UN Confirms: WMDs Smuggled Out of Iraq

[Matthew5]

UN Confirms: WMDs Smuggled Out of Iraq
The Vanguard ^

UN Confirms: WMDs Smuggled Out of Iraq



In a report which might alternately be termed “stunning” or “terrifying”, United Nations weapons inspectors confirmed last week not merely that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but that he smuggled them out of his country, before, during and after the war.

Late last week, the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) briefed the Security Council on Saddam's lightning-fast dismantling of missile and WMD sites before and during the war. UNMOVIC executive chairman Demetrius Perricos detailed not only the export of thousands of tons of missile components, nuclear reactor vessels and fermenters for chemical and biological warheads, but also the discovery of many (but not most) of these items - with UN inspection tags still on them -- as far afield as Jordan, Turkey and even Holland.

Notably absent from that list is Iraq's western neighbor Syria, ruled by its own Baath Party just like Saddam's and closed to even the thought of an UNMOVIC inspection. Israeli intelligence has been reporting the large-scale smuggling of Saddam's WMD program across the Syrian border since at least two months before the war. Syria has long been the world's foremost state-sponsor of terrorism.

Perricos highlighted the proliferation danger to the Security Council, as well he should: UNMOVIC has no idea where most of the WMD material is today, just that it exists and it's gone; and anything in Syria is likely to be in Jerusalem or New York tomorrow.

This is the biggest news story of 2004 so far. Yet you haven't heard about it, have you?

You probably haven't heard about Canada's Prime Minister Paul Martin either -- a socialist and no friend of America. Addressing a group of 700 university researchers and business leaders in Montreal last month, Martin stated bluntly that terrorists have acquired WMDs from Saddam. “The fact is that there is now, we know well, a proliferation of nuclear weapons, and that many weapons that Saddam Huseein had, we don't know where they are…. [T]errorists have access to all of them,” the Canadian premier warned.

The tip of this terrorist sword was scarcely deflected on April 26th, when Jordanian intelligence broke up an al Qaeda conspiracy to detonate a large chemical device in the capital city of Amman. Directed by al Qaeda terrorist leader Abu al-Zarqawi -- the same man who personally beheaded American Nicholas Berg in Iraq last month -- the plotters sought to use a massive explosion to spread a “toxic cloud”, meant to wipe out the U.S. embassy, the Jordanian prime minister's office, the Jordanian intelligence headquarters, and at least 20,000 civilians (by contrast, only 3,000 died on 9/11). Over twenty tons of chemical weapons were seized from the conspirators, who were just days away from carrying out their plot.

One wonders where CNN and USA Today think twenty tons of nerve gas and sarin came from: Chemical Weapons-Mart? Yet their coverage, like most major media outlets, mentioned not a word about Saddam's smuggled WMDs, which -- according to liberal dogma -- “don't exist.”

Even though the UN says they do exist, now spread around the world.

It's not just the UN. Bill Clinton says they exist, even after the war: in a July 2003 interview with Larry King, the ex-president uncharacteristically defended George Bush, saying “it is incontestable that on the day I left office, there [was]…a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for” in Iraq. Every intelligence agency in the world -- French, British, German, Russian, Czech, you name it -- agreed before the war; Jordanian intelligence can certainly confirm their opinion today.

So what's the deal? Why the relentless pretence that “Bush lied” when even the UN and Bill Clinton say he didn't? Why the absolute silence about “inconvenient” parts of various UN reports, such as the discovery of chemical and biological weapons plans, recipes and equipment; of bio-weapons agents in an Iraqi scientist's house; of a prison lab for testing bio weapons on humans; of complexes for manufacturing fuel for prohibited long-range missiles; of artillery rounds containing enough sarin to kill thousands of people, of similar shells containing mustard gas, two (but far from the only) of which were used in a terrorist attack against U.S. forces just weeks ago?

America cannot afford the answer to this “why”: that many on the left consider George W. Bush's defeat more urgent than al Qaeda's, his political death more essential than the possible physical death of millions of Americans.

The character of our foreign enemies has never been in doubt. The character of the enemy within -- from Dan Rather to Michael Moore -- has never been clearer. And the stakes are the highest they've ever been.

[rainstorm]

thanks matthew

[chadtm80]

Where did you get this story

[Matthew5]

Here you go http://www.thevanguard.org/

[Brent]

Liberals won't buy it...

[Stephanie]

When the $%!@# we're they going tell us that they were moved??? How long have they known this and why didn't they inform us BEFORE we invaded Iraq???

[streetsoldier]

Steph,

We on this board HAVE told you...from BEER980 to streetsoldier to "God-knows-who" over the past year or so. Not to mention President Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell, UK PM Tony Blair, etc., etc.

What I want to know is why the media is succeeding to bury this story...unless it IS for the reason as stated in the orignal post (read:anything to get Kerry elected, even at the expense of American lives at risk)? [/i]

[Stephanie]

Bill - I realize what YOU'VE told me and everyone else, but this is the UN who actually did the investigations. Also, we went to war because there are/were supposed to be "hidden" WMD's in Iraq. There SPECULATION that they MAY HAVE BEEN MOVED, but nothing for certain. Were there specific documents dug up, recited, by anyone inparticular that stated that they were DEFINATELY MOVED? I understand there are those that have a distain for the media, but we've been able to view other reports here that were not published nationwide.

I've often wondered why with our "intelligence" (now a days I'm using that term very loosely), why movement wasn't perhaps noted along the borders of Syria.

Why is this information coming out now? If the WMD's were already moved, what were we going into Iraq for in the first place? The UN inspecters said there were no WMD's and they were right - they weren't there anymore. We went in because we thought that they were still there.

[stormchazer]

Some of this Stephanie has been discovered after the fact. The scraps of metal, with the "yellow cake" used for nuclear weapons hidden inside, was discovered in Holland and Belgium were long after the invasion. Intelligence that was too sensitive to release at the time is now being declassified. Also, bits and pieces of of information taken as parts, had no meaning but after analysis, some conclusion were drawn. We have a 9/11 commission discussing the same issues today.

No one said that their were for certain WMDs in Iraq either. We looked at history and felt there was a higher then reasonable chance that Saddam continued to develop weapons. There have been poorly reported finds in Iraq. Labs that could be converted for dual purpose (Developing fertilizer or nerve gas) have been discovered and reported on. There were fields of plants that sprout beans that could be used to make Sarin. Could just be crops, or could be Sarin Gas in the making. We have found caches of weapons, right on bases we have been using since the invasion but are just finding a year later. The former weapons inspector Kay made several references to finds which were no the "smoking gun", but could be indications of weapons programs.

Has there been the big find.....no, but there are lots of indications that the weapons were or are hidden there.

[mf_dolphin]

Well said Jara! Let's keep in mind that there has always been a hign level of traffic between Syria and Iraq. Most of the stuff found abroad would have been hard or impossible to detect from remote sensing equipment or airplanes. Remember we're not talking about tanks and such. The castration of our human (spys) intelligence capabilities took away the most valuable source of this type of information. The other contributing factor was President Bush's attempt to get the UN to enforce their own resolutions. This gave Saddam ample time to move and hide the WMD that did exist. JMHO

[chadtm80]

Well said Jara! Let's keep in mind that there has always been a hign level of traffic between Syria and Iraq. Most of the stuff found abroad would have been hard or impossible to detect from remote sensing equipment or airplanes. Remember we're not talking about tanks and such. The castration of our human (spys) intelligence capabilities took away the most valuable source of this type of information. The other contributing factor was President Bush's attempt to get the UN to enforce their own resolutions. This gave Saddam ample time to move and hide the WMD that did exist. JMHO

Wait a minute? We gave him ample time? Wow, I thought we rushed into war with him

[Stephanie]

I think it would've been better if we were certain that they were there before we went to war. I understand looking at past history with Sadaam, but war is a serious business as we all are fully aware. So in a way it seems like the UN inspectors were correct all along. That information that had to be declassified should've been reported to the appropriate officials, so someone had to have known already that the WMD's already left Iraq.

[chadtm80]

Steph honestly what difference does it make? If they had them then hid them out of the country becuase they knew we were coming what does that mean? Since they got them out of the country no need to go after him? You dont think he would of got them back? I can assure you he didnt just GIVE them away

[Lindaloo]

We know he used them. Ask the Kurds and our own troops from the Gulf War. There was NO question they were there. He had 12 years of playing cat and mouse with the UN to hide them.

Sometimes you have to say WHEN, we said WHEN! Or should I say President Bush said WHEN.

He went through the UN to fix this problem or to make them do something, they refused. So, we did it for them. Send them the bill.

[Stephanie]

The war was because Sadaam HAD WMD's. We didn't believe the UN findings that there were none in Iraq. IMHO, this is does not support the reasons why we went to war with Iraq.

I think we should've kept our main focus on Al Qaeda.

[Lindaloo]

The war was because Sadaam HAD WMD's. We didn't believe the UN findings that there were none in Iraq. IMHO, this is does not support the reasons why we went to war with Iraq.

I think we should've kept our main focus on Al Qaeda.

We are though Steph. Who do you think is beheading Americans in Iraq? Why not kill two birds with one stone.

[Lindaloo]

He did have them. The UN allowed him to get away with hiding them.

[chadtm80]

Stephanie thats like over hearing a conversation that some criminal is going to come kill you.. But then you over hear him again say that he isnt going to do it tommorow he is going to wait untill next week.. So you just say, ah hell. He isnt going to kill me right this second, lets just let him go

[mf_dolphin]

I disagree on a couple of points and conclusions Stephanie. The UN never found that he did not have WMD's They said they hadn't located any yet and wanted more time to look for them. In contrast, they were searching for WMD that they knew he had, by his own admission, but which Saddam could not document when or how they were destroyed. Remember, this is a government that documented everything. They also found that he was producing banned delivery systems such as the missiles we heard so much about.

To highlight an excerpt from the original post...

Late last week, the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) briefed the Security Council on Saddam's lightning-fast dismantling of missile and WMD sites before and during the war. UNMOVIC executive chairman Demetrius Perricos detailed not only the export of thousands of tons of missile components, nuclear reactor vessels and fermenters for chemical and biological warheads, but also the discovery of many (but not most) of these items - with UN inspection tags still on them -- as far afield as Jordan, Turkey and even Holland.

[Rainband]

Bring on the Canes!!!