Saddam devoping aerosolized bio WMD's; may give to Palestinians

Time of London ^ | August 3, 2002 | Michael Evans

[Gemflint]

http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=13033

Sunday, August 4, 2002

Saddam plans biological weapons for Palestinians

Whitehall dossier says Saddam plans biological weapons for Palestinians

Michael Evans, defence editor Time of London 3 August 2002

SADDAM HUSSEIN is suspected of planning to arm a Palestinian terrorist group with biological weapons to attack either American or Israeli targets.

A Whitehall dossier containing a detailed assessment of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction programme, which has been circulated to the Prime Minister and other senior Cabinet ministers, is understood to focus on Iraq's biological weapons capability.

Details of the dossier came to light as the United Nations rejected a new offer from the Iraqi leader. Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, said that an Iraqi letter calling for a further round of technical talks with Hans Blix, the head weapons inspector, set conditions "at variance" with the demands of the United Nations Security Council.

Using mobile laboratories for their research, the team of scientists working for Saddam are believed to be developing a range of biological agents that can be "delivered" by an aerosol system.

The latest assessment in Washington and London is that Saddam's plan is to produce a basic weapon that can be used by a terrorist group to attack the Iraqi leader's enemies, the United States and Israel. In the same way that Iran has funded and trained terrorist groups to carry out attacks from Lebanon against Israel, Saddam, according to the assessment, could be banking on recruiting a Palestinian terrorist group to act on his behalf.

Analysis of US satellite imagery over the past four years has provided sufficient evidence to show what Saddam has been doing since the expulsion of the United Nations weapons inspectors in December 1998. While the Iraqi leader has pursued all elements of his weapons of mass destruction programme, he has made greatest progress in trying to "weaponise" his biological systems, using the mobile research laboratories to try to deceive America's spy satellites.

The Iraqi leader knows from experience that it is far more difficult to hide work on nuclear weapons because of the substantial infrastructure required. Saddam's attempts to develop long-range ballistic missiles, capable of reaching America, have also been carefully monitored from space and there is no sign that he has succeeded beyond trying to modify old Russian Scud missiles.

In assessing the threat posed by Saddam's weapons of mass destruction programme, the emphasis has, therefore, been on his biological warfare projects, which pose as great a threat as nuclear devices and can be developed relatively easily away from the sensors of America's spy satellites.

The Palestinian connection is now at the heart of intelligence thinking. Despite the belief in some quarters in America that a senior officer in Saddam's intelligence service met an al-Qaeda terrorist in Prague last year, before September 11, this is given no credence by the CIA, the FBI or by British Intelligence.

Saddam has funded Palestinian extremist groups for many years, and the assessment now is that, with the Middle East in turmoil, the Iraqi leader may see that the best way of taking revenge against the US and Israel is by using a Palestinian organisation as his proxy terrorists.

[GailA]

btt

[Free the USA]

Index Bump

[Mixer]

If this is even close to true then he must be "removed" from power.

[andy_card]

Palestinians are going to Israel with bio-weapons? This is a joke, right? Next thing you know, they're going to be trying to nuke the settlements a few hundred yards from their cities.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Looks like ol' Saddam dislikes the Palestinians as much as the Israelis.

[Vermont Lt]

I agree. The next time you see someone using a big spray gun to pain their house, go park your car downwind. Trust me, you wont get any overspray!

I know these guys dont think like us, but they also dont want to kill ALL of their own people.

I can see them using it on US, but not that close to their own people.

[cajungirl]

yeah, it is sort of dumb and dumber,,"hey Ahmed, lets spray the west bank settlements with some small pox,,yeah, lets do it"

[verity]

the team of scientists working for Saddam are believed to be developing a range of biological agents that can be "delivered" by an aerosol system.

Deodorant agents would be far more useful.:~)

[Mr. Mojo]

Looks like ol' Saddam dislikes the Palestinians as much as the Israelis.

I don't think Saddam either likes or dislikes anybody. His only concern is staying in power, and increasing it if he can. If somehow helping he Israelis served this end (although I can't see how that would ever be the case), he would do so without hesititation. He's actually very Clintonesque.

[sam_paine]

... the team of scientists working for Saddam are believed to be developing a range of biological agents that can be "delivered" by an aerosol system.

Is it just the tequila this morning, or are all of the cheezy 60's James Bond and Batman villains and their diabolical plans coming to life???

[cake_crumb]

"yeah, it is sort of dumb and dumber,,'hey Ahmed, lets spray the west bank settlements with some small pox,,yeah, lets do i' "

LOL...well said.

The Brits just screwed their own al Qaeda-connection argument with this article : bioweapons are best not used in the terrorists' own back yards. A more distant target like the US makes more sense. Terrorists affiliated with ao Qaeda or whatever they choose to call themselves by this time are more internationally mobile.

The terrorists that haven't blown themselves up have shown they aren't exactly swimming at the top of the gene pool, but they can't be so stupid as to drop a biohazard next to their own neighborhood to get at a few Israeli settlers when homocide bombs already do so nicely.

[Ancesthntr]

The terrorists that haven't blown themselves up have shown they aren't exactly swimming at the top of the gene pool, but they can't be so stupid as to drop a biohazard next to their own neighborhood to get at a few Israeli settlers when homocide bombs already do so nicely.

1. Never underestimate the capacity for human stupidity.

2. Did anyone ever think that the people spreading this stuff around could be lied to? After all, the really vicious people are at the top of the Pallie terror groups, and no one know what they are capable of doing.

[kinghorse]

This stuff can't be too dangerous or transmittable or the Israelis would be using it agains the Palis. This is the part I never got. Whatever douchebag Saddam has, we have in spades. Obviously it's not that much of a threat if our response can easily be magnified 100 fold.

Furthermore, if terrorism is so effective, why aren't the Israeli's leaving bags of explosives/nails with remote det devices lying around the West Bank and Gaza. I would have terror bombs going off on the hour every hour in their backyards until they backed off. Where is it written the west must be terrorized? It's kind of like the Indian wars I guess. They grabbed an occasional scalp, we rounded em up and exterminated in toto. I guess the modus operandi is as it has always been. We are peaceful people but when pushed to war we will execute it with gusto and our goal will be total annihilation.

[cake_crumb]

"1. Never underestimate the capacity for human stupidity."

True. My personal saying is "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups." However, I think that the ultimate suicide attack, i.e.: the potential destruction of your own people, just to kill off your enemies, is a little extreme. I don't see how even the most rabid terrorists could romanticize it for the popular consumption of the populace.

"2. Did anyone ever think that the people spreading this stuff around could be lied to? After all, the really vicious people are at the top of the Pallie terror groups, and no one know what they are capable of doing."

Sure they can be lied to. The press faithfully reports every lie they hear as "fact", usually from "unnamed sources". For a couple of decades, I've been under the impression that "journalists" don't even read the stuff they "report" to the public, or they would see that the patterns of behaviour of the terror groups they report on are not born out by the propaganda quoted in the media's own stories.

[rs79bm]

Saddam devoping aerosolized bio WMD's; may give to Palestinians

Sorry, your article should read as follows:

Saddam developing aerosolized bio WMD's; WILL give to Palestianians.

[cake_crumb]

"This stuff can't be too dangerous or transmittable or the Israelis would be using it agains the Palis. This is the part I never got. Whatever douchebag Saddam has, we have in spades. Obviously it's not that much of a threat if our response can easily be magnified 100 fold."

Neither Israel or the United States will use the terrorists methods against them because hiding in the dark and murdering children is neither "honorable" or "romantic"; it is base, cowardly and evil. We're cut from better cloth than terrorists.

[kinghorse]

That's a reasonable reply in the early stages of a conflict. Check your history books for the evolution of a romanticized vision of war to the concept of total war in the Pacific circa 1942-44. After a few months of kamikazes and dug in fanatics on the islands dotting the Pacific, our romantic view of war dimmed and we had little moral trouble firebombing 100,000 civilians to hell in one evening over Tokyo. So don't feed me that better cloth argument. We just haven't gotten warmed up yet =).

[cake_crumb]

"After a few months of kamikazes and dug in fanatics on the islands dotting the Pacific, our romantic view of war dimmed and we had little moral trouble firebombing 100,000 civilians to hell in one evening over Tokyo."

Yeah, you've got a point. However, it wasn't "our romantic view of war" that I was referring to : it's the terrorist's "romantic view" of death and destruction."

Hey, I know we may have to do it again. As a historian with a passion for socioanthropology, I can see circumstances heading in that direction...again.

OK...the Israelis won't use biochemical weapons in Gaza for the same reason I hope the terrorists are bright enough not to : it's just a tad too close to their own neighborhoods. I'm saying that both the US and Israel have conventional weapons that'll do the job without turning the whole place into an uninhabitable wasteland.

If we nuke anything...I say we nuke Mecca and the meteor the Islamonazis worship. Just the SUGGESTION of us nuking Mecca sends them into PAROXISMS of terrified shouting, "Hey, you guys can't nuke Mecca".

The obvious answer is "'Course we can, silly. We just choose not to." [at this time] ROFLOL...the reaction is fun to watch. Nuking Mecca is attractive for two reasons: destruction of the Meteor and the "spiritual home" of their moon god, and also it's far enough away from Israel that there won't be such a problem with fallout.

[monkeyshine]

This stuff can't be too dangerous or transmittable or the Israelis would be using it agains the Palis.

No they wouldn't. They've had plenty of opportunity to use bioweapons. The perfect place would have been Lebanon. A healthy dose of Agent Orange to kill off all the Hezbullah terrorists hiding in the bushes would be much more effective than their current methods. But they didn't and don't.