Exclusive: U.S. Finds Radioactive Missiles in Iraq

NewsMax ^ | 3/9/04 | Charles R. Smith

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

[<1/1,000,000th%]

The discovery is not, however, considered the long-sought "smoking gun" of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

Somebody kick me.

[Arrowhead1952]

Smoking gun ping.

[Lance Romance]

Dan Rather? Tom Brokaw? Chris Matthews? Aaron Brown? Where are you?

[Samwise]

Nothing to see here. Move along.

[zarf]

NewsMax again....ho hum.

[DoctorMichael]

Bttt

[jwalsh07]

If this isn't a "smoking gun" then guns don't smoke.

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

Print a quiet rebuttal in the Times and we can MoveOn.

[ex-Texan]

*BUMP*!

[Final Authority]

DU is somewhat radioactive and is uranium. If the missles contain DU (depleted Uranium) then they are little different than the tank buster rounds that the A-10 spits out. Now if they find plutonium?

[Pan_Yans Wife]

America has WMD. We just don't bury them in the desert. If Iraq was not hiding their WMD, why do they keep turning up buried?

[biblewonk]

Somebody kick me.

NFS. It reminds me of when I was a terrible batter and the kids on the block would keep pitching slower and more perfect so I'd finally hit the ball and get the game moving. They'd all be yelling "AH C'MOM WHADDA WANT!!!!"

[ContemptofCourt]

Ummm, its not a WMD...its an air to air missle. How would this be a smoking gun?

[biblewonk]

Oops, it was "WHADDAYA WANT??!!!"

[NorseWood]

But . . . but . . . but they were just intended for peaceful purposes!

[Dead Dog]

From www.fas.org

AA-8 APHID K-60 (R-60, Object 62)

Toward the end of the 1960s the Molniya design bureau begin working on the first missile for tactical air combat, the K-60 (R-60, Object 62), with infrared self-guidance. Series production of this missile began in 1973, with the R-60 missile being certified as a weapon for a variety combat aircraft.

The R-60 missile is an unusually small missile, weighing half as much as the lightest Western missiles, with a correspondingly small warhead which weighs barely 3.5 kg). The R-60 on attack aircraft such as the MiG-27, Su-24 or Su-25 serves as a self-defense missile, and on fighter aircraft such as the MiG-23, MiG-25, and Su-15 it is occasionally used as a supplementary missile. The R-60 missile had an unusually short development time, with only four years passing from the beginning of its design to the beginning of its production -- the normal development process of Soviet air-to-air missiles typically required 8 to 9 years. This rapid development was facilitated by the availability of a wealth of experimental data on the K-13 missile, and no new research was done for the R-60. Further developments of the R-60 include the R-60M missile, the export variant R-60MK, and the UZR-60 training version.

Specifications Manufacturer Date Deployed 1975 Range 3 km, 5 km 10 km Speed Mach 2+ Propulsion One solid-propellant rocket motor Fuze Two active radar fuze aerials located aft of the moving control fins, and a single strake running down the forward half of the body. Active laser in R-60M Guidance All aspect Infrared Warhead 6 kg ( 1.6 kg of which is uranium ) HE fragmentation Launch Weight 65 kg Length 2.08 m Diameter 130 mm Fin Span 0.43 m Platforms Mi-24, Su-15bis, Su-17M3, Yak-38, Su-25, Su-24M, MiG-21bis, MiG-23, MiG-25, MiG-27, MiG-29, MiG-31

[Saturnalia]

I imagine the uranium in question is unenriched at worst,
DU being far more likely. Not much of an issue here, lots
of stuff in military use can be toxic if handled incorrectly.

[cinFLA]

Move along. move on . org