Posted on 07/17/2005 2:21:36 PM PDT by wagglebee
By April 2003, when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Saddam Hussein had stockpiled 500 tons of yellowcake uranium at his al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development plant south of Baghdad.
That intriguing little detail is almost never mentioned by the big media, who prefer to chant the mantra "Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction" while echoing Joseph Wilson's claim that "Bush lied" about seeking more of the nuclear material in Niger. The media's decision to put the Wilson-Plame affair back on the front burner, however, may turn out to be a blessing in disguise for President Bush - giving his administration a chance to resurrect an important debate they conceded far too easily about the weapons of mass destruction threat posed by Saddam Hussein.
First, the facts - from a reliable critic of the White House - the New York Times, which covered the story long after the paper announced it was tightening its standards on WMD news out of Iraq.
"The United States has informed an international agency that oversees nuclear materials that it intends to move hundreds of tons of uranium from a sealed repository south of Baghdad to a more secure place outside Iraq," the paper announced in a little noticed May 2004 report.
"The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program until it was largely shut down after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, holds more than 500 tons of uranium," the paper revealed, before insisting: "None of it [is] enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon."
Well, almost none.
The Times went on to report that amidst Saddam's yellowcake stockpile, U.S. weapons inspectors found "some 1.8 tons" that they "classified as low-enriched uranium."
The paper conceded that while Saddam's nearly 2 tons of partially enriched uranium was "a more potent form" of the nuclear fuel, it was "still not sufficient for a weapon."
Consulted about the low-enriched uranium discovery, however, Ivan Oelrich, a physicist at the Federation of American Scientists, told the Associated Press that if it was of the 3 percent to 5 percent level of enrichment common in fuel for commercial power reactors, the 1.8 tons could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb.
And Thomas B. Cochran, director of the nuclear program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the Times that the low-enriched uranium could be useful to a nation with nuclear ambitions.
"A country like Iran could convert that into weapons-grade material with a lot fewer centrifuges than would be required with natural uranium," he explained.
Luckily, Iraq didn't have even the small number of centrifuges necessary to get the job done.
Or did they?
The physicist tapped by Saddam to run his centrifuge program says that after the first Gulf War, the program was largely dismantled. But it wasn't destroyed.
In fact, according to what he wrote in his 2004 book, "The Bomb in My Garden," Dr. Mahdi Obeidi told U.S. interrogators: "Saddam kept funding the IAEC [Iraq Atomic Energy Commission] from 1991 ... until the war in 2003."
"I was developing the centrifuge for the weapons" right through 1997, he revealed.
And after that, Dr. Obeidi said, Saddam ordered him under penalty of death to keep the technology available to resume Iraq's nuke program at a moment's notice.
Dr. Obeidi said he buried "the full set of blueprints, designs - everything to restart the centrifuge program - along with some critical components of the centrifuge" under the garden of his Baghdad home.
"I had to maintain the program to the bitter end," he explained. All the while the Iraqi physicist was aware that he held the key to Saddam's continuing nuclear ambitions.
"The centrifuge is the single most dangerous piece of nuclear technology," Dr. Obeidi says in his book. "With advances in centrifuge technology, it is now possible to conceal a uranium enrichment program inside a single warehouse."
Consider: 500 tons of yellowcake stored at Saddam's old nuclear weapons plan, where he'd managed to partially enrich 1.8 tons. And the equipment and blueprints that could enrich enough uranium to make a bomb stored away for safekeeping. And all of it at the Iraqi dictator's disposal.
If the average American was aware of these undisputed facts, the debate over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction would have been decided long ago - in President Bush's favor.
One more detail that Mr. Wilson and his media backers don't like to discuss: There's a reason Niger was such a likely candidate for Saddam's uranium shopping spree.
Responding to the firestorm that erupted after Wilson's July 2003 column, Prime Minister Tony Blair told reporters:
"In case people should think that the whole idea of a link between Iraq and Niger was some invention, in the 1980s we know for sure that Iraq purchased round about 270 tons of uranium from Niger."
Did you note THIS at the end of the release? Whereas the campaign said there would be "dozens" of foreign policy experts fanning out across the state, only SIX were worthy of having their biographical info included. And...you got it...Wilson was among the six. Sounds like he was pretty well connected inside the campaign at that early stage, don't ya think?
More significantly, here's what his bio says:
Ambassador Joe Wilson served a distinguished career as a diplomat for more than twenty years. He was the acting U.S. ambassador in Iraq during Operation Desert Shield and the last U.S. official to meet with Saddam Hussein before the first Gulf War. He was assigned in 2002 by Vice President Dick Cheney to investigate claims that Iraq was trying to buy Uranium for Niger.Hmmmmm. Isn't this the man who's been going around swearing he NEVER SAID VP CHENEY SENT HIM?!
Now, there is NO other possible source for that bio info than from Wilson himself. At that time, his trip wouldn't be publicly reported for at least 4 more months.
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Very good catch.....
I'm pretty sure that you are right...in any case, Wilson was already working for the Kerry campaign when he wrote the Op-Ed.
Also, this article goes back to the reason why some CIA analysts said that Iraq wouldn't have been seeking yellowcake from Niger: These analysts argued that Iraq already had plenty from the previous purchase.
Another thing of note: Compare the President's wording that Iraq was seeking yellowcake from Niger to Wilson and the MSM's argument that Niger had not sold them any. From the beginning there was clearly intentional distortion of the argument by all of those talk shows and articles - not just Wilson.
I've had little time the last 3 days. Checking in and out today. Looks like it is all coming together.
Ann Coulter...
Wilson implied he had been sent to Niger by Vice President Dick Cheney. Among copious other references to Cheney in the op-ed, Wilson said that CIA "officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story" that Saddam Hussein had attempted to buy uranium from Niger, "so they could provide a response to the vice president's office."
Soon Clown Wilson was going around claiming: "The office of the vice president, I am absolutely convinced, received a very specific response to the question it asked, and that response was based upon my trip out there."
Dick Cheney responded by saying: "I don't know Joe Wilson. I've never met Joe Wilson. I don't know who sent Joe Wilson. He never submitted a report that I ever saw when he came back." Clown Wilson's allegation that Cheney had received his (unwritten) "report" was widely repeated as fact by, among others, The New York Times.
In a huffy editorial, the Times suggested there had been a "willful effort" by the Bush administration to slander the great and honorable statesman Saddam Hussein. As evidence, the Times cited Bush's claims about Saddam seeking uranium from Niger, which, the Times said, had been "pretty well discredited" — which, according to my copy of The New York Times Stylebook means "unequivocally corroborated" — "by Joseph Wilson 4th, a former American diplomat, after he was dispatched to Niger by the CIA to look into the issue."
So liberals were allowed to puff up Wilson's "report" by claiming Wilson was sent "by the CIA." But — in the traditional liberal definition of "criminal" — Republicans were not allowed to respond by pointing out Wilson was sent to Niger by his wife, not by the CIA and certainly not by Dick
http://tinyurl.com/8e7dz
Could minor Ambassador Joe Wilson himself have been the source in blowing his own Wife's cover?
It is distinctly possible, (though it may be unlikely that Joe Wilson himself directly was NY Times Judith Miller's source), since Joe Wilson himself evidently routinely bragged openly to strangers about her CIA employment, prior to such "cover" being "blown" in the press.
Here's an example of Joe's apparently routine and open bragging about Valerie being a "CIA agent," which became known directly to me over a year ago:
He certainly bragged about it per a famous and highly reliable source's (named below) account of his own face-to-face encounter with Amb. Joe Wilson prior to Valerie Plame's "outing" as a CIA agent/employee.
Based upon a personal conversation (we were in a small group eating; it was NOT an "off the record") I had with eminent historian Victor Davis Hanson (we were at a luncheon table together during a trip to Europe), it appeared entirely possible that Joe Wilson himself was the (or one source, if not the original one) possible source in revealing his own wife's status as a CIA agent or employee.
Victor Davis Hanson (Wilson presumably knew Victor Davis Hanson wrote regularly for NRO (National Review Online), had done OpEds for the Wall street Journal, and other publications, and had his own Website with a widespread following) said he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were both in the same "Green Room" before a televised debate-discussion on Iraq, etc. and Joe first warned the TV make-up person not to get powder on his $14,000 Rolex watch, then he bragged to Victor about several things (possessions and trips to Aspen, etc.), like his expensive car (I think it was a Mercedes), and then bragged about his beautiful ("hot") wife who, Joe Wilson said (braggingly) was a CIA operative.
I asked Victor Davis Hanson Why he didn't write up this account.(?) He replied that Joe Wilson would probably simply deny it, since only he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were in the Green Room together before the broadcast.
However, it is now easy to surmise that Joe Wilson is a crass, materialistic, self-promoting, vain, egotistical, bragaddocio-opportunist, so this account is perfectly consistent with Valerie Plame's TWO photo shoots in Vanity Fair. (Or was it Vogue? No, probably too crass for Vogue, n'est pas?)
Could minor Ambassador Joe Wilson himself have been the source in blowing his own Wife's cover?
It is distinctly possible, (though it may be unlikely that Joe Wilson himself directly was NY Times Judith Miller's source), since Joe Wilson himself evidently routinely bragged openly to strangers about her CIA employment, prior to such "cover" being "blown" in the press.
Here's an example of Joe's apparently routine and open bragging about Valerie being a "CIA agent," which became known directly to me over a year ago:
He certainly bragged about it per a famous and highly reliable source's (named below) account of his own face-to-face encounter with Amb. Joe Wilson prior to Valerie Plame's "outing" as a CIA agent/employee.
Based upon a personal conversation (we were in a small group eating; it was NOT an "off the record") I had with eminent historian Victor Davis Hanson (we were at a luncheon table together during a trip to Europe), it appeared entirely possible that Joe Wilson himself was the (or one source, if not the original one) possible source in revealing his own wife's status as a CIA agent or employee.
Victor Davis Hanson (Wilson presumably knew Victor Davis Hanson wrote regularly for NRO (National Review Online), had done OpEds for the Wall street Journal, and other publications, and had his own Website with a widespread following) said he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were both in the same "Green Room" before a televised debate-discussion on Iraq, etc. and Joe first warned the TV make-up person not to get powder on his $14,000 Rolex watch, then he bragged to Victor about several things (possessions and trips to Aspen, etc.), like his expensive car (I think it was a Mercedes), and then bragged about his beautiful ("hot") wife who, Joe Wilson said (braggingly) was a CIA operative.
I asked Victor Davis Hanson Why he didn't write up this account.(?) He replied that Joe Wilson would probably simply deny it, since only he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were in the Green Room together before the broadcast.
However, it is now easy to surmise that Joe Wilson is a crass, materialistic, self-promoting, vain, egotistical, bragaddocio-opportunist, so this account is perfectly consistent with Valerie Plame's TWO photo shoots in Vanity Fair. (Or was it Vogue? No, probably too crass for Vogue, n'est pas?)
Also, don't forget that Wilson has been claiming that he went over to the Kerry campaign (and then went public with his accusations) because he was so angry about Bush's "sixteen words" in the State of the Union speech.
But, here we have evidence Wilson was already campaigning for Kerry in the week of January 13th....the SOTU wasn't until January 28th!
I wish we could find a record of what Wilson said on his little foray into New Hampshire politics. How much you want to bet he beat the drum of "Bush lied about the war"?
If nothing else, it's pretty apparent the whole Wilson brouhaha was a Kerry dirty trick set up....dependent on a willing MSM, of course.
Gosh, the guy is a total fraud!
No...that is precisely the problem.
We Freepers know it but I would wager that 90+% of the Mericun peeple do not know this.
The media barely reported this fact...if at all.
Look further down the page for the January, 2004 date for primary appearances.
No. What Bush needs to do is have the 500-tons of Iraqi yellow cake delivered to Joe Wilson's house. THAT would be a photo-op!
However, Wilson claiming that Cheney sent him to Niger is also on this site, a demonstration that Wilson LIED hen he said he never claimed this. So we still have some good information.
Look further down the page for the January, 2004 date for primary appearances.
Look further down the page for the January, 2004 date for primary appearances.
Dang. I had sent it to 3 bloggers.
I've sent them a correction.
I wish to point out that Pres. Bush said, "Africa" not Niger in his speech. I keep seeing that mistake repeatedly. It is an inaccurate quote when Niger is used.
The date doesn't change the fact that he was still claiming Cheney sent him to Niger. Of course, the campaign could have written it in 2004 from their own knowledge of press coverage.
But, that's a point I've been making all along. Even if Wilson was careful never to have said the words himself, the Kerry campaign and every Rat shill was all over the airwaves claiming Cheney had sent him to Niger. And he never corrected them until it came out that his wife had done it.
Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address
snip
The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.
Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production.
Saddam Hussein has not credibly explained these activities. He clearly has much to hide.
The dictator of Iraq is not disarming. To the contrary, he is deceiving.
From intelligence sources, we know, for instance, that thousands of Iraqi security personnel are at work hiding documents and materials from the U.N. inspectors, sanitizing inspection sites and monitoring the inspectors themselves.
http://tinyurl.com/51hb
Take a look at the bottom of the linked document. There's a January 13, 2004 date listed there.
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