cost troop lives!!!! What an idiot!!!!

Yeah, why wasn't Bush guarding that himself? I can't believe he didn't personally see to it that there was a brigade of soldiers guarding that site (sarcasm)!!! How do you expect to be taken seriously when everything wrong that happens you automatically blame Bush personally for it? This is the kind of attitude that makes people like me rally to Bush's side.

 

[97silverlsc]

Obviously forgot to read the article, again. They were warned about this depot before the war started and had ample time to deal with this. Instead they chose to ignore it.[/B]SHRUB has failed miserably at his mission goal of keeping weapons of mass distruction out of the hands of terrorists!!! After all, wasn't this one of the "justifications" given by Shrub and Cheney for invading Iraq?

This a major blunder on the part of Shrub's administration and jeopardizes the lives of all of our troops!!!!

But you and Bryan can poo-pooh this and try and sweep it under the rug. It never ceases to amaze me how you and the rest of the right wingers will look away when your boy has really screwed the pooch!!!!

 

[MonsterMark]

Phil, you have finally convinced me. It is Shrub's fault. He should have been more careful to watch all those stockpiles of French, Russian and Chinese WMD. How stupid could he be? I mean, they were shipping those weapons in before/during/after the war. Bush knew they were using the corrupt oil-for-food program that those we not pallets of rice they were bringing in. It was plain for everyone to see the giant skull and crossbones on the tips of those nukes. I mean right under our noses. How brazen!

 

[Kbob]

Obviously forgot to read the article, again.

I read it just fine, thank you. But your claim that I didn't gives further proof of how inept you are at arriving to an accurate conclusion.

 

[97silverlsc]

I think the conclusion I reach is valid, and I'm sure a lot of others will agree.
1. The IAEA warned us about the stockpile of explosives, some of which could be used for nuclear weapon detonation, before the war. Once the war started, the IAEA personnel were no longer able to guard this material. At that point, it should have been a concern for the Shrub administration.
2. During Shrubs lame attempts to justify the war, one of the reasons given was to prevent saddam from giving weapons of mass distruction to terrorists.
3. By not securing the stockpile, we have "given " this material to the terrorists, who no doubt are using these explosives against our troops, causing the death and mutilation of same, as well as innocent Iraqi citizens.
4. Bryan and Kbob will see this as a non issue because it makes Shrub look bad. No guys, I don't expect that he will personally guard this material. He is the commander in chief, at least in title, and I would expect that someone within his administration might possess enough intelligence to suggest that the stockpile be guarded, or moved to a more secure area, or destroyed rather than let the locals go on a shopping spree!

 

[Katshot]

Guys,
You gotta see the sense in what Phil is saying. Obviously Bush wouldn't guard them himself, to make that statement was just plain stupid. Anyone with even a small amount of common sense can see that this was a pretty big OOPS by the Bush administration. As was pointed out previously, Bush DID manage to have troops guarding the oil ministry. Why would that be more important to guard than a commonly known stockpile of WMD grade explosives. To not be able to see fault in this or to place blame on the Bush administration seriously undermines your credibility.
Face it, 380 tons wasn't smuggled out in a few pick-up trucks overnight.

 

[MonsterMark]

He is the commander in chief, at least in title, and I would expect that someone within his administration might possess enough intelligence to suggest that the stockpile be guarded, or moved to a more secure area, or destroyed rather than let the locals go on a shopping spree!

Please prove that the locals went on a shopping spree or that the weapons were either not destroyed, or moved, or buried. Then we can place blame on the military plan created by the Pentagon and signed off by Bush.

 

[97silverlsc]

Kerry Says Missing Explosives in Iraq Illustrate Bush's Failures
By TERENCE NEILAN

Published: October 25, 2004
Senator John Kerry seized on a report today that 380 tons of explosives had vanished from a site in Iraq that the United States admits it was supposed to have guarded, calling the disappearance "one of the great blunders of Iraq, one of the great blunders of this administration."

He added that "the incredible incompetence of this president and this administration has put our troops at risk and put this country at greater risk than we all need."

The chief White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, sought to downplay the threat posed by the missing explosives, saying they represented no threat of nuclear proliferation and that the administration preferred to concentrate on weapons destroyed, not those lost.

"We have destroyed more than 243,000 [tons of] munitions," he said, adding that Mr. Bush was told the material was missing on Oct. 15. "We've secured another nearly 163,000 that will be destroyed."

But with leadership in time of war a major issue as the Nov. 2 election approaches, Mr. Kerry pressed home his point during a campaign stop in Dover, N.H.: "Let me say this as directly as I can: that the unbelievable blindness, stubbornness, arrogance of this administration to do the basics, has now allowed this president to once again fail the test of being commander in chief."

Mr. Kerry went on: "If President Bush can't recognize his failures in Iraq, which he doesn't admit, won't acknowledge, you can't fix them, and then he's doomed to repeat the same mistakes elsewhere, whether its North Korea, or Iran, or in any other of the risks that we face ahead of us.

"My fellow Americans, we can't afford to risk four more years of George Bush's miscalculations."

A spokesman for the Bush-Cheney campaign, Steve Schmidt, describing "the entire country of Iraq" as "a weapons stockpile,'' responded that "all the Monday morning-quarterbacking and armchair-generaling in the world by John Kerry won't make up for the fact that he does not have a vision, a strategy or a plan to fight and win the war on terror."

Mr. Bush did not directly reply to Mr. Kerry's remarks or address the issue of the missing explosives during a campaign speech today in Colorado, whose nine electoral votes are still considered up for grabs by most opinion polls. Rather, he sought again to link the war in Iraq with the campaign against terrorism.

"We are fighting these terrorists with our military in Afghanistan and Iraq and beyond so we do not have to face them in the streets of our own cities," Mr. Bush told supporters in Greeley. "Victory in Iraq is essential to victory in the war on terror."

Mr. Bush also used the occasion to again portray Mr. Kerry as having a "flip-flop" record on the war and other issues.

"Just last year, American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan needed $87 billion for body armor, hazard pay, vehicles, weapons and bullets," Mr. Bush said. "First, Senator Kerry said it would be irresponsible to vote against the troops, then he voted against the troops. "

In his own address, in New Hampshire, whose four electoral votes are considered still in play, Mr. Kerry said that although American troops had been doing their job, "the problem is the commander in chief has not been doing his. "

The report, which appeared today in The New York Times, said the explosives were used to demolish buildings, make missile warheads and detonate nuclear weapons. The facility, called Al Qaqaa, was supposed to have been under American military control, but it is still being looted, the report said. White House and Pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished after the American-led invasion.

American weapons experts say their immediate concern is that the explosives could be used in major bombing attacks against American or Iraqi forces.

Mr. Kerry's criticism was echoed by his vice presidential running mate, Senator John Edwards.

Mr. Edwards, in a campaign stop in Toledo, Ohio, called Mr. Bush "reckless" and "clueless" for not safeguarding the explosives missing in Iraq and criticized the administration for sending Condoleezza Rice out on the campaign trail instead of the situation room.

"They failed to do what was necessary and what was needed to keep us safe," Mr. Edwards told a rally. "During the invasion, these explosives were taken by who knows who, who knows where. After they learned about the missing explosives, they still failed to properly guard this site."

He suggested that Ms. Rice should be in Washington directing the hunt for the explosives instead of giving a speech in hotly contested Florida.



Enough proof for you? "White House and Pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished after the American-led invasion."

 

[barry2952]

OK Bryan,

The stockpile went somewhere, and we didn't move it. Who did?

The biggest problem that I have with our current President is that he lacks the ability to admit to his and his minions mistakes. Admission of failings and changing course would go a long way to restoring GWB's credibility. I'm not saying that we should cut and run. I'm saying that we should stop and analyze our approach and try to build a new consensus.

I would agree that the intelligence the GWB relied on was faulty and I would also agree that the machine that produced this intelligence was started under other adminstrations so there is plenty of blame to go around. But, he can't keep blaming bad intelligence when he's in charge of intelligence. He can't keep blaming Kerry for voting for the war. The intelligence that Kerry used to make his decision was supplied directly and indirectly by the White House. Can't you see that?

Think of us (US) as a big family. If the dad makes an "assumption" and yells at the mom in front of the kids and later finds out that he's wrong, wouldn't the right thing to do be to aplologize to mom in front of the kids? I didn't think any less of my father for handling our family that way.

You and I just finished a round of pretty nasty exchanges. We made contact and came to an understanding. We both acknowledged that our extremes didn't do either of our positions any good. You acknowledged that you went too far sometimes and I admitted that I took pleasure in rubbing your nose in your statements. If we can agree to change course, why can't our Commander in Chief?

 

[MonsterMark]

380 tons of explosives had vanished

"We have destroyed more than 243,000 [tons of] munitions,"

"We've secured another nearly 163,000 that will be destroyed."

Ah, thank you. So we have destroyed or are going to have destroyed a total of 406,000 tons on munitions and you are whining about 380 tons. An amount equivalent to less than 1 small warehouse or bunker.

That works out to less than .1% (one-tenth of 1 percent) of the amount of munitions so far being discussed.

Man, you guys are precious. Talk amount making a mountain out of a molehill. Why don't you report that the US has seized 99.9% of the known munitions so far?

I see, the glass is always half empty and the Democrats cannot attain power unless good things happen like Americans being killed, hostages being taken, oil costing $5.00 gallon, tax money being returned to the people that pay it, etc, etc. What miserable existence must be led by many on the left to have acquired such a pessimistic and dour outlook on life.

I am just asking you guys to put things in perspective. There are millions of tons of munitions in Iraq. I guarantee I could hide 380 tons of weapons in Milwaukee and nobody could find them, much less in a country the size of California. I guess I am so upset about these things because Kerry is always Monday-Morning quarterbacking things.

I'm John kerry and I would have done this and I would have done that, and I would have done it smarter and I would have done it faster. And I have a plan.

Please, Mr. Kerry, spare me!

 

[MonsterMark]

You and I just finished a round of pretty nasty exchanges. We made contact and came to an understanding. We both acknowledged that our extremes didn't do either of our positions any good. You acknowledged that you went too far sometimes and I admitted that I took pleasure in rubbing your nose in your statements. If we can agree to change course, why can't our Commander in Chief?

Hopefully we can continue to smoke the peace pipe. It is much preferred to putting on the war paint.

As far as President Bush goes, please stop asking him to apologize. I don't think he has done anything wrong myself in prosecuting this war on terror. Saddam had to go! The whole world was in agreement. The world community was in agreement that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and was an emminent threat to our safety and that of the free world. Should I post again the statements made by the whole Democratic party that agreed that Saddam was a threat? But because it is not politically expedient anymore, now they have conveniently changed their minds.

I don't care anymore. Let Kerry win. Let him muck things up and then we'll take over in 4 years and control everything in the country for another 12 years after that. I'm willing to make that trade just to set things straight once and for all on which doctrine is the best for this country.

 

[Joeychgo]

A “lack of security” resulted in the loss of 377 tons of high explosives from the sprawling Al-Qaqaa military installation about 30 miles south of Baghdad, said Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA.


and another quote


The letter informed the IAEA that since Sept. 4, 2003, looting at the Al-Qaqaa installation south of Baghdad had resulted in the loss of 214.67 tons of HMX, 155.68 tons of RDX and 6.39 tons of PETN explosives.


You call this old news - yet bring up stuff from 35 years ago that is merely heresay from bush supporters at best? This stuff is a fact-300 tons missing. SO the question for you Bryan, is how do you shift blame from The Commander in Chief - to John Kerry? After all - GW isnt responsible is he?


Here are a few other notes:





Chemical weapons
Before: Iraq was believed to have stocked up to 500 metric tons of chemical warfare agents. It was also said to have concealed equipment and other items needed for continuing chemical weapons production.

After: No chemical weapons have been found. Some sources say Iraq was conducting experiments to develop chemical weapons, but no physical evidence has been found. More time is needed to investigate.




Biological weapons
Before: Intelligence agencies believed Iraq had biological weapons and facilities to develop more of them. Among the weapons believed to be in Iraq was anthrax, a deadly germ which could be quickly produced and delivered by bombs, missiles, aerial sprayers or covert operatives. Mobile laboratories were believed to be used for developing biological weapons.

After: No weapons have been found and Secretary of State Colin Powell said in a May 16, 2004 interview with 'Meet the Press" that the prewar intelligence on the existence of mobile biological weapons labs was based on sourcing that was "inaccurate and wrong and, in some cases, deliberately misleading." Powell originally introduced the threat of mobile labs during a February 2003 speech in front of the United Nations. Former chief weapons inspector David Kay and other U.S. officials have said that one of the main sources of the mobile labs evidence was an Iraqi defector code-named "Curveball." The defector was later identified as a brother of one of the top aides of Ahmad Chalabi, the Iraqi exile who was an important advocate for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.



Yup - we got a competent Commander in Chief

 

[Kbob]

Obviously Bush wouldn't guard them himself, to make that statement was just plain stupid. Anyone with even a small amount of common sense can see that this was a pretty big OOPS by the Bush administration.

What I typed was sarcastic, I even said so. It was made to point out how ridiculous it is to think that nothing will ever go wrong in a war. Taking my words literally, even with my (sarcastic) disclaimer is what is stupid. And Bryan has pointed out how little it really means anyway. Everyone has been waiting for something to drop right before the election. Anyone that takes the time to study this story can see that this is just an over-blown story dropped on Bush to make him look bad right before the election.

Next questions: when did those explosives disappear? When was the last time the IAEA knew where they were? How do they know how much there really was? Does anyone know if they were even there in the first place? Have they been gone since before the war in Iraq even started? I suspect so unless proven otherwise. I suspect this "news" is probably at least 1 1/2 years old.

 

[Kbob]

Gee Joey, that was timely. You answered a couple of my questions and backed up some of my suspicions, thanks. I still would like to know how they knew what was there before 9-4-03.

 

[Joeychgo]

IAEA Insepections - the explosives were under IAEA seal -- and - as I recall - we had already invaded and occupied iraq as of 9-4-03 -


here is the whole article

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6323933/

 

[MonsterMark]

I wouldn't be surprised if Kofi Annan had them stolen so he could give them to the next country that wanted to rattle its tail against the US or he may have just 'given' them to the terrorists to teach us a lesson.

 

[barry2952]

What basis do you have for this delusion?

 

[MonsterMark]

He was the last to see them and he is corrupt. Should I post the info on Annan and his son? And the scandal that is the Oil-For-Food program that caused the French, Germans and Soviets to not support that action against Saddam because they were knee deep in it?

I wouldn't doubt for a second that he would be capable of such a thing. He hates the US and wants to see us go down. Its called MOTIVE.

 

[Katshot]

All I want to know is how ANYONE could claim 380 TONS is no big deal. What are you totally nuts?! No wonder you like Bush. He'd have to be like HITLER before you'd finally admit he's a liar and a useless leader.

 

[MonsterMark]

What is "SUPPOSEDLY" missing, and may well have been "missing" before we entered Iraq amounts to 40 truckloads of material. We have already destroyed or will be destroying shortly a total of 40,000 truckloads.

Keep drinking the kerry kool-aid. In fact, spike it with something. You're already in lala land, you might as well enjoy it.

Go ahead and prove the weapons are missing becuase of the US occupation and disprove that they weren't moved before the war even started. Have you seen the pictures of the sand pile that is supposed to be the weapons dump? Not a real high profile place when there are millions of pounds of weaponry elsewhere in Iraq.

I can't believe how many people believe what the press writes. The New York Times runs with this story fed to them a week ago by the IAEA and it is national news. We find out that Kerry lied during the 2nd debate when he said he met with all the heads of the UN Security Council and not a peep is heard in the media and not a peep from you guys.

 

[Joeychgo]

Bryan, how come anyone who seems to provide a story that isnt favorable to GW is a liar or a crook or whatever, but anyone who speaks out against Kerry is rightous? Surely they cant ALL be liars and crooks and left wing hacks.

I cant remember once where you have agreed that GW is weak on anything Bryan - is the man now perfect? Should God make room for the almighty GW Bush now?

 

[MonsterMark]

Come on Joey, smell the ribs.

The UN via the IAEA comes out with this bogus 'news event' 8 days before the election to influence the election in the hope of getting their patsy elected.

I have been following the money trail for a month now and I could make your head spin around like the exorcist. Kerry is in way deeper than anybody wants to report. Especially with the North Korean and the bridges and deep water port they want to build.

Anyway, I digress, this falsified or bogus UN report comes out that says the weapons were once there, but now they are not. They don't know and they can't say if they were missing before the US invasion, only that at some point they were there. But it is Bush's fault anyways. And that is big news. 40 truckloads missing vs the 40,000 we have secured and destroyed. That is what I am talking about. Why aren't we celebrating the fact that we got 40,000 truckloads so far? That is 40,000 more truckloads that can't be used against us but would have been available if Kerry or Gore would have been in office. That is the facts of life. And that is what the media should be reporting. If Gore or Kerry were in office, the Iraqis will still be in possession of 400,000 tons (that's 8,000,000,000 billion pounds) of weapons that they could have been used against our troops or handed over to the terrorists. THAT IS THE REAL STORY HERE, not the 40+ trucks. But that is how the media spins it and then they shove it down, not my throat, but yours. Enjoy and please pass the butter.

I need to look into the psychology of what it takes to be from the left. Did you need to be dropped on your head as child or something.

Sincerely, this whole half-empty view of the world is really troubling to me. Your not happy unless there is bad news.

On a positive note, there is a new movie coming out this week (can't remember the name) that is a documentary type movie where they handed out 150 cameras to Iraqis and let them film their lives. Why it was not produced 1 month ago I don't know. From what I have heard of it, it would secure the election for President Bush if the American people could see how grateful the Iraqi people truly are about our rescue of them from Saddam. Instead all we get shown on TV screens is the occasional car bomb footage or the fabrications of a pompous fool in the movie theaters.

We perform 4000 murders, (I'm sorry) abortions a day in this country. We kill hundreds of our fellow citizens over drugs, sex, and money each hour. Bush is out trying to save mankind and freedom as we know it. Give him a break, wiil ya.