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Uncovering the truth about going to war
Soldiers for the Truth ^ | 10-11-03 | Ed Offley

Posted on 10/15/2003 6:08:46 PM PDT by LadyDoc

DefenseWatch "The Voice of the Grunt" 10-11-2003

From the Editor:

Uncovering the Truth about Going to War

By Ed Offley

This is a message for Barbara and David McPhillips, Michael and Roxanne Kaylor, and the hundreds of other parents and spouses who still grieve for loved ones killed in Iraq since the U.S. invaded to topple Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Ignore the naysayers in the news media, forget the French and dismiss the Democratic presidential contenders, all of who are trying to persuade you that your father, husband and son – or mother, wife or daughter – died for nothing in Operation Iraqi Freedom and its tempestuous aftermath.

Your loved ones perished in a just conflict that was urgently required, fully justified and sanctioned by the United Nations and a bipartisan vote of Congress. Their service was honorable and their sacrifices warrant our eternal gratitude.

There is now solid proof that the prime justification for going to war – Iraqi defiance of United Nations Resolution 1441 – was true. The Iraq Survey Group (ISG), the international group of weapons inspectors headed up by David Kay, reported last week discoveries of concrete evidence that Iraq had illegally hidden its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs and efforts to build long-range ballistic missiles.

That resolution, unanimously adopted by the U.N Security Council on Nov. 8, 2002, in its own words gave Baghdad “a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament provisions.”

In an op-ed column for The Washington Post on Nov. 10, 2002, Secretary of State Colin Powell warned that the U.N. resolution was unambiguous and clear on its intent:

“Saddam Hussein must give the inspectors immediate, unimpeded, unconditional and unrestricted access to uncover the weapons of mass destruction that he has had so many years to hide. Access not just to places such as presidential palaces but to people and other sources of information will be critical, because you have to know where and when to look in order to find biological and chemical weapons that are easy to conceal and move.”

“President Bush and both houses of Congress have emphasized that the United States prefers to see Iraq disarm under U.N. auspices without a resort to force. We do not seek a war with Iraq, we seek its peaceful disarmament. But we will not shrink from war if that is the only way to rid Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction. The Security Council has confronted Saddam Hussein and his regime with a moment of truth. If they meet it with more lies, they will not escape the consequences.”

Here’s what Kay and his inspectors have found so far:

* Iraqi officials engaged in “deliberate dispersal and destruction of material and documentation related to weapons programs” before, during, and after the war – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441.

* The ISG located found proof that the Iraqi regime had concealed WMD supplies and facilities from U.N. inspectors, including a “clandestine network of laboratories and safe houses [with] equipment … suitable for continuing” chemical and biological warfare research – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441.

* Inspectors discovered “a prison laboratory complex, possibly used in human testing of BW [biological warfare] agents, that Iraqi officials … were explicitly ordered not to declare to the U.N.” – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441.

* The report noted that inspectors interviewed one Iraqi scientist who had hidden in his home “a vial of live C. botulinum Okra B,” which is a precursor for the deadly botulism toxin – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441.

* Inspectors reported another Iraqi chemical weapons official told them that the Iraqi regime could have produced weaponized mustard gas within two months and Sarin, a lethal nerve agent, within two years – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441.

* Inspectors concluded that Saddam would have succeeded in building ballistic missiles with a range up to 600 miles had the U.S.-led invasion not occurred – a violation of U.N. Resolution 1441 and its 1991 precursor, U.N. Resolution 687.

If this seems surprising to you, don’t be alarmed. Coverage, as usual, was twisted into incomprehensibility by the news media, which focused on the failure of inspectors to find caches of WMD weapons while ignoring the larger story that Iraq had breached the provisions of U.N. Resolution 1441.

The postwar debate over whether or not the U.S. government possessed adequate intelligence about Iraq’s WMD program – or whether, in the now-infamous and discredited BBC report, authorities had “sexed up” intelligence material to make it more convincing – quickly morphed into a babble of voices in the political arena and news media arguing that the Bush administration had all but fabricated the evidence.

By ready transfer, the administration’s opponents have insinuated that those who fought and died in that war did so on a fool’s errand.

Angered by the distorted news coverage, Kay went on the Sunday talk shows and asserted, “I’m sort of amazed at what was powerful information about both their intent and their actual activities that were not known and were hidden from U.N. inspectors seems not to have made it to the press. This is information that, had it been available last year, would have been headline news.”

Kay noted that ISG inspectors had made several explicit discoveries of concealed WMD programs that could have quickly gone into production of active agents: “We now have three cases in which scientists have come forward with equipment, technology, diagrams, documents and, in this case, actual weapons material, reference strains and Botulinum toxin, that they were told to hide and that the U.N. didn’t find.”

It was a just war.

Ed Offley is Editor of DefenseWatch. He can be reached at dweditor@yahoo.com.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: iraq; kayreport; liberalpress; pressbias; weapons; wot
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-27 next last
FYI
1 posted on 10/15/2003 6:08:46 PM PDT by LadyDoc
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To: LadyDoc
Bump.
2 posted on 10/15/2003 6:11:27 PM PDT by Rocko
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To: LadyDoc
Yet another writer who can seperate the wheat from the chaff.

BUMP
3 posted on 10/15/2003 6:12:11 PM PDT by Spruce
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To: LadyDoc
Yep,they did not die in vain. They made the way for a better life for the Iraqi's and made our country a little safer - TRUE HEROES!
4 posted on 10/15/2003 6:15:39 PM PDT by everyvotecounts
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To: LadyDoc
Great article! BUMP!
5 posted on 10/15/2003 6:16:01 PM PDT by cake_crumb (UN Resolutions = Very Expensive, Very SCRATCHY Toilet Paper)
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To: Ragtime Cowgirl; snippy_about_it
Just war WMD PING!
6 posted on 10/15/2003 6:16:48 PM PDT by Old Sarge (Serving You... on Operation Noble Eagle!)
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To: LadyDoc
"This is a message for Barbara and David McPhillips, Michael and Roxanne Kaylor, and the hundreds of other parents and spouses who still grieve for loved ones killed in Iraq since the U.S. invaded to topple Saddam Hussein’s regime."

My hat is off to these people, to the author of this fine piece and to you for posting this wonderful article.

7 posted on 10/15/2003 6:17:37 PM PDT by CWOJackson
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To: LadyDoc
Hooray! Hooray! The truth comes out! I knew it! Saddam actually had WMD's -- or, at least he had the possibility and perhaps intention of acquiring them. If he had gotten those 600-mile missles he could have threatened the United States -- well maybe not quite, but close enough! Besides, now we can have democracy in Iraq. President Bush is vindicated at last! Hooray! Hooray!
8 posted on 10/15/2003 6:21:48 PM PDT by findingtruth
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To: LadyDoc; joanie-f; snopercod; TPartyType; brityank; mommadooo3
Bump.
9 posted on 10/15/2003 6:22:07 PM PDT by First_Salute
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To: findingtruth
"Hooray! Hooray! The truth comes out! I knew it! Saddam actually had WMD's -- or, at least he had the possibility and perhaps intention of acquiring them."

Possibility? "Perhaps" the intention of acquiring them? Where have you been since he gassed his own people, and threw out the weapons inspectors? Hiding in some underground bunker? Oh no, he didn't have 'em. He just invited his own destruction because he was innocent, hid everything from inspectors because he was a little prankster! Wake your brain up, coffee's brewing.
10 posted on 10/15/2003 6:28:13 PM PDT by jim35
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To: LadyDoc
The gates of British military cemeteries bear this inscription:

They will not grow old, as we that are left grow old/Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn/At the going down of the sun, and in the morning/We will remember them.

11 posted on 10/15/2003 6:36:22 PM PDT by resistmuch
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To: findingtruth
Sorry if I sent you a "private reply" by accident there, findingtruth. I'll repost publicly.

I'll never forget my shock at seeing the major media start to crow about Bush "not finding any WMD." I say I was shocked because I distinctly remember seeing before the war in USA Today a picture of a box of components for an Iraqi NUKE. And yes, when I think about it, the UN rhetoric was full of references to "stopping" Iraq's WMD program. "Stopping" refers to something that already exists. Saddam would have had WMD eventually if we didn't have the time--assuming he didn't already have full-fledged WMD. The whole "no WMD" thing is a farce and has been from the beginning.

Speaking of vindication, an interesting prophecy was made a few weeks ago. It was prophesied that October would be a month of great vindication and everything hidden would be exposed. These new findings would seem to fit that prophecy and I suspect that might also explain Bush's (and perhaps Schwarzenegger's) decisions to go over the heads of the traditional biased media. I look at this month with great interest.
12 posted on 10/15/2003 6:50:38 PM PDT by Proud to Be a McCarthyist (To eternally damn you would be sinfully easy. All I'd have to do is tell you you don't need Jesus.)
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To: Proud to Be a McCarthyist
Correction: ...give him (Saddam) the time
13 posted on 10/15/2003 6:51:59 PM PDT by Proud to Be a McCarthyist (To eternally damn you would be sinfully easy. All I'd have to do is tell you you don't need Jesus.)
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To: Proud to Be a McCarthyist
Yet another correction: ...GAVE him the time
14 posted on 10/15/2003 6:52:47 PM PDT by Proud to Be a McCarthyist (To eternally damn you would be sinfully easy. All I'd have to do is tell you you don't need Jesus.)
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To: findingtruth
He had the WMD PROGRAM, and evidence of ONE WMD was found. Please educate yourself.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome this opportunity to discuss with the Committee the progress that the Iraq Survey Group has made in its initial three months of its investigation into Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) programs.

I cannot emphasize too strongly that the Interim Progress Report, which has been made available to you, is a snapshot, in the context of an on-going investigation, of where we are after our first three months of work. The report does not represent a final reckoning of Iraq's WMD programs, nor are we at the point where we are prepared to close the file on any of these programs. While solid progress - I would say even remarkable progress considering the conditions that the ISG has had to work under - has been made in this initial period of operations, much remains to be done. We are still very much in the collection and analysis mode, still seeking the information and evidence that will allow us to confidently draw comprehensive conclusions to the actual objectives, scope, and dimensions of Iraq's WMD activities at the time of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Iraq's WMD programs spanned more than two decades, involved thousands of people, billions of dollars, and were elaborately shielded by security and deception operations that continued even beyond the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The very scale of this program when coupled with the conditions in Iraq that have prevailed since the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom dictate the speed at which we can move to a comprehensive understanding of Iraq's WMD activities.

We need to recall that in the 1991-2003 period the intelligence community and the UN/IAEA inspectors had to draw conclusions as to the status of Iraq's WMD program in the face of incomplete, and often false, data supplied by Iraq or data collected either by UN/IAEA inspectors operating within the severe constraints that Iraqi security and deception actions imposed or by national intelligence collection systems with their own inherent limitations. The result was that our understanding of the status of Iraq's WMD program was always bounded by large uncertainties and had to be heavily caveated. With the regime of Saddam Husayn at an end, ISG has the opportunity for the first time of drawing together all the evidence that can still be found in Iraq - much evidence is irretrievably lost - to reach definitive conclusions concerning the true state of Iraq's WMD program. It is far too early to reach any definitive conclusions and, in some areas, we may never reach that goal. The unique nature of this opportunity, however, requires that we take great care to ensure that the conclusions we draw reflect the truth to the maximum extent possible given the conditions in post-conflict Iraq.

We have not yet found stocks of weapons, but we are not yet at the point where we can say definitively either that such weapon stocks do not exist or that they existed before the war and our only task is to find where they have gone. We are actively engaged in searching for such weapons based on information being supplied to us by Iraqis.

Why are we having such difficulty in finding weapons or in reaching a confident conclusion that they do not exist or that they once existed but have been removed? Our search efforts are being hindered by six principal factors:

  1. From birth all of Iraq's WMD activities were highly compartmentalized within a regime that ruled and kept its secrets through fear and terror and with deception and denial built into each program;

  2. Deliberate dispersal and destruction of material and documentation related to weapons programs began pre-conflict and ran trans-to-post conflict;

  3. Post-OIF looting destroyed or dispersed important and easily collectable material and forensic evidence concerning Iraq's WMD program. As the report covers in detail, significant elements of this looting were carried out in a systematic and deliberate manner, with the clear aim of concealing pre-OIF activities of Saddam's regime;

  4. Some WMD personnel crossed borders in the pre/trans conflict period and may have taken evidence and even weapons-related materials with them;

  5. Any actual WMD weapons or material is likely to be small in relation to the total conventional armaments footprint and difficult to near impossible to identify with normal search procedures. It is important to keep in mind that even the bulkiest materials we are searching for, in the quantities we would expect to find, can be concealed in spaces not much larger than a two car garage;

  6. The environment in Iraq remains far from permissive for our activities, with many Iraqis that we talk to reporting threats and overt acts of intimidation and our own personnel being the subject of threats and attacks. In September alone we have had three attacks on ISG facilities or teams: The ISG base in Irbil was bombed and four staff injured, two very seriously; a two person team had their vehicle blocked by gunmen and only escaped by firing back through their own windshield; and on Wednesday, 24 September, the ISG Headquarters in Baghdad again was subject to mortar attack.

Supporting Images

Photo: Container with vials.
Click Image to Enlarge

Vials: A total of 97 vials-including those with labels consistent with the al Hakam cover stories of single-cell protein and biopesticides, as well as strains that could be used to produce BW agents-were recovered from a scientist's residence.

Photo: Lab equipment from a Mosque.
Click Image to Enlarge

Lab Equipment From Mosque.

Photo: Burned Documents Found at SAAD Center
Click Image to Enlarge

Burned Documents Found at SAAD Center: An exploitation team on a recent mission to the SAAD Center, part of the Baghdad New Nuclear Design Center, found massive looting and the remnants of deliberately destroyed documents. Other documents were left untouched, however, and recovered by the team

Photo: Storage room in basement of Revolutionary Command Council Headquarters. Burned frames of PC workstations visible on shelves.
Click Image to Enlarge

Storage room in basement of Revolutionary Command Council Headquarters. Burned frames of PC workstations visible on shelves. All rooms sharing walls with this storage room were untouched from fire or battle damage.

Photo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The basement historical files were systematically selected and destroyed.
Click Image to Enlarge

Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The basement historical files were systematically selected and destroyed.

What have we found and what have we not found in the first 3 months of our work?

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:

In addition to the discovery of extensive concealment efforts, we have been faced with a systematic sanitization of documentary and computer evidence in a wide range of offices, laboratories, and companies suspected of WMD work. The pattern of these efforts to erase evidence - hard drives destroyed, specific files burned, equipment cleaned of all traces of use - are ones of deliberate, rather than random, acts. For example,

I would now like to review our efforts in each of the major lines of enquiry that ISG has pursued during this initial phase of its work.

With regard to biological warfare activities, which has been one of our two initial areas of focus, ISG teams are uncovering significant information - including research and development of BW-applicable organisms, the involvement of Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS) in possible BW activities, and deliberate concealment activities. All of this suggests Iraq after 1996 further compartmentalized its program and focused on maintaining smaller, covert capabilities that could be activated quickly to surge the production of BW agents.

Debriefings of IIS officials and site visits have begun to unravel a clandestine network of laboratories and facilities within the security service apparatus. This network was never declared to the UN and was previously unknown. We are still working on determining the extent to which this network was tied to large-scale military efforts or BW terror weapons, but this clandestine capability was suitable for preserving BW expertise, BW capable facilities and continuing R&D - all key elements for maintaining a capability for resuming BW production. The IIS also played a prominent role in sponsoring students for overseas graduate studies in the biological sciences, according to Iraqi scientists and IIS sources, providing an important avenue for furthering BW-applicable research. This was the only area of graduate work that the IIS appeared to sponsor.

Discussions with Iraqi scientists uncovered agent R&D work that paired overt work with nonpathogenic organisms serving as surrogates for prohibited investigation with pathogenic agents. Examples include: B. Thurengiensis (Bt) with B. anthracis (anthrax), and medicinal plants with ricin. In a similar vein, two key former BW scientists, confirmed that Iraq under the guise of legitimate activity developed refinements of processes and products relevant to BW agents. The scientists discussed the development of improved, simplified fermentation and spray drying capabilities for the simulant Bt that would have been directly applicable to anthrax, and one scientist confirmed that the production line for Bt could be switched to produce anthrax in one week if the seed stock were available.

A very large body of information has been developed through debriefings, site visits, and exploitation of captured Iraqi documents that confirms that Iraq concealed equipment and materials from UN inspectors when they returned in 2002. One noteworthy example is a collection of reference strains that ought to have been declared to the UN. Among them was a vial of live C. botulinum Okra B. from which a biological agent can be produced. This discovery - hidden in the home of a BW scientist - illustrates the point I made earlier about the difficulty of locating small stocks of material that can be used to covertly surge production of deadly weapons. The scientist who concealed the vials containing this agent  has identified a large cache of agents that he was asked, but refused, to conceal. ISG is actively searching for this second cache.

Additional information is beginning to corroborate reporting since 1996 about human testing activities using chemical and biological substances, but progress in this area is slow given the concern of knowledgeable Iraqi personnel about their being prosecuted for crimes against humanity.

We have not yet been able to corroborate the existence of a mobile BW production effort. Investigation into the origin of and intended use for the two trailers found in northern Iraq in April has yielded a number of explanations, including hydrogen, missile propellant, and BW production, but technical limitations would prevent any of these processes from being ideally suited to these trailers. That said, nothing we have discovered rules out their potential use in BW production.

We have made significant progress in identifying and locating individuals who were reportedly involved in a mobile program, and we are confident that we will be able to get an answer to the questions as to whether there was a mobile program and whether the trailers that have been discovered so far were part of such a program.

Let me turn now to chemical weapons (CW). In searching for retained stocks of chemical munitions, ISG has had to contend with the almost unbelievable scale of Iraq's conventional weapons armory, which dwarfs by orders of magnitude the physical size of any conceivable stock of chemical weapons. For example, there are approximately 130 known Iraqi Ammunition Storage Points (ASP), many of which exceed 50 square miles in size and hold an estimated 600,000 tons of artillery shells, rockets, aviation bombs and other ordinance. Of these 130 ASPs, approximately 120 still remain unexamined. As Iraqi practice was not to mark much of their chemical ordinance and to store it at the same ASPs that held conventional rounds, the size of the required search effort is enormous.

While searching for retained weapons, ISG teams have developed multiple sources that indicate that Iraq explored the possibility of CW production in recent years, possibly as late as 2003. When Saddam had asked a senior military official in either 2001 or 2002 how long it would take to produce new chemical agent and weapons, he told ISG that after he consulted with CW experts in OMI he responded it would take six months for mustard. Another senior Iraqi chemical weapons expert in responding to a request in mid-2002 from Uday Husayn for CW for the Fedayeen Saddam estimated that it would take two months to produce mustard and two years for Sarin.

We are starting to survey parts of Iraq's chemical industry to determine if suitable equipment and bulk chemicals were available for chemical weapons production. We have been struck that two senior Iraqi officials volunteered that if they had been ordered to resume CW production Iraq would have been willing to use stainless steel systems that would be disposed of after a few production runs, in place of corrosive-resistant equipment which they did not have.

We continue to follow leads on Iraq's acquisition of equipment and bulk precursors suitable for a CW program. Several possibilities have emerged and are now being exploited. One example involves a foreign company with offices in Baghdad, that imported in the past into Iraq dual-use equipment and maintained active contracts through 2002. Its Baghdad office was found looted in August 2003, but we are pursuing other locations and associates of the company.

Information obtained since OIF has identified several key areas in which Iraq may have engaged in proscribed or undeclared activity since 1991, including research on a possible VX stabilizer, research and development for CW-capable munitions, and procurement/concealment of dual-use materials and equipment.

Multiple sources with varied access and reliability have told ISG that Iraq did not have a large, ongoing, centrally controlled CW program after 1991. Information found to date suggests that Iraq's large-scale capability to develop, produce, and fill new CW munitions was reduced - if not entirely destroyed - during Operations Desert Storm and Desert Fox, 13 years of UN sanctions and UN inspections. We are carefully examining dual-use, commercial chemical facilities to determine whether these were used or planned as alternative production sites.

We have also acquired information related to Iraq's CW doctrine and Iraq's war plans for OIF, but we have not yet found evidence to confirm pre-war reporting that Iraqi military units were prepared to use CW against Coalition forces. Our efforts to collect and exploit intelligence on Iraq's chemical weapons program have thus far yielded little reliable information on post-1991 CW stocks and CW agent production, although we continue to receive and follow leads related to such stocks. We have multiple reports that Iraq retained CW munitions made prior to 1991, possibly including mustard - a long-lasting chemical agent - but we have to date been unable to locate any such munitions.

With regard to Iraq's nuclear program, the testimony we have obtained from Iraqi scientists and senior government officials should clear up any doubts about whether Saddam still wanted to obtain nuclear weapons. They have told ISG that Saddam Husayn remained firmly committed to acquiring nuclear weapons. These officials assert that Saddam would have resumed nuclear weapons development at some future point. Some indicated a resumption after Iraq was free of sanctions. At least one senior Iraqi official believed that by 2000 Saddam had run out of patience with waiting for sanctions to end and wanted to restart the nuclear program. The Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) beginning around 1999 expanded its laboratories and research activities and increased its overall funding levels. This expansion may have been in initial preparation for renewed nuclear weapons research, although documentary evidence of this has not been found, and this is the subject of continuing investigation by ISG.

Starting around 2000, the senior Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) and high-level Ba'ath Party official Dr. Khalid Ibrahim Sa'id began several small and relatively unsophisticated research initiatives that could be applied to nuclear weapons development. These initiatives did not in-and-of themselves constitute a resumption of the nuclear weapons program, but could have been useful in developing a weapons-relevant science base for the long-term. We do not yet have information indicating whether a higher government authority directed Sa'id to initiate this research and, regretfully, Dr. Said was killed on April 8th during the fall of Baghdad when the car he was riding in attempted to run a Coalition roadblock.

Despite evidence of Saddam's continued ambition to acquire nuclear weapons, to date we have not uncovered evidence that Iraq undertook significant post-1998 steps to actually build nuclear weapons or produce fissile material. However, Iraq did take steps to preserve some technological capability from the pre-1991 nuclear weapons program.

The ISG nuclear team has found indications that there was interest, beginning in 2002, in reconstituting a centrifuge enrichment program. Most of this activity centered on activities of Dr. Sa'id that caused some of his former colleagues in the pre-1991 nuclear program to suspect that Dr. Sa'id, at least, was considering a restart of the centrifuge program. We do not yet fully understand Iraqi intentions, and the evidence does not tie any activity directly to centrifuge research or development.

Exploitation of additional documents may shed light on the projects and program plans of Dr. Khalid Ibrahim Sa'id. There may be more projects to be discovered in research placed at universities and private companies. Iraqi interest in reconstitution of a uranium enrichment program needs to be better understood through the analysis of procurement records and additional interviews.

With regard to delivery systems, the ISG team has discovered sufficient evidence to date to conclude that the Iraqi regime was committed to delivery system improvements that would have, if OIF had not occurred, dramatically breached UN restrictions placed on Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War.

Detainees and co-operative sources indicate that beginning in 2000 Saddam ordered the development of ballistic missiles with ranges of at least 400km and up to 1000km and that measures to conceal these projects from UNMOVIC were initiated in late-2002, ahead of the arrival of inspectors. Work was also underway for a clustered engine liquid propellant missile, and it appears the work had progressed to a point to support initial prototype production of some parts and assemblies. According to a cooperating senior detainee, Saddam concluded that the proposals from both the liquid-propellant and solid-propellant missile design centers would take too long. For instance, the liquid-propellant missile project team forecast first delivery in six years. Saddam countered in 2000 that he wanted the missile designed and built inside of six months. On the other hand several sources contend that Saddam's range requirements for the missiles grew from 400-500km in 2000 to 600-1000km in 2002.

ISG has gathered testimony from missile designers at Al Kindi State Company that Iraq has reinitiated work on converting SA-2 Surface-to-Air Missiles into ballistic missiles with a range goal of about 250km. Engineering work was reportedly underway in early 2003, despite the presence of UNMOVIC. This program was not declared to the UN. ISG is presently seeking additional confirmation and details on this project. A second cooperative source has stated that the program actually began in 2001, but that it received added impetus in the run-up to OIF, and that missiles from this project were transferred to a facility north of Baghdad. This source also provided documentary evidence of instructions to convert SA-2s into surface-to-surface missiles.

ISG has obtained testimony from both detainees and cooperative sources that indicate that proscribed-range solid-propellant missile design studies were initiated, or already underway, at the time when work on the clustered liquid-propellant missile designs began.  The motor diameter was to be 800 to 1000mm, i.e. much greater than the 500-mm Ababil-100. The range goals cited for this system vary from over 400km up to 1000km, depending on the source and the payload mass.

A cooperative source, involved in the 2001-2002 deliberations on the long-range solid propellant project, provided ISG with a set of concept designs for a launcher designed to accommodate a 1m diameter by 9m length missile. The limited detail in the drawings suggest there was some way to go before launcher fabrication. The source believes that these drawings would not have been requested until the missile progress was relatively advanced, normally beyond the design state. The drawing are in CAD format, with files dated 09/01/02.

While we have obtained enough information to make us confident that this design effort was underway, we are not yet confident which accounts of the timeline and project progress are accurate and are now seeking to better understand this program and its actual progress at the time of OIF.

One cooperative source has said that he suspected that the new large-diameter solid-propellant missile was intended to have a CW-filled warhead, but no detainee has admitted any actual knowledge of plans for unconventional warheads for any current or planned ballistic missile. The suspicion expressed by the one source about a CW warhead was based on his assessment of the unavailability of nuclear warheads and potential survivability problems of biological warfare agent in ballistic missile warheads. This is an area of great interest and we are seeking additional information on warhead designs.

While I have spoken so far of planned missile systems, one high-level detainee has recently claimed that Iraq retained a small quantity of Scud-variant missiles until at least 2001, although he subsequently recanted these claims, work continues to determine the truth.  Two other sources contend that Iraq continued to produce until 2001 liquid fuel and oxidizer specific to Scud-type systems. The cooperating source claims that the al Tariq Factory was used to manufacture Scud oxidizer (IRFNA) from 1996 to 2001, and that nitrogen tetroxide, a chief ingredient of IRFNA was collected from a bleed port on the production equipment, was reserved, and then mixed with highly concentrated nitric acid plus an inhibitor to produce Scud oxidizer.  Iraq never declared its pre-Gulf War capability to manufacture Scud IRFNA out of fear, multiple sources have stated, that the al Tariq Factory would be destroyed, leaving Baghdad without the ability to produce highly concentrated nitric acid, explosives and munitions. To date we have not discovered documentary or material evidence to corroborate these claims, but continued efforts are underway to clarify and confirm this information with additional Iraqi sources and to locate corroborating physical evidence. If we can confirm that the fuel was produced as late as 2001, and given that Scud fuel can only be used in Scud-variant missiles, we will have strong evidence that the missiles must have been retained until that date. This would, of course, be yet another example of a failure to declare prohibited activities to the UN.

Iraq was continuing to develop a variety of UAV platforms and maintained two UAV programs that were working in parallel, one at Ibn Fernas and one at al-Rashid Air Force Base. Ibn Fernas worked on the development of smaller, more traditional types of UAVs in addition to the conversion of manned aircraft into UAVs. This program was not declared to the UN until the 2002 CAFCD in which Iraq declared the RPV-20, RPV-30 and Pigeon RPV systems to the UN. All these systems had declared ranges of less than 150km. Several Iraqi officials stated that the RPV-20 flew over 500km on autopilot in 2002, contradicting Iraq's declaration on the system's range. The al-Rashid group was developing a competing line of UAVs. This program was never fully declared to the UN and is the subject of on-going work by ISG. Additional work is also focusing on the payloads and intended use for these UAVs. Surveillance and use as decoys are uses mentioned by some of those interviewed. Given Iraq's interest before the Gulf War in attempting to convert a MIG-21 into an unmanned aerial vehicle to carry spray tanks capable of dispensing chemical or biological agents, attention is being paid to whether any of the newer generation of UAVs were intended to have a similar purpose. This remains an open question.

ISG has discovered evidence of two primary cruise missile programs. The first appears to have been successfully implemented, whereas the second had not yet reached maturity at the time of OIF.

The first involved upgrades to the HY-2 coastal-defense cruise missile. ISG has developed multiple sources of testimony, which is corroborated in part by a captured document, that Iraq undertook a program aimed at increasing the HY-2's range and permitting its use as a land-attack missile. These efforts extended the HY-2's range from its original 100km to 150-180km. Ten modified missiles were delivered to the military prior to OIF and two of these were fired from Umm Qasr during OIF - one was shot down and one hit Kuwait.

The second program, called the Jenin, was a much more ambitious effort to convert the HY-2 into a 1000km range land-attack cruise missile. The Jenin concept was presented to Saddam on 23 November 2001 and received what cooperative sources called an "unusually quick response" in little more than a week. The essence of the concept was to take an HY-2, strip it of its liquid rocket engine, and put in its place a turbine engine from a Russian helicopter - the TV-2-117 or TV3-117 from a Mi-8 or Mi-17helicopter. To prevent discovery by the UN, Iraq halted engine development and testing and disassembled the test stand in late 2002 before the design criteria had been met.

In addition to the activities detailed here on Iraq's attempts to develop delivery systems beyond the permitted UN 150km, ISG has also developed information on Iraqi attempts to purchase proscribed missiles and missile technology. Documents found by ISG describe a high level dialogue between Iraq and North Korea that began in December 1999 and included an October 2000 meeting in Baghdad. These documents indicate Iraqi interest in the transfer of technology for surface-to-surface missiles with a range of 1300km (probably No Dong) and land-to-sea missiles with a range of 300km. The document quotes the North Koreans as understanding the limitations imposed by the UN, but being prepared "to cooperate with Iraq on the items it specified". At the time of OIF, these discussions had not led to any missiles being transferred to Iraq. A high level cooperating source has reported that in late 2002 at Saddam's behest a delegation of Iraqi officials was sent to meet with foreign export companies, including one that dealt with missiles. Iraq was interested in buying an advanced ballistic missile with 270km and 500km ranges.

The ISG has also identified a large volume of material and testimony by cooperating Iraq officials on Iraq's effort to illicitly procure parts and foreign assistance for its missile program. These include:

Uncertainty remains about the full extent of foreign assistance to Iraq's planned expansion of its missile systems and work is continuing to gain a full resolution of this issue. However, there is little doubt from the evidence already gathered that there was  substantial illegal procurement for all aspects of the missile programs.

I have covered a lot of ground today, much of it highly technical. Although we are resisting drawing conclusions in this first interim report, a number of things have become clearer already as a result of our investigation, among them:

  1. Saddam, at least as judged by those scientists and other insiders who worked in his military-industrial programs, had not given up his aspirations and intentions to continue to acquire weapons of mass destruction. Even those senior officials we have interviewed who claim no direct knowledge of any on-going prohibited activities readily acknowledge that Saddam intended to resume these programs whenever the external restrictions were removed. Several of these officials acknowledge receiving inquiries since 2000 from Saddam or his sons about how long it would take to either restart CW production or make available chemical weapons.

  2. In the delivery systems area there were already well advanced, but undeclared, on-going activities that, if OIF had not intervened, would have resulted in the production of missiles with ranges at least up to 1000 km, well in excess of the UN permitted range of 150 km. These missile activities were supported by a serious clandestine procurement program about which we have much still to learn.

  3. In the chemical and biological weapons area we have confidence that there were at a minimum clandestine on-going research and development activities that were embedded in the Iraqi Intelligence Service. While we have much yet to learn about the exact work programs and capabilities of these activities, it is already apparent that these undeclared activities would have at a minimum facilitated chemical and biological weapons activities and provided a technically trained cadre.

Let me conclude by returning to something I began with today. We face a unique but challenging opportunity in our efforts to unravel the exact status of Iraq's WMD program. The good news is that we do not have to rely for the first time in over a decade on

The bad news is that we have to do this under conditions that ensure that our work will take time and impose serious physical dangers on those who are asked to carry it out.

Why should we take the time and run the risk to ensure that our conclusions reflect the truth to the maximum extent that is possible given the conditions in post-conflict Iraq? For those of us that are carrying out this search, there are two reasons that drive us to want to complete this effort.

First, whatever we find will probably differ from pre-war intelligence. Empirical reality on the ground is, and has always been, different from intelligence judgments that must be made under serious constraints of time, distance and information. It is, however, only by understanding precisely what those difference are that the quality of future intelligence and investment decisions concerning future intelligence systems can be improved. Proliferation of weapons of mass destruction is such a continuing threat to global society that learning those lessons has a high imperative.

Second, we have found people, technical information and illicit procurement networks that if allowed to flow to other countries and regions could accelerate global proliferation. Even in the area of actual weapons there is no doubt that Iraq had at one time chemical and biological weapons. Even if there were only a remote possibility that these pre-1991 weapons still exist, we have an obligation to American troops who are now there and the Iraqi population to ensure that none of these remain to be used against them in the ongoing insurgency activity.

Mr. Chairman and Members I appreciate this opportunity to share with you the initial results of the first 3 months of the activities of the Iraqi Survey Group. I am certain that I speak for Major General Keith Dayton, who commands the Iraqi Survey Group, when I say how proud we are of the men and women from across the Government and from our Coalition partners, Australia and the United Kingdom, who have gone to Iraq and are carrying out this important mission.

Thank you.



15 posted on 10/15/2003 6:58:45 PM PDT by cake_crumb (UN Resolutions = Very Expensive, Very SCRATCHY Toilet Paper)
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To: LadyDoc; Old Sarge; MJY1288; Calpernia; Grampa Dave; anniegetyourgun; Ernest_at_the_Beach; ...
Great post. Thank you!

Your loved ones perished in a just conflict that was urgently required, fully justified and sanctioned by the United Nations and a bipartisan vote of Congress. Their service was honorable and their sacrifices warrant our eternal gratitude.

Why we fight, ping!

Another powerful essay from someone who was there and understands why:

8 Protests From Those Who Don't Know Ring Hollow

 Thanks, Tonkin!

If you want on or off my Pro-Coalition ping list, please Freepmail me. Warning: it is a high volume ping list on good days. (Most days are good days).

16 posted on 10/15/2003 7:14:44 PM PDT by Ragtime Cowgirl ("Life's a roller coaster." ~ Rummy 10/2 - in response to a reporter re. critics wanting him fired.)
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To: LadyDoc
Yes it was a just war. Let us not forget our fallen. They died to deliver the gift of freedom to the Iraqis and to help keep the terrorist blight from our shores.

They deserve much better coverage, treatment and rememberance than they have been getting.

Tell a friend the truth and have them tell a friend.

17 posted on 10/15/2003 7:40:28 PM PDT by pfflier
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To: LadyDoc
BUMP!

"This is information that, had it been available last year, would have been headline news."

The liberal media at work to hide any evidence that this administration is great. Thank goodness for FR!

18 posted on 10/15/2003 7:43:10 PM PDT by InShanghai (I was born on the crest of a wave, and rocked in the cradle of the deep.)
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To: Proud to Be a McCarthyist
Speaking of vindication, an interesting prophecy was made a few weeks ago. It was prophesied that October would be a month of great vindication and everything hidden would be exposed. These new findings would seem to fit that prophecy and I suspect that might also explain Bush's (and perhaps Schwarzenegger's) decisions to go over the heads of the traditional biased media. I look at this month with great interest.

Are you, by any chance, a devotee of Our Lady of Medjugorie? Or Our Lady of Necedah? Or perhaps the Rev. Sun Myung Moon?

19 posted on 10/15/2003 7:43:17 PM PDT by findingtruth
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To: jim35
Oh no, he didn't have 'em. He just invited his own destruction because he was innocent, hid everything from inspectors because he was a little prankster!

That's right. We know what happened to them now. He shipped those WMD's out of Iraq and into other countries. Now all we have to do is invade those other countries. We are present at the historic founding of a great new world empire, my friend.

20 posted on 10/15/2003 7:48:28 PM PDT by findingtruth
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