Posted on 10/28/2004 7:29:47 PM PDT by tomahawk
On Great (Fox News), Bill Gertz said he is coming out with an article that U.S. intelligence stands behind assessment that the Russian GRU moved weapons out of Iraq in the time leading up to the war.
He also said it would take weeks for the story to develop.
On Greta, not On Great.
Reckon the defense will say Scott Petersen was in Iraq, looting those weapons, at the time Laci was murdered?
Oops.
The correct link would be
http://www.washingtontimes.com
The article should be up soon.
Or Laci drowned hiding the 377 tons of weapons at the bottom of San Francisco Bay.
Greta will find out. If not, maybe Saddam can put a word in Rita Cosby's ear.
I just came up with a theory, which, while it sounds far fetched, maybe, it seems to fit at least some of the facts.
Suppose the Russians did indeed remove the weapons, including WMD, by telling Saddam that they are just removing it for safe keeping, but in fact, the Russians were working with us behind the scenes. Russia removed those weapons, so Saddam couldn't use it against our troops. Remember, we were expecting our troops to be attacked with chem and bio weapons, that's why they were wearing the defensive suits in the 120 degree heat.
Suppose Russia couldn't come out openly then, and even now, to admit that they supported us, and Bush is protecting them, by not coming out and saying that's where the WMD went, because we would have to reveal things which would hurt our War on Terror.
Maybe it was some agreement, that we won't reveal to the world all the terrible germs the Russians gave to Saddam, if the Russians will recapture and take out of Iraq all Saddam's WMD, precisely so it won't fall into the hands of terrorists.
**** FROM UPDATES GERTZ ARTICLE *****
The Russian units were dispatched beginning in January 2003 and by March had destroyed hundreds of pages of documents on Russian arms supplies to Iraq while dispersing arms to Syria, the second official said.
Besides their own weapons, the Russians were supplying Saddam with arms made in Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria and other Eastern European nations, he said.
"Whatever was not buried was put on lorries and sent to the Syrian border," the defense official said.
Documents reviewed by the official included itineraries of military units involved in the truck shipments to Syria. The materials outlined in the documents included missile components, MiG jet parts, tank parts and chemicals used to make chemical weapons, the official said.
The director of the Iraqi government front company known as the Al Bashair Trading Co. fled to Syria, where he is in charge of monitoring arms holdings and funding Iraqi insurgent activities, the official said.
Also, an Arabic-language report obtained by U.S. intelligence disclosed the extent of Russian armaments. The 26-page report was written by Abdul Tawab Mullah al Huwaysh, Saddam's minister of military industrialization, who was captured by U.S. forces May 2, 2003.
The Russian "spetsnaz" or special-operations forces were under the GRU military intelligence service and organized large commercial truck convoys for the weapons removal, the official said.
Regarding the explosives, the new Iraqi government reported that 194.7 metric tons of HMX, or high-melting-point explosive, and 141.2 metric tons of RDX, or rapid-detonation explosive, and 5.8 metric tons of PETN, or pentaerythritol tetranitrate, were missing.
The material is used in nuclear weapons and also in making military "plastic" high explosive.
Defense officials said the Russians can provide information on what happened to the Iraqi weapons and explosives that were transported out of the country. Officials believe the Russians also can explain what happened to Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs.
I like that theory. I was thinking that Russia took it back because Russia sold it to
Sadam, therefore, it will be in safe hands until the crisis is over.
Never ever trust the Ruskies.
from a purely political perspective - this story about the Russians is dead. neither side will corroborate it.
Too late to help Bush... AP will be attacking Bush now until Nov. 2 on "devastating" Halliburton story. Then on Sunday, the WaPo or LAT will probably have something that there's no time to respond to. Our only hope is a backlash like the one that happened to the LAT when they hit Arnold at the last second.
Sounds plausible considering Putin warned Bush after 9/11 that Saddam was going to attack America. I think Putin plays both sides. Un,oh that sounds suspiciously like Kerry, maybe Kerry aspires to be a double agent like in Kgb.
Not only did the Russians remove the explosives and weapons (WMD?), they gave them to Saddam in the first place!!! If Iran disarms and gets rid of its nuclear facilities, it will be the same story...it will all go back to RUSSIA.
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