"Stockpiles of Uranium"

How quickly some people forget that Saddam did, in fact, have stockpiles of WMDs -- not only before, but AT THE VERY TIME we invaded Iraq. Remember the 500 TONS of uranium that the Iraqi dictator kept stored at his al-Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development plant? And, only recently, Dr. Obeidi (who ran Saddam's nuclear centrifuge program until 1997) clearly said, "We had 500 tons of yellow cake [uranium] in Baghdad," and warned that Saddam could have revived his stalled nuclear program "with a snap of his fingers." Additionally, not too long ago, Saddam used Anthrax, Sarin and Mustard Gas (chemical WMDs) against his own people -- remember?

And how can the UN panel be concerned about the disappearance of high-precision NUCLEAR equipment from Iraq's nuclear facilities that could be used to make NUCLEAR weapons (see AP story below), if such stockpiles supposedly never existed in the first place?! Evidently, some of our neo-pacifist friends don't want to know the answer. Wake up, people, and don't believe the liberal Big Media! They have an agenda that is a clear conflict of interest....

See all newly declassified Iraqi documents below with full English translations. Read them for yourself and decide....

"US intelligence managed to track the Iraqi WMD convoy to Lebanon's Bekaa Valley. Through the use of satellites, electronic monitoring and human intelligence, the intelligence community has determined that much, if not all, of Iraq's biological and chemical weapons assets are being protected by Syria, with Iranian help, in the Bekaa Valley [Lebanon]." --Geostrategy-direct.com

"The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) continues to be concerned about the widespread and apparently systematic dismantlement that has taken place at sites previously relevant to Iraq's nuclear program and sites previously subject to ongoing monitoring and verification by the agency." --Mohamed ElBaradei, General Director of the IAEA

"What you see reading through these documents is that the [Persian Gulf] war did not end. This is a continuation of that war. The war was necessary because Saddam was involved in 9/11. There is no question that Saddam is part of a terror war." --Former Clinton advisor Laurie Mylroie, who taught at Harvard and the US Naval College and authored two books on Iraq under Saddam Hussein

No WMD Stockpiles in Iraq? Not Exactly...
Carl Limbacher & NewsMax.com Staff
Newsmax
October 8, 2004

Is it really true that Saddam Hussein had no "stockpiles" of weapons of mass destruction before the US invaded in March 2003? Not exactly -- at least not if one counts the 500 tons of uranium that the Iraqi dictator kept stored at his al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development plant.

The press hasn't made much of Saddam's 500-ton uranium stockpile, downplaying the story to such an extent that most Americans aren't even aware of it. But it's been reported -- albeit in a by-the-way fashion -- by the New York Times and a handful of other media outlets. And one of Saddam's nuclear scientists, Jaffar Dhia Jaffar, admitted to the BBC earlier this year, "We had 500 tons of yellow cake [uranium] in Baghdad."

Surely 500 tons of anything qualifies as a "stockpile." And press reports going back more than a decade give no indication that weapons inspectors had any idea the Iraqi dictator had amassed such a staggering amount of nuke fuel until the US invaded. That's when the International Atomic Energy Agency was finally able to take a full inventory, and suddenly the 500-ton figure emerged.

Still, experts say Saddam's massive uranium stockpile was largely benign. Largely? Well, except for the 1.8 tons of uranium that Saddam had begun to enrich. The US Energy Department considered that stockpile so dangerous that it mounted an unprecedented airlift operation four months ago to remove the enriched uranium stash from al Tuwaitha.

But didn't most of that enrichment take place before the first Gulf War -- with no indication whatsoever that Saddam was capable of proceeding any further toward his dream of acquiring the bomb? That seems to be the consensus. But there's also disturbing evidence to the contrary.

David Kay, the former chief US weapons inspector who was hailed by the press last year for pronouncing Iraq WMD-free, shared some interesting observations with Congress this past January about goings-on at al Tuwaitha in 2000 and 2001. "[The Iraqis] started building new buildings, renovating it, hiring some new staff and bringing them together," Kay said. "And they ran a few physics experiments, re-ran experiments they'd actually run in the '80s."

"Fortunately, from my point of view," he added, "Operation Iraqi Freedom intervened and we don't know how or how fast that would have gone ahead.... Given their history, it was certainly an emerging program that I would not have looked forward to their continuing to pursue."

Kay's successor, Charles Duelfer, also has confirmed that nuclear research at al Tuwaitha was continuing right up until the US invasion, telling Congress in March that Saddam's scientists were "preserving and expanding [their] knowledge to design and develop nuclear weapons." One laboratory at al Tuwaitha, Duelfer said, "was intentionally focused on research applicable for nuclear weapons development."

Still, most experts say that Iraq was nowhere near being able to produce nuclear weapons, which is a good thing, considering how much raw material Saddam had to work with. Writing in the London Evening Standard earlier this year, Norman Dombey, professor of theoretical physics at the University of Sussex, walked his readers through a simple calculation: "You have a warehouse containing 500 tons of natural uranium; you need 25 kilograms of U235 to build one weapon. How many nuclear weapons can you build? The answer is 142."

Fortunately for the world, Saddam didn't have the nuclear enrichment technology to convert his 500-ton uranium stockpile into weapons-grade bombmaking material. Or did he?

After he was captured by US forces in Baghdad last year, Dr. Mahdi Obeidi, who ran Saddam's nuclear centrifuge program until 1997, had some disturbing news for coalition debriefers. He kept blueprints for a nuclear centrifuge, along with some actual centrifuge components, stored at his home -- buried in the front yard -- awaiting orders from Baghdad to proceed. "I had to maintain the program to the bitter end," Obeidi said recently. His only other choice was death.

In his new book, "The Bomb in My Garden," the Iraqi physicist explains that his nuclear stash was the key that could have unlocked and restarted Saddam's bombmaking program. "The centrifuge is the single most dangerous piece of nuclear technology," he writes. "With advances in centrifuge technology, it is now possible to conceal a uranium enrichment program inside a single warehouse."

Last week Dr. Obeidi warned in a New York Times op-ed piece that Saddam could have restarted his nuclear program "with a snap of his fingers." Perhaps the 500-ton stockpile of nuclear fuel that Saddam kept at al Tuwaitha wasn't quite as benign as our media like to pretend.

NewsMax
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Unmasked Men
by Mindy Belz, with Priya Abraham
World Magazine
October 2004

COVER STORY: Leaked Iraqi intelligence documents connect Saddam Hussein to prominent terror leaders, including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden. Only question is, when will John Kerry change his stump speech?

Walid Phares thumbed a sheaf of documents, all in Arabic and nearly all bearing the spherical slogan of Iraq's intelligence service, or Mukhabarat. The Middle East scholar, a Lebanese-American Christian who speaks four languages and is a recognized expert on Islamic militants and terrorism, has interrupted a sick day (prior engagement with a root canal) in order to evaluate 42 just-leaked intelligence documents confiscated by US forces in Iraq.

Moistening his finger and translating out loud, Mr. Phares read from the pages in his third-floor office in downtown Washington, where he is taking a year off from teaching at Florida Atlantic University to serve as senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. He didn't notice as his narrating voice rose with incredulity. Finishing, he rapped the papers with his fingers and concluded: "This is a watershed. This is big."

Mr. Phares is one of at least four eminent Middle East experts to agree that the documents -- published for the first time last week -- demonstrate that Saddam Hussein collaborated with and supported Islamic terrorist groups, including the current terror nemesis in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The papers, obtained by Cybercast News Service (CNS) and released Oct. 4, "establish irreversible evidence that there were strategic relations between the Baathist regime and Islamist groups that became al-Qaeda," Mr. Phares said after reviewing them at WORLD's request on Oct. 6. In addition, the documents link al-Zarqawi-associated groups throughout the Middle East, including al-Qaeda, on Saddam's payroll and acting under his direct authority.
(Source)

Evidence and the word of experts, however, is having little effect on the John Kerry campaign, which has staked its bid for the White House on what it calls a flawed rationale for war in Iraq. Only hours after the CNS website absorbed so many hits over the revelations that its server crashed, vice-presidential candidate John Edwards blasted the president's war strategy in a televised debate with Vice President Dick Cheney. "There is no connection between Saddam Hussein and the attacks of September 11th -- period," Mr. Edwards said. "In fact, any connection with al-Qaeda is tenuous at best."

Sen. John Kerry, too, insists on the stump that the president's "two main rationales -- weapons of mass destruction and the al-Qaeda/Sept. 11 connection -- have been proved false."

But the documents suggest otherwise. They include an 11-page memo, dated Jan. 25, 1993, listing "parties related to our system . . . expert in executing the required missions." The memo cites Palestinian, Sudanese, and Asian terror groups, and shows a developing relationship with groups affiliated with al-Qaeda, including Mr. al-Zarqawi, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar -- figures who are now on the US most-wanted list for ongoing assaults in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Jan. 25, 1993, memo also describes an intelligence service meeting with a splinter group led by Mohammed Omar Abdel-Rahman. Mr. Abdel-Rahman is a son of the blind Egyptian, Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, accused of inspiring the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and arrested in 1994 for targeting New York landmarks. Pakistani officials caught the younger Abdel-Rahman last year, and say he helped lead authorities to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, one of the 9/11 attack planners.

A separate memo, dated March 18, 1993, asks intelligence officers to provide "details of Arab martyrs who got trained" in conjunction with post–Gulf War "committees of martyrs act." In reply another office supplied 92 names with nationalities, all "trained inside the ‘martyr act camp' that belonged to our directorate." In all, 40 are linked to Palestinian groups, 21 are Sudanese, and others range from Eritrea, Tunisia, Morocco, Lebanon, and Egypt. Most of the trainees completed a government-sponsored course on Nov. 24, 1990, and were sent on missions throughout the Arabian Peninsula.

Accompanying the memos are separate notations signed by Saddam Hussein's secretary, suggesting the president himself had reviewed and endorsed each action. "Saddam was personally overseeing the details" of training terrorists and assigning their missions, Mr. Phares said. "From 1993 on, Saddam Hussein connected with Sunni fundamentalists in the Arab world. He was in touch with the founding members of al-Qaeda."

CNS enlisted its own cast of experts -- a former weapons inspector with the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM), a retired CIA counterterrorism official with experience in Iraq, and a former Clinton advisor on Iraq -- to review the documents prior to publication. CNS reporter Scott Wheeler received the data from an unnamed "senior government official" who is not a political appointee. The source said the documents have not been made public because Bush administration officials have "thousands and thousands" of similar documents waiting to be translated and "it is unlikely they even know this exists."

Former Clinton advisor Laurie Mylroie, who taught at Harvard and the US Naval College and authored two books on Iraq under Saddam Hussein, told CNS the find represents "the most complete set of documents relating Iraq to terrorism, including Islamic terrorism."

Bruce Tefft, the retired CIA official, described the documents as "accurate." He cited as particularly significant the Iraq link to al-Jihad al Tajdeed. Tajdeed is allied with Mr. al-Zarqawi. Its website currently posts Mr. al-Zarqawi's speeches, messages, and videos -- including images portraying the Jordanian terrorist actively participating in the beheading of American Nicholas Berg and, just last month, the beheading of US engineer Eugene Armstrong. At 37, Mr. al-Zarqawi is considered the main instigator behind suicide bombings, assassination attempts, and beheadings in Iraq. The connections "are too close to be accidental," Mr. Tefft told CNS, suggesting "one of the first operational contacts between an al-Qaeda group and Iraq."

Mr. al-Zarqawi is often portrayed as a lone ranger, a cult figure running a nascent uprising in response to so-called US imperialism. Yet these latest documents, along with other emerging reports, reveal Mr. al-Zarqawi's "authority stemmed from specific instructions and guidance" received from Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders. According to terror expert Yossef Bodansky in his new book, The Secret History of the Iraq War, intelligence data shows Mr. al-Zarqawi entered northern Iraq from Iran shortly before the war to oversee a sophisticated guerrilla-war plan crafted in conjunction with Iraqi intelligence agents and Saddam himself.

In addition to the terror-group connections, several pages of the leaked documents also demonstrate that Saddam possessed mustard gas and anthrax, both considered weapons of mass destruction. They describe Iraq's purchase of five kilograms of mustard gas in August 2000 and three vials of malignant pustule, a term for anthrax, the following month -- all at a time when Saddam prohibited UN weapons inspectors from working in Iraq. The purchase orders include gas masks, filters, sterilization, and decontamination equipment.

With this latest release of Iraqi documents, and the assembly of nonpartisan experts standing by them, the Kerry campaign will have to work harder to dismiss Bush administration actions as "a rush to war."

"What you see reading through these documents is that the [Persian Gulf] war did not end. This is a continuation of that war," Ms. Mylroie told WORLD. Saddam's aim, she said, was to "pick off the [1991] coalition" with terror attacks as a means of turning Middle East allies against the United States. That tactic emboldened the kind of transnational terror network described in the documents, continuing through 2001 and beyond. "What is interesting is that Iraq was working with Islamic militants of all stripes. Saddam did not make a distinction between Baathists or Sunnis or Shiites or anyone else," Ms. Mylroie said.

Such conclusions, she said, may prompt critics to call her paranoid and to denigrate the importance of this recent find as outdated and fanciful. But Ms. Mylroie has been called a conspiracy theorist before. Ignoring the evidence of state-sponsored terrorism and its ongoing threat is a zero-sum game for Bush opponents. Focusing only on the role of individual terror fanatics like Mr. al-Zarqawi, says Ms. Mylroie, does "make the terrorist threat appear as terrifying as possible. But authorities can do virtually nothing about terrorism when it is depicted this way."

Despite "missteps" in prosecuting the war, "the war was necessary because Saddam was involved in 9/11," Ms. Mylroie said. "There is no question that Saddam is part of a terror war."

For the Kerry campaign the revelations have come late enough in the election season to inflict lasting damage on his foreign-policy credibility. For US and Iraqi forces fighting terror in Iraq, they have come not a moment too soon.

World Magazine
© 2004 WORLD Magazine

CNSNews.com Publishes Iraqi Intelligence Docs
by David Thibault,
CNSNews.com Managing Editor
October 11, 2004

Full English Translation Accompanies Each Document

(CNSNews.com) - When CNSNews.com published an article Monday, Oct. 4, entitled, "Exclusive: Saddam Possessed WMD, Had Extensive Terror Ties" we had decided against publishing all 42 pages of the Iraqi intelligence documents in our possession and on which the article was based.

We published only the first page, fearing that if more were made widely available on the Internet, they might end up being altered or otherwise manipulated. We offered credentialed news organizations and counter-terrorism experts the opportunity to view and receive copies of the documents so that they might check for themselves on the authenticity of the documents and judge their importance in the debate over whether Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and/or had ties to international terrorist organizations.

Several news organizations did just that. But in light of other assertions on Wednesday, widely reported by the mainstream media, that Saddam did not pose any significant threat prior to the US invasion of Iraq, we felt it was time to publish as many of the Iraqi intelligence documents as possible.

What follows are copies of 24 of the 42 pages that are in our possession. Pages 21 through 26 were not published because they contain a list of terrorists trained at a camp belonging to the Iraqi Intelligence Directorate. CNSNews.com hopes to glean more information about the individuals on this list and provide updates in the future on their activities and whereabouts. Pages 29 through 40 were excluded because they replicate, though in a different person's handwriting, earlier documents.

Upon clicking on the individual pages of Arabic documents, readers will have an opportunity to click on the unedited English translation of those documents. We hope this serves to further illuminate a very important element of the ongoing debate.

Page 1: Jan. 18, 1993 memo from Saddam Hussein, through his secretary, to the Iraqi Intelligence Service, urging that missions be undertaken to "hunt down Americans," especially in Somalia.

Pages 2-12: Jan. 25, 1993 memo from the Iraqi Intelligence Service to Saddam Hussein, outlining the existing or developing relationships between Iraq and terrorist organizations.
Page 2
Page 3
Page 4
Page 5
Page 6
Page 7
Page 8
Page 9
Page 10
Page 11
Page 12

Page 13: Feb. 8, 1993 response from Saddam Hussein to the Jan. 25, 1993 memo.

Pages 14, 15: March 11, 1993 memo from the Iraqi Intelligence Service detailing plans for a meeting with "one of the leaders from the Egyptian Al-Jehad" terrorist organization.
Page 14
Page 15

Page 16: March 16, 1993 response from Saddam's secretary to the March 11, 1993 memo.

Pages 17, 18: March 18, 1993 memo from the Iraqi Intelligence Service detailing plans to "move against the Egyptian regime" of Hosni Mubarak.
Page 17
Page 18

Pages 19-20: Iraqi Intelligence Service internal memos regarding the information of individuals who participated at "the martyr act camp" belonging to the Iraqi intelligence directorate.
Page 19
Page 20

Pages 21-26: They comprise a list of terrorists trained at a camp belonging to the Iraqi Intelligence Directorate.
Page 21
Page 22
Page 23 Page 24
Page 25
Page 26

Pages 27, 28: Notes from the Iraqi Intelligence Service outlining strategies. Included is the assessment that terrorist "efforts should be concentrated on Egypt." The notes also advise against targeting the US military, but recommend targeting "Americans as general" as well as "US agents inside the (Egyptian) regime."
Page 27
Page 28

Page 29-40: Duplicative of pages 2-12, except in a different person's handwriting.

Page 41: Table indicating Sept. 6, 2000 acquisition of malignant pustule (anthrax) as well as sterilization/decontamination equipment.

Page 42: Table indicating Aug. 21, 2000 acquisition of mustard gas as well as protective equipment.

CNS News
All original CNSNews.com material, copyright 1998-2004 Cybercast News Service.

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UN Panel Concerned about Missing NUCLEAR Equipment
by Edith M. Lederer
Associated Press
October 12, 2004

UNITED NATIONS - The UN nuclear watchdog group expressed concern yesterday about the disappearance from Iraq's nuclear facilities of high-precision equipment that could be used to make nuclear weapons. "As the disappearance of such equipment and materials may be of proliferation significance, any state that has information about the location of such items should provide the IAEA with that information," said the agency's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei. International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors left Iraq just before the March 2003 US-led war.

In a letter to the UN Security Council, the head of the IAEA said some industrial material that Iraq sent overseas has been located in other countries, but not high-precision items including milling machines and electron beam welders that have both commercial and military uses.

The Bush administration then barred UN weapons inspectors from returning, deploying US teams instead in what turned out to be an unsuccessful search for weapons of mass destruction. Nonetheless, IAEA teams were allowed into Iraq in June 2003 to investigate reports of widespread looting of storage rooms at the main nuclear complex at Tuwaitha, and in August to take an inventory of "several tons" of natural uranium in storage near Tuwaitha.

ElBaradei told the council that Iraq is still obligated, under IAEA agreements, "to declare semiannually changes that have occurred or are foreseen at sites deemed relevant by the agency." But since March 2003 "the agency has received no such notifications or declarations from any state," he said. As a result of the IAEA's ongoing review of satellite photos and follow-up investigations, ElBaradei said, "the IAEA continues to be concerned about the widespread and apparently systematic dismantlement that has taken place at sites previously relevant to Iraq's nuclear program and sites previously subject to ongoing monitoring and verification by the agency."

Boston Globe
© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.

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