Posted on 06/03/2005 7:35:31 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - The White House on Friday played down a report in which U.N. weapons inspectors documented additional materials missing from weapons sites in Iraq.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the Bush administration had taken steps to ensure sites were secured, and he suggested it was doubtful the looted material was being used to boost other countries' weapons programs.
In a report to the U.N. Security Council, acting chief weapons inspector Demetrius Perricos said that satellite imagery experts had determined that material that could be used to make biological or chemical weapons and banned long-range missiles had been removed from 109 sites, up from 90 reported in March.
The sites have been emptied of equipment to varying degrees, with the largest percentage of missing items at 58 missile facilities.
For example, 289 of the 340 pieces of equipment to produce missiles — or about 85 percent, had been removed, the report said.
Biological sites were the least damaged, according to the analysts at the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission.
Perricos said he's reached no conclusions about who removed the items or where they went. He said it could have been moved elsewhere in Iraq, sold as scrap, melted down or purchased.
He said the missing material can be used for legitimate purposes. "However, they can also be utilized for prohibited purposes if in a good state of repair."
McClellan said that the United States has helped to remove low enriched uranium and radioactive sources, offered jobs to weapons experts from Saddam Hussein's programs to keep them from taking their expertise elsewhere, and helped Iraq establish an independent radioactive source regulatory authority.
"We have been working closely with the government in Iraq to ensure that Iraq's former weapons of mass destruction personnel and proliferation materials do not contribute to proliferation programs in other countries," McClellan said.
U.N. inspectors have been blocked from returning to Iraq since the U.S.-led war in 2003. They have been using satellite photos to see what happened to the sites that were subject to U.N. monitoring because their equipment had both civilian and military uses.
Since the war, U.S. teams took over the weapons search. Former chief arms hunter Charles Duelfer and his Iraq Survey Group found no weapons of mass destruction in the country, discrediting President Bush's stated rationale for invading Iraq.
McClellan referred to findings by Duelfer, saying that "any looting was the work of uncoordinated elements rather than directed at an effort to try to export equipment to a country that might obtain or have a weapons of mass destruction program."
He also noted that Duelfer had concluded that, since the looted materials are easily obtained elsewhere, "other governments are not likely to look to Iraq to buy used versions of it."
there were no WMDs in iraq the MSM told us, so how can this story also be true?
Missing arms:
Leni
dang--gmta!
Funny how "Weapons Of Mass Destruction" that the MSM, France, Germany, The Hapless U.N. and the Liberals said didn't even exist, .... SOMEHOW turn up MISSING !
Huh ...????????????
ROFLMAO !!!!!!!!!!!!
Good grief! More ammunition for the likes of the pedophile Scott Ritter to open his big mouth yet again.
There's a difference between:
1) "Weapons of Mass Destruction" and
2) "Assorted industrial items that can be use to MAKE innocuous civilian items but also CAN be used to MAKE Weapons of Mass Destruction that Iraq legally had and were regularly inspected but went missing after we took over the country."
But, I've about given up on trying to explain any of these articles. If people are simply going to skim them, not understand them, and go into a frothing fit when they see the letters "WMD" or the word "missle" they're beyond help.
Exactly .. only now that they may be able to sting the Bush admin with the information .. they will play that hand. I've never seen such an evil bunch in my life. I'm serious .. these people are really out there.
But I thought the final report also said that this stuff was gone before we got there ..?? Which makes me wonder what reports the UN gave us before we went in .. did the UN show the stuff was there to sucker us into going into Iraq and then they were going to show these films of the stuff being missing .. and either blame us for losing it .. or blame us for taking it ..??
I don't like this at all - it stinks to high heaven. We need Bolton in there NOW to find out what's going on.
Yes, one is a final product and the other is ingredients just looking for someone to "cook it." People don't need to even skim over the article to understand the UN's ploy: the US dropped the ball and so a future terrorist attack can be directly attributed all the way back to the Coalition invasion. People don't need to skim over the article to understand that what the UN supports is a policy where the "cook" Sadaam would have the ingredients vs. Coalition forces mostly throwing ingredients away while keeping the rest in some tupperware.
All I want is for them to uncover 1 warehouse full of something.
This way the entire world can say, "see? we told you there were WMD." Bush lied because he said that after review there wasn't any in Iraq.
Or better yet, the WMD turns up in Syria and the MSM and libs say, "see? we told you there was no WMD in Iraq."
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