1991, April 18. Iraq delivers its first official report to the U.N. on its unconventional weapons. They acknowledge limited production of chemical weapons but do not mention nuclear or biological weapons. It is later learned the top Iraqi official have been ordered by Tariq Aziz to hide all evidence of these weapons, as well their stocks of VX (an advanced nerve agent), from inspectors.
1991, August 2. UNSCOM’s first biological inspections team arrives in Iraq. They are given a one-page statement that acknowledges that they performed biological research for defensive military purposes.
Between 1991 and 1998 UNSCOM succeeded in identifying and destroying very large quantities of chemical weapons and ballistic missiles as well as associated production facilities. The IAEA also destroyed the infrastructure for Iraq's nuclear weapons program and removed key nuclear materials. This was achieved despite a continuous and sophisticated program of harassment, obstruction, deception and denial. Because of this UNSCOM concluded by 1998 that it was unable to fulfill its mandate. The inspectors were withdrawn in December 1998.
From Iraqi declarations to the UN after the Gulf War we know that by 1991 Iraq had produced a variety of delivery means for chemical and biological agents including over 16,000 free-fall bombs and over 110,000 artillery rockets and shells. Iraq also admitted to the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) that it had 50 chemical and 25 biological warheads available for its ballistic missiles.
UNSCOM discovers samples of indigenously-produced highly enriched uranium, forcing Iraq's acknowledgment of uranium enrichment programs and attempts to preserve key components of its prohibited nuclear weapons program.
1991, September. CIA identifies 8 sites suspected of germ production. On the list is Al Hakem which the Iraqis claim is just a warehouse, but is surrounded by security fences spaced 2 miles apart. When inspectors arrive the Iraqis change their story and say that it is a factory for making animal feed. At the time of their visit it is in fact making animal feed, but suspicions are aroused because of medical quality of the equipment and the fact that the plant is staffed by highly trained micro-biologists. It would later be proved that this facility had been one of Iraq's primary bio-weapons production lines, making tons of Botulinin and Anthrax. It is a perfect example of a “dual-use” facility.
1995. After four years of deception, Iraq finally admits it had a crash nuclear weapons program prior to the Gulf War. Were it not for that war, the regime in Iraq would likely have possessed a nuclear weapon no later than 1993.
In July, after being presented with proof that they have been lying, Iraq admits that Al-Hakam is, in fact, a bio-weapons facility that had been used to produce Botulinum and Anthrax. They present what they claim is a complete disclosure of their program. In it they claim all stockpiles were destroyed after the war with Iran.
A month later, Lieutenant General Hussein Kamael, a son-in-law of Saddam, and the man who had run Iraq’s bio-weapons program defects to Jordan. Assuming he is about to spill his guts to the U.N. (incorrectly it turns out), Iraqi officials claim they have “discovered” a new cache of documents on a chicken-farm owned by Kamel. It detailed the weaponization of thousands of liters of Anthrax, Botulinum toxin, and Aflatoxin for use with Scud warheads, aerial bombs and aircraft.
Saddam uses prisoners as test subjects for chemical and biological warfare experiments. 1,600 death-row inmates are transfered to a special unit for this purpose. An eye witness sees prisoners tied down to beds, experiments conducted on them, blood oozing around the victim's mouths and autopsies performed to confirm the effects.
1995, April. UNSCOM reports to the UN Security Council that Iraq had concealed its biological weapons program and had failed to account for 3 tons of growth material for biological agents.
1997. Andrew Weber, a U.S. diplomat involved in arranging inspections and scientific exchanges between Russia and the U.S., talks to two scientists from the Oblensk State Research Center of Applied Microbiology while visiting Moscow. He is told that a delegation of Iranians had recently visited the Oblensk and and Vector facilitie as well as others. The Iranians were on a recruiting mission, offering $5,000 per month salaries to Russian microbiologist willing to come to work in Iran. Similar delegations from Iraq, Libya and North Korea have visited Russia. Several Russian scientists are known to have accepted these offers. The exact number is not known, but the whereabouts of many former Biopreparat employees is unknown.
1997. UNSCOM discoveres evidence that Iraq is producing Ricin in quantity.
1997, June. UNSCOM reports that one of their Iraqi escorts attempted to wrest the controls of a U.N. helicopter from its Chilean pilots to keep it from flying over a suspected arms site and even threatened to shut off the fuel pump to the engine, stating he would, “do whatever he could to stop the aircraft from flying." In another case an Iraqi helicpoter blocked the progress of a U.N. helicopter by flying dangerously close to it.
1998, November 11. U.N. weapons inspectors are kicked out of Iraq by Saddam. Based on the UNSCOM report to the UN Security Council in January 1999 and earlier UNSCOM reports, when the UN inspectors left Iraq they were unable to account for: up to 360 tonnes of bulk chemical warfare agent, including 1.5 tons of VX nerve agent; up to 3,000 tons of precursor chemicals, including approximately 300 tons of which, in the Iraqi chemical warfare program, were unique to the production of VX; growth media procured for biological agent production (enough to produce over three times the 8,500 liters of anthrax spores Iraq admits to having manufactured); over 30,000 special munitions for delivery of chemical and biological agents. During their tenure, UNSCOM turns up several “cookbooks” for chemical and biological weapons.
1999, January. The UN Special Commission reports that Iraq failed to provide credible evidence that 550 mustard gas-filled artillery shells and 400 biological weapons-capable aerial bombs had been lost or destroyed.
1999, April. A man claiming to be Saddam’s former personal driver publishes a book in Britain. He quotes Saddam as saying he might one day use the West Nile virus against his enemies.
1999, August. An outbreak of West Nile Virus strikes New York. 62 people become ill and seven die. Most doctors are stumped by the flu-like symptoms, but an astute lab-technician notifies the CDC which confirms West Nile. The Mayor orders spraying the city for mosquitoes, which prevents a wider outbreak. This is the first known outbreak in North America. Experts still don’t know how the virus found its way to New York from the Middle-East.
2001. An Iraqi defector, Adnan Ihsan Saeed al-Haideri, says he has visited twenty secret facilities for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Mr. Saeed, a civil engineer, supports his claims with stacks of Iraqi government contracts, complete with technical specifications. Mr. Saeed said Iraq uses front companies to purchase dual-use equipment with the blessing of the United Nations – and then secretly used the equipment for their weapons programs.
2001. Iraq announces that it will begin renovating the al-Dawrah Foot and Mouth Disease Vaccine Facility, one of two known bio-containment, level-three, facilities in Iraq that have an extensive air handling and filtering system. Iraq has admitted that this was a biological weapons facility. Iraq starts the plant without UN approval, ostensibly to produce vaccines that it could more easily and more quickly import through the UN.
2001, December. Adnan Saeed al-Haideri, a specialist in Iraq’s nuclear program defects. al-Haideri identifies 300 separate clandestine sites used by Iraq to hide biological and chemical weapons, and nuclear materials. Some of the equipment is hidden in lead containers stored in fake wells lined with concrete. Al-Haideri an advanced epoxies specialist said he was called in to seal cracks in the concrete because the Iraqis feared U.S. surveillance satellites would pick up the slightest radioactive emissions.
2002. A former Iraqi intelligence officer responsible for setting up front companies for illegal overseas purchases claims that Iraq has arranged to purchase nuclear weapons material (including uranium) from Armscor, South Africa’s state armaments directorate. During the Iran-Iraq war Armscor supplied Iraq with advanced 155mm howitzers. These sales are handled through a front company in Jordan.
For five years he personally ran a procurement network based in Dubai for the Special Security Organization, the elite of Saddam's vast intelligence apparatus, in charge of overseas procurement and responsible for hiding key equipment and material for Saddam's weapons programs. He was arrested by the regime in 1998, viciously tortured, given an injection of thalium and dumped on the street. Bleeding from his nose, mouth and stomach, he managed to escape to Northern Iraq and ultimately to Turkey, where human-rights workers treat him successfully for thallium poisoning Thalium poisonig a favorite method of the regime for executing its enemies, becasue it causes a slow, painful death.
2003, January 16. Previously undisclosed warheads for chemical weapons are discovered by UN inspectors. A joint UNMOVIC/IAEA team also find a significant cache of documents related to Iraq’s uranium enrichment program in the home of Iraqi scientist Faleh Hassan.
“Inspectors going in now will have an almost impossible task to discover what’s going on in the nuclear field.... Since the inspectors left, Saddam has had four years at least to hide what needs to be hidden. Now he’s well on the road, his game will be to stall and stall — if America lets him.” - Dr Hamza, Former head of Iraq’s Nuclear development program.
“Time is on my side.” - Saddam Hussein.