US weapons team quits Iraq
 

US weapons team quits Iraq
January 8, 2004

A 400-strong US military team that has been searching for illicit weapons in Iraq has been withdrawn after finding nothing of substance, although a separate group looking for weapons of mass destruction still remains in the country, The New York Times reported today.

"They picked up everything that was worth picking up," one US official told the daily, referring to the Joint Captured Material Exploitation Group, made up of technical experts headed by an unidentified Australian brigadier.

The team's task included searching weapons depots and other sites for missile launchers that might have been used with illicit weapons, another also unidentified Defence Department official was quoted as saying.

The withdrawal of the 400-member military team was seen by some military officials as a sign that the US government may no longer expect to uncover chemical or biological weapons in Iraq, the daily said.

A separate military team tasked with disposing of chemical or biological weapons in Iraq remains part of the 1,400-member Iraq Survey Group that has been searching for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq since Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was overthrown, a member of the survey group said.

However he told the paper that the group in question, known as Task Force D/E, for disablement and elimination, was "still waiting for something to dispose of."

In October, an interim report by Iraq Survey Group leader David Kay said his search had yielded no weapons of mass destruction, which President George W Bush had cited as justification for war against Iraq.

Kay, however, said documents found in Iraq indicated that Saddam intended to develop illicit weapons and may have retained the capacity to do so. Kay has yet to announce when he will turn in his final report on the matter.

The Washington Post yesterday said interviews with Iraqi scientists and investigators indicate that Saddam's regime concealed arms research that never went beyond the planning stage, although it engaged in "abundant deception" about its ambitions.

"The broad picture emerging from the investigation to date," said the Post, "suggests that, whatever its desire, Iraq did not possess the wherewithal to build a forbidden armory on anything like the scale it had before the 1991 Persian Gulf War."



well, who would have thought !!:RE: Link

sigh...some people still fail to grasp how much things have changed after 9-11, going after Saddam wasn't about getting his possible WMD's (which btw every country on the planet is sure he had) it was about stopping him before he was a further danger, in fact Bush specifically said he wasn't an imminent threat, 9-11 showed that sitting around being reactive to threats and dangers is disasterous, i think all the plans showing he was ready to re-start as soon as the sanctions/and or inspections were over shows that wasn't going to stop being a beligerant asshole to the rest of the world.

start lefty trolling......NOW!

I give up------ Who?


So, what you think we should do? Put Saddam back in Power?, or Maybe AUS would like to have him. He could be a member of your government, or maybe we could invent a time machine, go back 6 months. We will re-write history, I saw it in a movie once.


Anyhow, To the Anti-war group, Are you just against this war and will find everything and anything to try and sway the masses who disagree with you? Or Do you just Hate the USA and GWB? And use this War to try and Prove the USA is Evil?

Maybe this war was the start for a new ideology for the new century.

EDIT---Before people go off the deep end......What is done is done, no point finger pointing and saying Ha Ha I told you so. Question is, How do we try and not let something like this happen again? I still believe the War was or is justified tho.

One of these days, hopefully, you'll figure out that exposing, or at least considering the hype, misdirection and outright deceit of your own government is a form of patriotism, and a necessary form of participation--without shrieking "SADDAM LOVER" in that shrill nasal tone.

I can't speak for people in other countries, but I assume people everywhere know that bullshit stinks.

gotta give credit where its due, the war mongers have done a fine job of shifting the focus from one point to another. if they had just came out from the start and said they have a lot of oil and Israel told us to, well it would suck, but at least it would be honest. but the grand scale of backpeddeling on wmds is laffable. now hurry up and impose the draft, so you can be soundly defeated by Dean, or whoever it is.

heh it's all dem dirty jooooos fault eh?

you sound like a typical jihadist, and you wonder why some label you and your ilk as traitorous.

i dident say jooooos, nice try, and unlike many i dont equate the zionists in Israel with the rest of the jews. even though they try as hard as they can to confuse the issue.

ramona's link - this worked better for me.

“The country really was flattened by the Gulf War, by the bombing of 1998 and by the 10 years of sanctions, and simply didn’t have capabilities it had before.” - Barton Gellman

- js.

meanwhile, in related news:

f$%&ing aye:tu:

of course the fact that the CEIP is a liberal think tank that opposed the war has nothing to do with that report :RE:

yup. i was struck by that, too....they're liberal and they're right - amazing, no?

My observations: the people in this forum that opposed the war are still fighting it, 'fishin' for warmongers.' Granted, both sides are responsible for the unrest here, but when you pick a fight with the pro-war types what do expect to happen?

i expect them to cry, bitch, whine and distort the truth. fun isnt it.

pot meet keetle, keetle this is pot

ahhahahahha, hey thats my analogy

:spin:
at the end of every pbs news hour
i see dead people...

some time i go to change the channel...but i just cant..finger stays poised over the channel changer..but just cant do it...
almost happens every time
(dr who starts right after):)

bloody hell theres some beautiful kids coming back dead...brave souls that they are..

:(

these kids should be out enjoying life
and not dying like this ..doing crack deals...or dying in an OD..maybe..
fast car..bungee accident..?

anything..
WAR SUCKS !

:rofl:

what a load of shit :rofl:

you can take your fake sympathy and shove it up your ass, the majority of troops actually think what they're doing is a good thing, not everyone is a bleeding heart tree hugger like you and Greedy, especially not people who volunteer to train in the ways of killing people.

I'm not against war.
I think it's a great population control for a species that has no natural predators.

I'd just rather be told the reason for having a war, and when the reasons change not be told that the original reasons weren't the reasons at all.

A little optimistic maybe. I fully expect my govermental leaders to lie to the world and at times to their own people. But I'd rather not be treated like an idiot when they do it.

you were told, and the reason never changed

im glad you found it amusing...

no i dont have any real symapthy for them ...but i do feel for thier freinds and relavtives...




you dont say ?


i wonder if the number of hand lanched ground to air missiles the iraqi insurgents have..out number the amount of blackhawk choppers that are over there?

So... some inspectors have left... there's jack shit to be found... well, excuse me if I don't piss my pants in surprise.

It amazes me that there are still people on this board (like Span... yes, I'm singling you out) that fit perfectly into the knee-jerk, xenophobic, binkered, characature-like terms that 'The Left' like to describe 'The Right' in.

First of all, we have people arguing that the reason the US went to war wasn't about the 'presence' of WMD, but about the possibilty of Hussain becoming a further danger... but remember sheeple, Bush never said said the word "imminant".... oh no, no... he said the words "grave and gathering danger", with his fellow chum Cheney claiming that Hussain possessed "reconstituted nuclear weapons" - which as we all know is entirely different to giving the impression that there's any "imminant danger". Use your fucking common sense... the repeated statements about Iraq/Hussain at the time were designed to stop short of claiming attack was imminant, but to make people feel threatened enough to feel comfortable with a pre-emptive attack on Iraq.

Ah yes.... then there's the issue of 11th Septempber. I agree with you Span, being reactive after terrorist events isn't good enough (then, neither is letting it happen). Rather than bombing the shit out of people and calling it progress, there's an interesting idea that involves trying to undestand why terrorism is happening... (i'll give you a clue: it aint because "evildoers hate our freedom and way of life"). I know that's a difficult concept to entertain - the fact that there might be shades of grey out there surrounding terrorists and that... god forbid... there might be an argument to be had over policy, but try... try.

Which leads nicely onto a shitload of issues - one of which is Israel. It amazes me that in a supposed desire to promote freedom and democracy around the globe, that anybody who dares to criticise Israel, it's links with terror or it's present role... is suddenly faced with subtle accusations of being anti-semite, anti-jewish or some such other bullshit like "blaming it on dem dirty joooos". Why not go the whole hog and suggest anyone who questions the obvious bullshit surrounding Israel, could be (but possibly not) a holocaust denier? You seem to have no problem with the of labeling US citzens that question their government as 'traitorous'... and non-US citizens who crititcise US policy as anti-american or GWB-haters.

Well, I can't stand GWB for many reasons. But you're right about one of the reasons, Span. I find it frustrating that people are prepared to go along with someone like Bush... but then again, the populous of both our countries are no different when it comes to facing home truths... a nice comfortable lie feels so much more cushy. As for anti-americanism... it's a convenient phrase considering there's so much of it in the world. There are people who hate the US and there are people who like what America used to stand for (that Constitution thing you guys always used to bang on about)... and it's usually the latter that criticise the present government - but why bother make a distinction between the two - it's much easier to blanket the whole lot as anti-american?

A distinct theme emerging here..... take a variety of views, throw them into the same tincan, slap the 'evil' label on them and a use-by-date that says 'do not open until 2005'. Nice try.

Sleep tight, Span.:kiss:

A couple of unsupported but interesting stories about Hussein
 

Saddam's presidential secretary ''dies'' in US custody
Al Bawaba
Unofficial Iraqi sources told Al Bawaba Wednesday that Abed Hamoud al-Tikriti, presidential secretary of former leader Saddam Hussein died two days ago while in US custody.

Iraqi security officials contacted by Al Bawaba declined to comment on the report, but have not denied it either.

Read More...
--------------
Report: Saddam Hussein Has Cancer
Sofia Morning News
The ousted Iraqi dictator, who is currently under custody with the coalition forces, suffers from cancer of lymph glands, Kuwaiti Al-Anba daily reads, citing an Iraqi official. According to the daily, the disease is in an advanced stage, so doctors predict the former dictator would probably live a couple of years more.

Doctors came out with the fatal diagnosis while making thorough medical checking of Saddam Hussein at his capture near his hometown of Tikrit in December 2003.

Allegations of Saddam's illness appeared during the military campaign in Iraq last year, when one of his private doctors, residing in Syria, claimed that the former dictator suffered from cancer.

A well-known, under-reported story - now probably about to gather more attention as the pressure for an international trial increases... he'll be dead before any trial - as will most of his aides.

President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat
October 7, 2002
Remarks by the President on Iraq
Cincinnati Museum Center - Cincinnati Union Terminal
Cincinnati, Ohio

For bureaucratic reasons, we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction (as justification for invading Iraq) because it was the one reason everyone could agree on.

Paul Wolfowitz May 28, 2003





More great WMD quotes ;)

Former US president Bill Clinton said in October during a visit to Portugal that he was convinced Iraq had weapons of mass destruction up until the fall of Saddam Hussein, Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso said.

"When Clinton was here recently he told me he was absolutely convinced, given his years in the White House and the access to privileged information which he had, that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction until the end of the Saddam regime," he said in an interview with Portuguese cable news channel SIC Noticias.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/World/story_54281.asp

oh yea, x-lint post gigerman
 

that could well be, for that matter santa claws might to, but big differance between they and Busie and pals. they dident yell and rant and carry on and on about how much danger the poor little US peeps were, and then proceed to knock the shit out of a country that we already been kickin ass on for 12 years.

try again.

Re: oh yea, x-lint post gigerman
 

Nope, They had a different agenda...



"Wag the Dog" bombings. The first came in the August 1998 missile strikes on Sudan and Afghanistan, three days after Clinton's grand jury testimony and in the midst of a media firestorm over his televised non-apology for the Lewinsky affair. The administration has refused to release the evidence it claims to have relied on for its assertions that the Sudanese pharmaceutical plant made nerve gas and that its owner was linked to terrorist Osama Bin Laden.

The second "Wag the Dog" bombing occurred on the eve of the House impeachment debate when the president ordered air strikes on Iraq. Attempting to explain the curious timing of the attack, Clinton asserted that "we had to act and act now [because] without a strong inspections system, Iraq would be free to retain and begin to rebuild its chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons programs—in months, not years." As a result of the president's action, we've since gone two years without any weapons inspections.

The timing of Clinton's actions gave rise to suspicion that he was applying a chillingly literal version of Clausewitz's dictum that war is politics by other means.

http://www.cato.org/dailys/01-20-01.html

you guys dont have to convince me Clinton did some shitty things, i agree completely, but Clinton isnt really the focus of this thread is he? again, he dident run us headlong into full war over lies about Iraqs bad things. so give him a rest. and hahahhah at Gadhafi saying look over here, we got all kinds of nastys. perhaps we attacked the wrong one eh?

if keeping wmd out of the hands of extremeists is the stated goal, then how come Israel has all kinds of wmds?

because they didn't sign the NPT , plus they aren't threatening to use them on anyone.

I will help you guys out.........



To quote Charles V Pena (Charles V. Peña director of defense policy studies at the Cato Institute), The whole analysis is here http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa502.pdf


President Bush asserts that U.S. military action against Iraq was justified because Saddam Hussein was in material breach of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441. But even if Iraq was in violation of a UN resolution, the U.S. military does not exist to enforce UN mandates. It exists to defend the United States: its territorial integrity and national sovereignty, the population, and the liberties that underlie the American way of life. So whether Iraq was in violation of Resolution 1441 is irrelevant. The real question is whether Iraq represented a direct and imminent threat to the United States that could not otherwise be deterred. If that was the case, then preemptive self-defense, like Israel's military action against Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq in the 1967 Six Day War, would have been warranted. And if Iraq was not a threat, especially in terms of aiding and abetting Al Qaeda, then the United States fought a needless war against a phantom menace.

In the final analysis, the war against Iraq was the wrong war. Not because the United States used preemptive military force—preemptive self-defense would have been justified in the face of a truly imminent threat. Not because the United States acted without the consent of the United Nations—no country should surrender its defense to a vote of other nations. And not because Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMD)—none has been discovered and, even if they existed, they were not a threat.

The war against Iraq was the wrong war because the enemy at the gates was, and continues to be, Al Qaeda. Not only was Iraq not a direct military threat to the United States (even if it possessed WMD, which was a fair assumption), but there is no good evidence to support the claim that Saddam Hussein was in league with Al Qaeda and would have given the group WMD to be used against the United States. In fact, all the evidence suggests the contrary. Hussein was a secular Muslim ruler, and bin Laden is a radical Muslim fundamentalist—their ideological views are hardly compatible

Finally someone from the Bush Administration has told the truth. Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill has told everyone what we already knew; that Bush was a moron, a lying one and that the reason to invade Iraq was not weapons of mass destruction but oil and was bandied about months before the 9-11 attacks. O'Neill backed it up with Pentagon documents proving without a doubt American soldiers died for oil and money and not to save America from weapons of mass destruction. The Pentagon had Iraqi maps for potential areas of oil exploration in March of 2001 and two years later suddenly Bush starts lying about weapons of mass destruction and Iraq as an imminent threat. They just happened to have maps of oil drilling sites, what a coincidence that suddenly Iraq becomes this great threat. How is the Bush Administration and the Pentagon going to explain their desire to invade Iraq just 10 days after his inauguration? Throw in the fact that David Kay's search for WMD has uncovered absolutely nothing. Did Bush have some secret info when he was governor of Texas? Sure he did, it was given to him by his campaign contributors, aka the big oil companies. The oil companies placed a stooge to be elected president and had their oil man Dick Cheney running the show so they could all make more profits at the expense of the American budget deficit and the American soldiers' lives. Paul O'Neill's documents prove it. Paul O'Neill is a hero for coming forward and telling the truth, however I would advise him to get some bodyguards because he might mysteriously disappear or have an accident. It is not that I don't trust the Bush Administration but O'Neill should watch his back just the same...

The former Treasury Secretary described Bush and his cabinet in meetings as a ''blind man in a roomful of deaf people,'' which is a nice way of saying he was a moron being pushed and prodded by his so-called advisers. This verifies everything we have heard. Bush is a simpleton. Cheney runs the show. The oil companies set the agenda. The war was for oil. It is no longer an argument; it is now fact, backed up by O'Neill and his documents. The Bush Administration is the most corrupt administration in the history of the country. With all the facts now out there for everyone to see, it is time for those taken in by the Bush Administration's big lie to admit that they had been fooled and repent. All those flag waving patriots should start by apologizing to the antiwar group who had this administration pegged from the get-go. And if you still believe the WMD and the 'Iraqi people are better off now' propaganda, then I suggest you click here and find yourself some help...

As for me I'm going to sit back and give you a big, fat I TOLD YOU SO....

regime change in Iraq has been an official US policy since '98, i think it's great that Bush actually decided to enfore that policy.

ah so finally someone admits the anti-war crowd isn't patriotic.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/005628.php

paul o'neil is a disgruntled insider who was disgraced and fired.

maybe he should've included this letter in his book, written by democrats...sent to clinton in 1998, and take note of the signatures.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/gen/Document.jpg

since he says bush lied about wmd's and iraq being an imminent threat, then every democrat who signed that document must have been lying as well.


"Let us be clear on one thing about Paul O'Neil: He was one of the worst Treasury secretaries in memory. During the height of a currency crisis and meltdown in the stock market, Mr. O'Neil was playing the role of a rock groupie as he followed Bono around Africa. Many Washingtonians, not least of all, Mr. Bush himself, half hoped he would never come back. He had a penchant for wedging his foot in his mouth, talking down the dollar and the need for tax cuts, and then pathetically blaming every faux pas on his penchant for "telling the truth."

http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/...5239-4470r.htm

you fellas just cling to the WMD hoax like drowning men with a life preserver...

and you fellas just cling to the word hoax :)


a quote from hillary...

"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members, though there is apparently no evidence of his involvement in the terrible events of September 11, 2001. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. Should he succeed in that endeavor, he could alter the political and security landscape of the Middle East, which as we know all too well affects American security."

-- Hillary Clinton, October 10, 2002


"Some are suggesting, certainly, that (Saddam) destroyed the weapons after 1998 or maybe even sooner. It's just counterintuitive that he would have done that. His would have been the greatest intelligence hoax of all time, fooling every intelligence agency, three presidents, five secretaries of defense and the entire world into thinking he still had the weapons."

--Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., ranking member of the House intelligence Committee


that's rather contradictory to his interim progress report.


STATEMENT BY DAVID KAY ON THE INTERIM PROGRESS REPORT ON THE ACTIVITIES OF THE IRAQ SURVEY GROUP (ISG)
BEFORE THE HOUSE PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS, SUBCOMMITTEE ON DEFENSE, AND THE
SENATE SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE

October 2, 2003

some excerpts.........

"We have discovered dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG has discovered that should have been declared to the UN. Let me just give you a few examples of these concealment efforts, some of which I will elaborate on later:

A clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment subject to UN monitoring and suitable for continuing CBW research.


A prison laboratory complex, possibly used in human testing of BW agents, that Iraqi officials working to prepare for UN inspections were explicitly ordered not to declare to the UN.


Reference strains of biological organisms concealed in a scientist's home, one of which can be used to produce biological weapons.


New research on BW-applicable agents, Brucella and Congo Crimean Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF), and continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin were not declared to the UN.


Documents and equipment, hidden in scientists' homes, that would have been useful in resuming uranium enrichment by centrifuge and electromagnetic isotope separation (EMIS).


A line of UAVs not fully declared at an undeclared production facility and an admission that they had tested one of their declared UAVs out to a range of 500 km, 350 km beyond the permissible limit.


Continuing covert capability to manufacture fuel propellant useful only for prohibited SCUD variant missiles, a capability that was maintained at least until the end of 2001 and that cooperating Iraqi scientists have said they were told to conceal from the UN.


Plans and advanced design work for new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1000 km - well beyond the 150 km range limit imposed by the UN. Missiles of a 1000 km range would have allowed Iraq to threaten targets through out the Middle East, including Ankara, Cairo, and Abu Dhabi.


Clandestine attempts between late-1999 and 2002 to obtain from North Korea technology related to 1,300 km range ballistic missiles --probably the No Dong -- 300 km range anti-ship cruise missiles, and other prohibited military equipment."

full report here....

http://www.cia.gov/cia/public_affair..._10022003.html



in addition.....


"David Kelly, the weapons expert whose suicide rocked the British government, believed Iraq did pose an immediate threat, the BBC said on Wednesday, just days before a critical report into his death."

"Kelly's comments on Iraq's weapons -- never previously broadcast -- were to be aired on Wednesday evening in a BBC "Panorama" programme that reconstructed the run-up to his death and Hutton's inquiry.

Asked if Iraq was an "immediate threat", Kelly, a former United Nations weapons inspector, said: "Yes."

"Even if they're not actually filled and deployed today, the capability exists to get them filled and deployed within a matter of days and weeks," he said in the October 2002 interview with the BBC, which was submitted to Hutton."

full story here....

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L21296095.htm

what part of the qoute didn't you get, bunkie? ok, i'll repost it:

the Bush's top WMD inspector in Iraq says, when it's all said and done, at the end of the day, that they aren't there.

think you better fall back to the "save the poor Iraqi people" line...you might get better mileage out of that one:RE:

so is he lying now, or was he lying in his interim report?

and what part of kays complete interim progress report (that fully contradicts himself in your quote) didn't you get?

he's changed his story.

even though his revised statements blatantly contradict his previous statements you believe his revised statements...and why? 'cause it's what you want to believe.

if only you could take the words "i don't think..." out of kays latest statements. but as is, it's just a collection of conjecturous statements from a failed "expert" who couldn't find a the broad side of the great wall of china if he was standing right in front of it.

if we're talking about saving the iraqi people then by all means this war was justified. the problem is that's not what the american people were told they were going to war for.

i truly believe that iraq did have an active WMD program. maybe not a fullscale nuclear development yet but certainly a chemical and biological program. giving the amount of information that's been coming out it appears more and more that many of these banned weapons were transferred somewhere else shortly before the war, possibly syria, under the nose of american intelligence. while i believe the americans had good intentions, the intelligence fuckup is quite embarrassing. if this was some kind of "rescue mission" then the bush administration should have said so from the very beginning. instead, they chose to focus on the WMD issue and now, because of faulty intelligence, the bush administration looks stupid.

What?
 

"the bush administration looks stupid." NO you don't mean that.

:rofl:

let's see...he was an expert during the interim report ("interim" as in "here's what we know so far), but in his final assessment (as in "here's what we know now"), he's a failed expert? very weak, fellas - i'm disappointed in you :no:

"here's what we know now" supercedes "interim" - it's a chronological concept you clearly have difficulty grasping.

From today's NYT:

http://www.nytimes.com/

let it go, fellas...go for a walk, have a cream soda, go wash your car, anything, but just let it go...

lol...seems like a response from a magic eight ball.


just 'cause kay doesn't "think" that the wmds are in iraq, does not mean that they do not exist.


other questions posed to kay in that same interview......


Q: Why did you decide to step down?

A: "It was, as usually it is in these cases, a complex set of issues, it related in part to a reduction in the resource and a change in focus of ISG (Iraq Survey Group). When I had started out, I had made it a condition that ISG be exclusively focused on WMD. That's no longer so. The reduction of resources. And the reason those were important is, and at least to me they were important, is I didn't feel that we could complete the task as quickly as I thought it important to complete the task, unless we exclusively focused ISG.

Q: Is it true that one of the reasons you wanted to step down was because you don't believe that anything will be found, is that true?

A: "No. No, that wasn't the reason. In fact, the reason I thought it important to complete everything is that ... by the time we get to June ... we're not going to find much after June. Once the Iraqis take complete control of the government it is just almost impossible to operate in the way that we operate. In fact it was already becoming tough. We had an important ministry that would not allow its people to be interviewed unless they had someone present. It was like the old regime.


the rest of the interview is mostly peppered with kays "i think"...and "i don't think"....

http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackage...section =news

that's exactly where david kay says they are.



Saddam's WMD Hidden In Syria, Says Iraq Survey Chief

By Con Coughlin
(Filed: 25/01/2004)

David Kay, the former head of the coalition's hunt for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, yesterday claimed that part of Saddam Hussein's secret weapons programme was hidden in Syria.

In an exclusive interview with The Telegraph, Dr Kay, who last week resigned as head of the Iraq Survey Group, said that he had uncovered evidence that unspecified materials had been moved to Syria shortly before last year's war to overthrow Saddam.

"We are not talking about a large stockpile of weapons," he said. "But we know from some of the interrogations of former Iraqi officials that a lot of material went to Syria before the war, including some components of Saddam's WMD programme. Precisely what went to Syria, and what has happened to it, is a major issue that needs to be resolved."

Dr Kay's comments will intensify pressure on President Bashar Assad to clarify the extent of his co-operation with Saddam's regime and details of Syria's WMD programme. Mr Assad has said that Syria was entitled to defend itself by acquiring its own biological and chemical weapons arsenal.

Syria was one of Iraq's main allies in the run-up to the war and hundreds of Iraqi officials - including members of Saddam's family - were given refuge in Damascus after the collapse of the Iraqi dictator's regime. Many of the foreign fighters responsible for conducting terrorist attacks against the coalition are believed to have entered Iraq through Syria.

A Syrian official last night said: "These allegations have been raised many times in the past by Israeli officials, which proves that they are false."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...ixnewstop.html

We Knew It Would Come To This
 

Before the war broke out the Iraqis had told the United States that they did not have these weapons, I think they were telling the truth and moved all their weapons over several boarders it is the only thing that makes any since out of this whole thing.

Everyone thinks that this war would start on one day and end the next and all our troops will come home and we will let the Iraqis have their country back in their hands and wipe our hands of it. That isn’t the way the war works, at least not in this day and age. We know where the weapons are and we have known that before the war broke out, and like I told my father the night they dropped those bombs on Baghdad, “They just wasted those bombs Saddom was long gone at that time. You could tell that just by the way he looked when we captured him. I also think that his sons are really still alive; any makeup artist can do wonders with faces. Us Americans are on a need to know kind of deal, so our government only tells us what we need to hear.

Do I feel that the war in Iraq was necessary? In some ways yes and no. I knew that we had to over throw Saddom that was just in my eyes. He was just a bad apple spoiled and corrupt. Over all I do think that the war did what it set out to do and did it very well and our troops did a great job. Why I feel it wasn’t necessary is my feelings for the Iraqis who had to go through all that blood shed.

Do the Iraqis have these weapons of mass destruction? Sure they do, we just haven’t gotten outside of Iraq to know who has them all. We know but we can’t do anything about it but if I was smart I would keep my eyes on Syria and Iran because you never know what those fools will do.

I know I might get hammered for what I said tonight just joining and all. But like I said there is more to the war in Iraq then just the weapons. The weapons are such a small problem compared to what lays ahead for the United States. The wars have just started, but the bigger ones are just around the corner. This is far from over.

yup brave 1st post for a forum that deals with other stuff. WMD`s ha ha don`t get me started . they have way better sand then us :beer:

geez, looks like even the White House has given up on this one:

never mind the WMD's - lemme tell you about those poor Iraqi people we had to liberate...

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040126_2094.html

I guess that answers the question where we are going next.... ;)

a very important quote from your link....

"Asked whether Bush owed the nation an explanation for the discrepancies between his warnings and Kay's findings, Kay said, "I actually think the intelligence community owes the president, rather than the president owing the American people."

no doubt. the bush administration really fucked this one up. it's not that there aren't any iraqi WMD. i'm sure the weapons are out there. they're just not in iraq. and even if there is evidence that iraqi WMD were transported to syria, how are the americans going to deal with syria? launch a military invasion? how? there are american troops in afghanistan, iraq, how the heck can america manage another military operation? their military resources are already stretched. besides, unlike the situation with iraq, there are no UN resolutions against syria that threaten the use of force for non-compliance. therefore any military move against syria will been seen by the world as even more illegitimate than the war in iraq. but then again syria does actually pose a threat to american national security. syria provides a lot of support to hizballah who already attacked americans in the past and hizballah also have close ties to al-kaida.

you seem to be under the mistaken assumption that Syria has an Army worth a damn, i think no more than 40k ground troops along with the adequate air power would crush them in days, the real problem would be even more terrorists as well as getting a coalition, that would be nearly impossible without irrefutable proof of wrongdoing on Syria's part, that said i don't think a major conflict with Syria will happen anytime in the immediate future, beef up the CIA and fund some insurections for a few years and hope for an uprising like we'll soon be having in Iran.

since you place so much emphasis on what david kay says....


Kay: Bush Was Right to Attack Iraq
Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2004 10:58 a.m. EST

Critics of the Bush administration have seized on Iraq weapons hunter David Kay's pronouncement over the weekend that Baghdad didn't have any WMDs immediately before the U.S. attacked last March.

But Tuesday morning Kay gave President Bush a full-fledged endorsement on his decision to go to war.

In an interview with NBC's "Today Show," Kay told host Matt Lauer that the U.S. decision to attack was "absolutely prudent."

"In fact," said Kay, "I think at the end of the inspection process, we'll paint a picture of Iraq that was far more dangerous than even we thought it was before the war."

Kay described Iraq's government as "a system collapsing."

"It was a country that had the capability in weapons of mass destruction areas, and ... terrorists, like ants to honey, were going after it."

Meanwhile, Saddam Hussein "was putting more money into his nuclear program, he was pushing ahead his long-range missile program as hard as he could," Kay said.

Although Baghdad wasn't successful, Kay said Iraq "had the intent to acquire these weapons," adding that Saddam had "invested huge amounts of money" to do so.

The chief weapons hunter also debunked the notion that the White House pressured U.S. intelligence to exaggerate the Iraq threat.

"The tendency to say, well, it must have been pressure from the White House is absolutely wrong," he told "Today."

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2...7/114102.shtml

what a difference a few years makes
 

Powell (feb 2001) "He (Saddam) has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors."


Powell (feb 2003) "We know that Saddam Hussein is determined to keep his weapons of mass destruction, is determined to make more."

Case Not Closed: Iraq’s WMD Stockpiles

March 2nd, 2004


In the summer of 2003, I served as Chief of Staff in the Iraqi Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), an organization formerly called the Ministry of Atomic Energy. The Ministry had a small staff of Americans and Iraqis, and was one of several ministries of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Baghdad. One of our key tasks was to transition several thousand Iraqi scientists and engineers from military and state-owned enterprises to private enterprises involved in more peaceful endeavors. Working there, I enjoyed a unique vantage point on the activities of the Iraqi Survey Group (ISG), the inspection agency headed by Dr. David Kay, charged with finding WMD. Dr. Kay’s recent report and his testimony before Congress have helped fuel flames of criticism of the Bush Administration, and of 12 years of prewar intelligence on Iraq.

We at the MOST were a vital link in the WMD reporting chain, and in coordinating interviews by the ISG with the scientists of the ministry. In addition, we had resident scientific and technical expertise, and some of our people also had extensive experience working with intelligence organizations in the conduct of tactical ground and maritime reconnaissance operations. Based on this background, I want to report to my fellow Americans on some of the problems and missed opportunities I observed in the work of the ISG. In doing so, I speak only for myself, not for my colleagues, or for any organ of the CPA, or for any agency of the United States Government.

The ISG’s search for significant stockpiles of WMD has so far come up empty. It may be that there are no large stockpiles, as Dr. Kay has stated. But from my perspective in the MOST, this lack of a positive finding may also be the result of unfocused and uncoordinated ISG search operations. It is entirely possible that the much sought-after WMD stockpiles may be literally right under the feet of coalition forces, and until a properly coordinated search effort is completed, no firm conclusions about their presence or absence can be reached. The case remains open.

In his recent testimony, Dr. Kay pronounced that there are no large stockpiles of WMD. This is a pretty bold assertion considering that actual surveys of sites we were familiar with were haphazard and uncoordinated. Also, according to his own interim report published in October of 2003, the ISG had not even searched 120 of the 130 known ammo storage points, much less any underground sites. In addition to these known sites, “neighborhood” arms caches are discovered all the time in Iraq. It is entirely possible that WMD stockpiles were moved out of Iraq, or that they were dispersed in Baghdad neighborhoods and throughout Iraq. All of this may even have been accomplished while the unfocused search operations were ongoing.

My most fundamental criticism of the ISG is that previous intelligence assessments, however partial or inadequate they may have been, were not used to provide an operational focus to the search efforts.

Before Dr. Kay’s arrival, the ISG, and its predecessor in the search, the 75th Exploitation Team, were supposedly operating off a list of locations to search for WMD. Presumably, this list was developed based upon pre-war intelligence assessments. However, many of the US intelligence analysts who had been working on Iraq’s WMD, and knowledgeable UNSCOM personnel who had conducted United Nations searches for WMD, were not initially present on the ground in Iraq.

When Dr. Kay arrived, he shifted the focus from the list of sites to interrogating scientists; not just certain scientists based upon a focused plan, but any and all scientists, as the developing trail would lead. It was apparent that the ISG was largely conducting a massive collection exercise without an operational search scheme to guide it.

The effort to interrogate scientists was obviously necessary, and promised to be a valuable source of information. But the shotgun approach was inefficient. The ISG was swamped by the amount of potentially corroborating documentation, which should have been used to shape interview priorities and test the validity of the scientists’ stories, as they were told. It was not until the Fall of 2003, however, that the Defense Intelligence Agency finally contracted out for assistance to go through the reams of documentation available to the Coalition.

The scientists who were interrogated provided information which was suspect at times, due to several factors. Outright deception on their part was always a possibility. People who were themselves incriminated, or who knew of incriminating data, had a very real fear of long-term detention and sequestering by the ISG, not to mention ultimate trial as war criminals. One supposedly cooperative scientist was held incommunicado for weeks, without even telephonic contact with his family. This sort of treatment hardly provides an incentive for others to spill their beans.

Fear of reprisal from Baathist Party “dead-enders” and enforcers was another very powerful inducement to lying and covering up important information. Lacking corroborating documents to trap liars, scientist interrogation became another collection effort with no strategy for identifying and checking on the veracity of key personnel.

In addition, there was apparently little operational control of the search activities which did take place. For example, a report came into the Ministry about a potential biological warfare (BW) equipment cache in the house of a scientist, only blocks away from the palace HQ of the CPA. The ISG operative came to the Ministry and was briefed on the specifics, points of contact, and so forth. The man then went and met with the scientist. Eventually, he gained access to the house. His initial reports back to us were enthusiastic about the equipment and substances he found. For about a week, we heard nothing further, until we received an email from the ISG, stating that he had gone on two weeks leave. Could we please let no one into the house while he was gone?

This sort of ball-dropping, unfortunately, was standard operating procedure for the ISG. There was little or no operational coordination with Combined Joint Task Force-7 (CJTF-7) , which is the headquarters of the Coalition military forces in Iraq, or the tactical units responsible for the area of operations that could have actually secured suspected WMD sites.

Dr. Kay has concluded that Iraq’s key scientists had ended up working directly for Saddam in development of WMD programs, and that they had fooled him into believing in non-existent weapons. My experience, and the character of day to day life in Iraq, indicate just the opposite. We at the MOST have been trying to put 8000 scientists and engineers back to work without their Baathist enforcers and “project managers.” It has been a Herculean task. While the scientific knowledge of the individuals is intact, actually managing complex programs is well beyond the reach of these people.

To assert that the scientists bypassed the Baathist infrastructure, the Iraqi Intelligence Service, and Special Republican Guard commanders, all the while fooling Saddam is, to put it mildly, a real stretch. To this day, many still fear the consequences of cooperating with the ISG. We would need to see the detailed rationale for Dr. Kay’s conclusions on this matter to gauge if Saddam was really fooled by scientists scared to death of him and the Baath Party, or if he ran one of military history’s most successful deception operations. If he did the latter, we must also ask why he would risk the toppling of his regime, and his death or capture, over non-existent WMDs. The only alternative explanation to these two questionable scenarios is that WMD stockpiles did in fact exist, but that they have been hidden, and/or spirited out of the country.

Dr. Kay and the ISG have already proven that Iraq was in violation of several UN resolutions. Their findings include, among others, that Iraq was involved in manufacturing of the biotoxin Ricin “right up to the end,” the restarting of Saddam’s nuclear program, and the development of BW “seed” agents, such as botulinum, that could be used to regenerate stockpiles of BW agents once UN sanctions were lifted.

Unfortunately, several factors worked against the ISG in locating actual stockpiles of WMDs. These factors included lack of analysis of historical data and preparation of an operational framework to focus the search, over-reliance on unsystematic interrogation of scientists, and poor operational monitoring and coordination of the search effort.

Some factors were beyond the ISG’s control. For example, the ISG faced a lack of resources (especially evident in the WMD and hazardous material clean-up effort), poor security of suspected WMD sites on the part of CJTF-7, and failure of US forces to prevent looting.

While the US examines the validity of national intelligence as it relates to Iraq’s WMD, it is also important to analyze the lessons of the ISG’s search operations. It would stand to reason that any continuing effort to find banned weapons would need to rely more on sound tactical intelligence preparation, and a careful handoff to experienced operational units. High-level intelligence assessments and collection efforts are not enough.



Douglas Hanson was a US Army cavalry reconnaissance officer for 20 years, and is a Gulf War I combat veteran. He has a background in radiation biology and physiology, and was an Atomic Demolitions Munitions (ADM) Security Officer, and a Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Defense Officer. As a civilian analyst, he has worked on stability and support operations in Bosnia, and helped develop a multi-service medical treatment manual for nuclear and radiological casualties. He was initially an operations officer in the operations/intelligence cell of the Requirements Coordination Office of the CPA, and was later assigned as the Chief of Staff of the Ministry of Science and Technology.

http://www.americanthinker.com/artic...rticle_id=3399

to sum up the flight of fancy above - "we didn't find anything, therefore they must (possibly) be there." evidence? no, of course not.

meanwhile back on earth, the un said yesterday inspections worked. iraq didn't have wmds.

- js.

well, let's look at this objectively....

1. he was there in an official capacity, and has some impressive credentials to back him up.

2. the un = useless nitwits.

3. you are a tree hugging moonbat.


gee, i just don't know who is more credible....


i think i'll have to go with the "chief of staff in the iraqi ministry of science and technology" guy.

ok, let's. show me some of his objective evidence.

- js.

i already did.

yet more proof that you merely respond to posts without reading them.

this your evidence?

''It may be that there are no large stockpiles, as Dr. Kay has stated.

It is entirely possible that the much sought-after WMD stockpiles may be literally right under the feet of coalition forces.''

where i come from that's called gas.

what i'd like to know is how you can make posts without reading them.

- js.