IRAQ
Breaking All the Sprouls
The White House has been unable to explain how 380 tons of powerful explosives
disappeared under its watch in Iraq, and has instead tried to deflect blame with
a series of excuses. None of them hold up. Read this new document
(http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/pp.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=234230) from
American Progress for the full story.
EXCUSE #1 -- THEY WERE GONE WHEN WE GOT THERE: Administration spokesman Dan
Senor said on CNN that "there's a very high probability that those weapons
weren't even there (http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0410/26/pzn.01.html)
before the war." All the evidence, however, suggests the opposite. In an Oct. 25
AP story, a Pentagon official said, "US-led coalition troops had searched Al
Qaqaa in the immediate aftermath of the March 2003 invasion and confirmed that
the explosives, which had been under IAEA seal since 1991, were intact
(http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1098677410357)
." According to Today's New York Times, after U.S. troops came through, Iraqis
on the scene in Al Qaqaa " described an orgy of theft
(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/28/international/middleeast/28bomb.html?oref=login&oref=login)
" as the sensitive military site was picked clean by looters. Iraq's top science
official, Mohammed al-Sharaa, confirmed these reports, saying, "It is impossible
that these materials could have been taken from this site before the regime's
fall. The officials that were inside this facility (Al Qaqaa) beforehand
confirm that not even a shred of paper left it before the fall
(http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200410/s1229343.htm) ."
EXCUSE #2 -- WE DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT IT: One White House strategy has been to
simply plead ignorance. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "We were
informed on October 15th. Condi Rice was informed days after that. This is all
in the last, what, 10 days now.
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/10/20041025-1.html) " What they're
not talking about: The New York Times reported that Iraqi officials say they
warned Paul Bremer, the American head of the occupation authority, that Al Qaqaa
had probably been looted in May 2004, six months ago
(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/international/middleeast/25bomb.html?ei=5094&en=61cf6e1aa29b7871&hp=&ex=1098676800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=all&position=)
.
EXCUSE #3 -- WE'VE SECURED LOTS OF OTHER MUNITIONS: White House Press Secretary
Scott McClellan tried to minimize the importance of the 380 tons of explosives
that went missing, saying, "400,000 tons of munitions have been seized or
destroyed (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/10/20041027-3.html) by
coalition forces." But McClellan is comparing apples to oranges. The 400,000
tons the White House cites refers to munitions -- including guns and ammunition.
Pound for pound, the 380 tons of explosives are much, much more powerful. For
example, "the bomb that brought down Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland,
in 1988 used less than a pound
(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/international/middleeast/25bomb.html?oref=login&ei=5094&en=61cf6e1aa29b7871&hp=&ex=1098676800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=all&position=)
of the same type of material." By that math, the size of the explosives cache
looted would be enough to bring down 760,000 planes.
EXCUSE #4 -- THE NBC STORY: The Bush campaign spun an NBC News story in an
attempt to bolster its excuse, charging, " NBC Nightly News
(http://www.georgewbush.com/KerryMediaCenter/Read.aspx?ID=4097) later reported
that on April 10, 2003, one day after Iraq was liberated, US troops entered Al
Qaqaa and did not find the explosives." NBC News, however, resisted that
characterization. What the network actually said: "Military officials tell NBC
News that on April 10, 2003, when the Second Brigade of the 101st Airborne
entered the Al Qaqaa weapons facility, south of Baghdad, that those troops were
actually on their way to Baghdad, that they were not actively involved in the
search for any weapons
(http://mediamatters.org/static/video/msnbclive-200410260007.wmv) , including
the high explosives, HMX and RDX...And because the Al Qaqaa facility is so huge,
it's not clear that those troops from the 101st were actually anywhere near the
bunkers that reportedly contained the HMX and RDX."
REALITY -- ADMINISTRATION WAS WARNED: In a blistering op-ed in the Boston Globe,
former Ambassador Peter Galbraith describes the widespread looting of sensitive
materials in Iraq as a " preventable disaster
(http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/10/27/eyewitness_to_a_failure_in_iraq/)
." Iraq's sensitive material was stored in only a few known locations, all of
which were closely monitored by the international community. U.S. troops,
however, were not given any relevant intelligence about these sites from the
White House and there was never a plan in place to secure them after the
invasion. According to Lt. Col. Fred Wellman, spokesman for one of the first
units to reach Al Qaqaa, " orders were not given
(http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2004_10_27.html#3FE6EBD1) from higher to
search or to secure the facility or to search for [explosives]." Iraqi witnesses
to looting at Al Qaqaa also say Al Qaqaa "employees asked the Americans to
protect the site but were told this was not the soldiers' responsibility
(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/28/international/middleeast/28bomb.html?oref=login&oref=login)
." |
