I'm loving this "Germany and France could be concealing evidence" hokum. It's brightening my day.
Don't forget that Donald Rumsfeld sold Saddam all those bio-agents Scottyboy. And that the people who have been doing all the concealment of who-sold-what-to-who, (which would have implicated .fr .de .uk as well as the US) is the United States. After all, why did they strip that bit of the Iraqi declaration out?
1. One true statement does not make lies true. Bush fabricated IAEA reports as ultimate justification for war. They have lied about sat. photos (al farat construction). There are so many it's just crazy. Just because the admin says one thing that is true doesn't mean that the IAEA report existed! How could it?!?!?!
2. That story about the bodyguard seems to only have been picked up in Australia and they don't seem to give any indication of source.
Lets try a different tack since you all seem to be searching for something that exists, yet can't be seen. Yes, he proabably does have some sort of WoMD, but doesn't seem to be inclined to play with them. To all you pre-emptively happy boys out there, lets repeat again:
He doesn't seem inclined to play with them.
Let play a counting game:
1.) Where's Bin Laden? Conservative Israeli papers have him running around the Saudi Arabian desert.
2.) What's up with Qatar? Home of Al Zazeera, Bin Laden's Hollyqood style agents and recent home of a military coup begun by pan-arabic sympathizers. Stratfor could not confirm an Al Qaeda link. And the coup de grace, for the news disabled:
[quote]Mr. Powell withheld some critical details [from his speech] today, like the discovery by the intelligence agencies that a member of the royal family in Qatar, an important ally providing air bases and a command headquarters for the American military, operated a safe house for Mr. Zarqawi when he transited the country going in and out of Afghanistan.
The Qatari royal family member was Abdul Karim al-Thani, the coalition official said. The official added that Mr. al-Thani provided Qatari passports and more than $1 million in a special bank account to finance the network.
Mr. al-Thani, who has no government position, is, according to officials in the gulf, a deeply religious member of the royal family who has provided charitable support for militant causes for years and has denied knowing that his contributions went toward terrorist operations.<hr></blockquote>source: NYTimes
4. What's up with Pakistan? Now how do you think the North Koreans got all that nuclear technology.
5. What's up with Saddam. He's a bad bad man, but boy those ties to Al Qaeda sure are tenuous.
Now play threat assessment and politics, and post:
A.) Which is the biggest threat to the US right now.
its not as if they are trying to get the Nobel in Lit.
The issue becomes: how accurate was the original research?</strong><hr></blockquote>
No. The issue is that sources are questionable. Why does everything have to be spelled out to the letter on Appleinsider? It's really sad. For the future: even if you don't agree, just demonstrate a slight degree of competency by understanding why it was posted instead of just arguing to argue.
I really don't mean to be rude, but the frequency of this is getting really pitiful. It's very indicative of the degree to which people read and digest before posting here.
You don't get it . . . . its a government report, they say "sources say" and then they take from some published, or unpublished piece of crap, and paste it in . . . . the only point is that they have a 'source'
that's supposed to imply, however false, a notion of some kind of legitimacy.
That's teh way people think: if it has 'sources' to site, real written down documents then it is legit..
Now, how they treat the said source material is not a matter of wether or not it was plagiarized, chances are it will be, they are government writers and they could care less about the style, coherence or etc, all they want to do is convey the information that they gleened from their source, its rather, a matter of how well the source is researched: did this grad student get an A . . . .
... if they forget to put quotes around it, tant pis!!!
Of course they don't want to say who their source is: "it might jeopardize sensitive information"
which means, in this case, it might show how desperate they are, how far they will cast their nets, and, how feeble their sources are . . . meaning that they, ultimatley, would jeopardize their 'sensitive' argument.
Now, just because I differ on the value of your 'plagairism link' doesn't mean that I don't find it interesting . . . I just think that discounting the information because of the hackneyed cut and paste manner of its acquisition misses its purely pragmatic aims
so don't get all huffy, buddy . . . especially when, for the most part, I agree with your position
I originally posted the link because I thought it was a good example of how far the Bush administration is willing to go to make war. I mean, I guess technically you're right, sources do say so, but it just means that they know their sources aren't valid so we shouldn't care what their sources say.
I could say "Saddam doesn't have WOMD." Now if some newspaper decided to run an article "proving" that Saddam didn't have WOMD citing anonymous sources (my quote) then I'd hope everyone would realize how worthless that newspaper would be: as worthless as the data coming from the Bush administration.
But don't think I am discounting information. It's just important for people to learn not to blindly take information at face value.
The one point we seem to differ on is the ethics of what they did. Typically it would be somewhat benign, but altering it to make it seem more sinister demonstrates further how wording is used by these politicians to help sell the war. Of course, that is common knowledge, but many here in AppleInsider, and apparently throughout America, seem to have forgotten that following Sept. 11.
So Powell's speech is now under fire. This is just the beginning of what I will be posting about it.
About the alleged 'chemical weapons factory'
[quote]The facility, which was discovered to be near the small hamlet of Sargatt – not Khurmal, as Powell had stated – was visited by Western journalists on February 8. The reporters found no obvious signs of a chemical weapons production facility. Ansar commanders said the site had been used as a radio and television studio. A BBC correspondent described the visit: “We were shown radio and TV studios which had obviously been there for some time. But they did not look as though they had been used recently. Other buildings in the compound had apparently been used as residential premises and hastily abandoned because of fears of an imminent American air or missile strike. At the back of a row of buildings there was one drum which had originally contained plastic-related chemicals but it was empty. The Ansar said it had been used to store fuel. … If the site had been used for producing or experimenting in chemical or biological weapons, there was no obvious sign that that is still the case.” The Ansar commanders also contested Powell's statements alleging that their organization had links to al-Qaeda and the Baghdad government. A man named Ayoub Hawleri told the AP he had never heard of Abu Musab Zarqawi. “The first time I even heard of al-Zarqawi was on television,” he claimed. [BBC 2/9/03; AP 2/8/03]
Allegation. Describing a photo of the al-Rafah weapons site, Powell said, “As part of this effort, another little piece of evidence, Iraq has built an engine test stand that is larger than anything it has ever had. Notice the dramatic difference in size between the test stand on the left, the old one, and the new one on the right. Note the large exhaust vent. This is where the flame from the engine comes out. The exhaust vent on the right test stand is five times longer than the one on the left. The one of the left is used for short-range missiles. The one on the right is clearly intended for long-range missiles that can fly 1,200 kilometers.” [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03]
...Criticism. The AP reported, “But the U.N. missile experts have reported inspecting al-Rafah at least five times since inspections resumed Nov. 27, have studied the specifications of the new test stand, regularly monitor tests at the installation, and thus far have reported no concerns.” [Associated Press 2/7/03] Similarly, Reuters quoted Ali Jassem, an Iraqi official, who explained that the large stand referred to in Powell’s presentation was not yet in operation and that its larger size was due to the fact that it was designed to test engines horizontally. [Reuters 2/7/03]
02. Removing items from various sites.
Allegation. Powell showed the UN Security Council satellite shots depicting what he said were chemical weapons bunkers and convoys of Iraqi cargo trucks preparing to transport ballistic missile components from a weapons site just two days before inspections. Powell said: “We saw this kind of housecleaning at close to 30 sites … We must ask ourselves: Why would Iraq suddenly move equipment of this nature before inspections if they were anxious to demonstrate what they had or did not have?” [Washington Post 2/6/03]
...Criticism. Reported the AP: “An incredulous site director, Karim Jabar Youssef, said such shipments of parts and finished missiles were an everyday occurrence at the Rasheed Co. site. ‘On any day there would be constant activity, so any day Colin Powell can claim there is intense activity here,’ Youssef said. Besides, he noted, U.N. inspectors have visited al-Musayyib 10 times since November. The short-range Fatah missiles there, legal under U.N. resolutions, bore U.N. inventory stickers. Inspectors have not reported any violations at the site.”
03. Iraqis appeared to have scraped away topsoil.
Allegation. The Washington Post summarized: “In one series of photos taken last spring and summer, Iraqis appeared to have scraped away a layer of topsoil from what was described as a transshipment point near Al Moussaid chemical complex -- a move intended to eliminate evidence that might be discovered later by inspectors.” [Washington Post 2/6/03h]
...Criticism. The act of scraping topsoil does not necessarily imply the act of eliminating evidence.
04. Removal of truck and guard.
Allegation. The Washington Post summarized: “[A] weapons bunker near the town of al-Taji appeared to have been furnished with a special guard station and a decontamination truck. In a later photo of the same facility -- taken on Dec. 22, when U.N. inspections were well underway -- the decontamination truck and guard had disappeared.” [Washington Post 2/6/03h; see also Washington Post, 2/6/03]
...Criticism. Powell did not explain how he knew the truck in the photograph was a ‘decontamination truck’. The subsequent disappearing of a truck and a guard does not necessarily imply covering up of illegal activities.
(i) Colin Powell said that U.S. intelligence had “first-hand descriptions” of mobile biological weapons factories mounted on trucks and railroad cars. He said that there were some 18 vehicles in all configured as such. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; New York Times 2/6/03; New York Times 2/6/03; Reuters 2/8/02]
(ii) Information about the mobile weapons labs were based on the testimonies of at lease 4 human sources [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d] including an Iraqi chemical engineer. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; New York Times 2/6/03]
(iii) According to Colin Powell, the mobile units are capable of producing enough dry biological agent in a single month to kill several thousands people [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d]
(iv) Two weeks before Powell’s presentation to the UN Security Council, U.S.A. Today reported that U.S. Intelligence had photos of tractor-trailers configured with unusually large roof-mounted air vents, which according to the Bush administration, indicated possible mobile biological weapons labs. [USA Today 1/20/03] These photos, however, were not shown to the UN. Instead Powell displayed computer-generated sketches of the alleged labs based on descriptions from unnamed sources. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post, 2/6/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d; New York Times, 2/6/03b] The Times of London described the pictures as “childlike graphic of lorries laden with fiendish-looking tanks and tubes.” [Times, 2/6/03]
(v) Colin Powell said that during the late 1990s, Iraq’s biological weapons scientists would often begin the production of pathogens on Thursday nights and complete the process on Fridays in order to evade UNSCOM inspectors whom Iraq believed would not conduct inspections on the Muslim holy day [Washington Post 2/5/03d] But Raymond Zilinskas, a microbiologist and former U.N. weapons inspector, challenged this account, arguing that significant amounts of pathogens such as anthrax, could not be produced in such a short span of time. He said, “You normally would require 36 to 48 hours just to do the fermentation … The short processing time seems suspicious to me.” He also explained: “The only reason you would have mobile labs is to avoid inspectors, because everything about them is difficult. We know it is possible to build them -- the United States developed mobile production plants, including one designed for an airplane -- but it's a big hassle. That's why this strikes me as a bit far-fetched.” [Washington Post 2/5/03d]
(b) Criticisms
(i) Prior to Colin Powell’s presentation, Hans Blix had dismissed suggestions that the Iraqis were using mobile biological weapons labs. He explained that he had already examined two alleged mobile labs and discovered nothing. “Two food-testing trucks have been inspected and nothing has been found,” Blix said. [Guardian 2/5/03]
(ii) Sources were not named and no pictures were provided [Pitt 2/6/03] in spite of USA Today having reported earlier that U.S. intelligence allegedly had such pictures. [USA Today 1/20/03]
(iii) Scott Ritter, a former Marine intelligence officer and chief weapons inspector, speaking to an audience in the United Arab Emirates, contended that no evidence existed to back this claim. He said, “These labs exist purely in the minds of inspectors. We hypothesized their existence. There is no information to say they ever existed. We made them up. But they have taken on a life of their own.” [Reuters 2/8/02]
(c) Observations
(i) The Washington Post noted, “The mobile labs were the highlight of a presentation on biological weapons that otherwise yielded little new information.” [Washington Post 2/5/03d]
Oh, honestly, why do we do this over and over again?
Bush is the bad guy : Saddam is a good guy?!
Saddam is the root fo all evil: Bush is our savior?
Don't even try to tell me that Saddam is without a lot of these weapons. But don't tell me that he has been indesputably collaborating with Al Qaeda and crap like that. The man uses these weapons to hold power. Why can't we have some levity? Hopelss. No wonder we're all ****ed.
More info on the tubes (from before powell's speech, making them all the more important):
[quote]After weeks of investigation, U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq are increasingly confident that the aluminum tubes were never meant for enriching uranium, according to officials familiar with the inspection process. … New evidence supporting that conclusion has been gathered in recent weeks and will be presented to the U.N. Security Council ….The quantity and specifications of the tubes -- narrow, silver cylinders measuring 81 millimeters in diameter and about a meter in length -- made them ill-suited to enrich uranium without extensive modification, the experts said. But they are a perfect fit for a well-documented 81mm conventional rocket program in place for two decades. Iraq imported the same aluminum tubes for rockets in the 1980s. The new tubes it tried to purchase actually bear an inscription that includes the word ‘rocket,’ according to one official who examined them. <hr></blockquote>
So the US is supplying false info to the inspectors.
[quote]So frustrated have the inspectors become that one source has referred to the U.S. intelligence they've been getting as "garbage after garbage after garbage." In fact, Phillips says the source used another cruder word. <hr></blockquote>
some examples include: [quote]
Example: satellite photographs purporting to show new research buildings at Iraqi nuclear sites. When the U.N. went into the new buildings they found "nothing."
Example: Saddam's presidential palaces, where the inspectors went with specific coordinates supplied by the U.S. on where to look for incriminating evidence. Again, they found "nothing."
Example: Interviews with scientists about the aluminum tubes the U.S. says Iraq has imported for enriching uranium, but which the Iraqis say are for making rockets. Given the size and specification of the tubes, the U.N. calls the "Iraqi alibi air tight."
[Example:] Discovering that the al-Samoud 2 has been flying too far in tests has been one of the inspectors' major successes. But the missile has only been exceeding its 93-mile limit by about 15 miles and that, the Iraqis say, is because it isn't yet loaded down with its guidance system. The al-Samoud 2 is not the 800-mile-plus range missile that Secretary of State Colin Powell insists Iraq is developing
Comments
Don't forget that Donald Rumsfeld sold Saddam all those bio-agents Scottyboy. And that the people who have been doing all the concealment of who-sold-what-to-who, (which would have implicated .fr .de .uk as well as the US) is the United States. After all, why did they strip that bit of the Iraqi declaration out?
1. One true statement does not make lies true. Bush fabricated IAEA reports as ultimate justification for war. They have lied about sat. photos (al farat construction). There are so many it's just crazy. Just because the admin says one thing that is true doesn't mean that the IAEA report existed! How could it?!?!?!
2. That story about the bodyguard seems to only have been picked up in Australia and they don't seem to give any indication of source.
He doesn't seem inclined to play with them.
Let play a counting game:
1.) Where's Bin Laden? Conservative Israeli papers have him running around the Saudi Arabian desert.
2.) What's up with Qatar? Home of Al Zazeera, Bin Laden's Hollyqood style agents and recent home of a military coup begun by pan-arabic sympathizers. Stratfor could not confirm an Al Qaeda link. And the coup de grace, for the news disabled:
[quote]Mr. Powell withheld some critical details [from his speech] today, like the discovery by the intelligence agencies that a member of the royal family in Qatar, an important ally providing air bases and a command headquarters for the American military, operated a safe house for Mr. Zarqawi when he transited the country going in and out of Afghanistan.
The Qatari royal family member was Abdul Karim al-Thani, the coalition official said. The official added that Mr. al-Thani provided Qatari passports and more than $1 million in a special bank account to finance the network.
Mr. al-Thani, who has no government position, is, according to officials in the gulf, a deeply religious member of the royal family who has provided charitable support for militant causes for years and has denied knowing that his contributions went toward terrorist operations.<hr></blockquote>source: NYTimes
4. What's up with Pakistan? Now how do you think the North Koreans got all that nuclear technology.
5. What's up with Saddam. He's a bad bad man, but boy those ties to Al Qaeda sure are tenuous.
Now play threat assessment and politics, and post:
A.) Which is the biggest threat to the US right now.
and
B.) Whose ass will be the easiest to kick.
Bet A != B
its not as if they are trying to get the Nobel in Lit.
The issue becomes: how accurate was the original research?
<strong>it's a source . . . so what?
its not as if they are trying to get the Nobel in Lit.
The issue becomes: how accurate was the original research?</strong><hr></blockquote>
No. The issue is that sources are questionable. Why does everything have to be spelled out to the letter on Appleinsider? It's really sad. For the future: even if you don't agree, just demonstrate a slight degree of competency by understanding why it was posted instead of just arguing to argue.
I really don't mean to be rude, but the frequency of this is getting really pitiful. It's very indicative of the degree to which people read and digest before posting here.
[ 02-06-2003: Message edited by: giant ]</p>
You don't get it . . . . its a government report, they say "sources say" and then they take from some published, or unpublished piece of crap, and paste it in . . . . the only point is that they have a 'source'
that's supposed to imply, however false, a notion of some kind of legitimacy.
That's teh way people think: if it has 'sources' to site, real written down documents then it is legit..
Now, how they treat the said source material is not a matter of wether or not it was plagiarized, chances are it will be, they are government writers and they could care less about the style, coherence or etc, all they want to do is convey the information that they gleened from their source, its rather, a matter of how well the source is researched: did this grad student get an A . . . .
... if they forget to put quotes around it, tant pis!!!
Of course they don't want to say who their source is: "it might jeopardize sensitive information"
which means, in this case, it might show how desperate they are, how far they will cast their nets, and, how feeble their sources are . . . meaning that they, ultimatley, would jeopardize their 'sensitive' argument.
Now, just because I differ on the value of your 'plagairism link' doesn't mean that I don't find it interesting . . . I just think that discounting the information because of the hackneyed cut and paste manner of its acquisition misses its purely pragmatic aims
so don't get all huffy, buddy . . . especially when, for the most part, I agree with your position
I could say "Saddam doesn't have WOMD." Now if some newspaper decided to run an article "proving" that Saddam didn't have WOMD citing anonymous sources (my quote) then I'd hope everyone would realize how worthless that newspaper would be: as worthless as the data coming from the Bush administration.
You say it better than I did.
But don't think I am discounting information. It's just important for people to learn not to blindly take information at face value.
The one point we seem to differ on is the ethics of what they did. Typically it would be somewhat benign, but altering it to make it seem more sinister demonstrates further how wording is used by these politicians to help sell the war. Of course, that is common knowledge, but many here in AppleInsider, and apparently throughout America, seem to have forgotten that following Sept. 11.
[ 02-06-2003: Message edited by: giant ]</p>
About the alleged 'chemical weapons factory'
[quote]The facility, which was discovered to be near the small hamlet of Sargatt – not Khurmal, as Powell had stated – was visited by Western journalists on February 8. The reporters found no obvious signs of a chemical weapons production facility. Ansar commanders said the site had been used as a radio and television studio. A BBC correspondent described the visit: “We were shown radio and TV studios which had obviously been there for some time. But they did not look as though they had been used recently. Other buildings in the compound had apparently been used as residential premises and hastily abandoned because of fears of an imminent American air or missile strike. At the back of a row of buildings there was one drum which had originally contained plastic-related chemicals but it was empty. The Ansar said it had been used to store fuel. … If the site had been used for producing or experimenting in chemical or biological weapons, there was no obvious sign that that is still the case.” The Ansar commanders also contested Powell's statements alleging that their organization had links to al-Qaeda and the Baghdad government. A man named Ayoub Hawleri told the AP he had never heard of Abu Musab Zarqawi. “The first time I even heard of al-Zarqawi was on television,” he claimed. [BBC 2/9/03; AP 2/8/03]
<hr></blockquote>
[ 02-10-2003: Message edited by: giant ]</p>
[quote]Al Rafah Site
Allegation. Describing a photo of the al-Rafah weapons site, Powell said, “As part of this effort, another little piece of evidence, Iraq has built an engine test stand that is larger than anything it has ever had. Notice the dramatic difference in size between the test stand on the left, the old one, and the new one on the right. Note the large exhaust vent. This is where the flame from the engine comes out. The exhaust vent on the right test stand is five times longer than the one on the left. The one of the left is used for short-range missiles. The one on the right is clearly intended for long-range missiles that can fly 1,200 kilometers.” [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03]
...Criticism. The AP reported, “But the U.N. missile experts have reported inspecting al-Rafah at least five times since inspections resumed Nov. 27, have studied the specifications of the new test stand, regularly monitor tests at the installation, and thus far have reported no concerns.” [Associated Press 2/7/03] Similarly, Reuters quoted Ali Jassem, an Iraqi official, who explained that the large stand referred to in Powell’s presentation was not yet in operation and that its larger size was due to the fact that it was designed to test engines horizontally. [Reuters 2/7/03]
02. Removing items from various sites.
Allegation. Powell showed the UN Security Council satellite shots depicting what he said were chemical weapons bunkers and convoys of Iraqi cargo trucks preparing to transport ballistic missile components from a weapons site just two days before inspections. Powell said: “We saw this kind of housecleaning at close to 30 sites … We must ask ourselves: Why would Iraq suddenly move equipment of this nature before inspections if they were anxious to demonstrate what they had or did not have?” [Washington Post 2/6/03]
...Criticism. Reported the AP: “An incredulous site director, Karim Jabar Youssef, said such shipments of parts and finished missiles were an everyday occurrence at the Rasheed Co. site. ‘On any day there would be constant activity, so any day Colin Powell can claim there is intense activity here,’ Youssef said. Besides, he noted, U.N. inspectors have visited al-Musayyib 10 times since November. The short-range Fatah missiles there, legal under U.N. resolutions, bore U.N. inventory stickers. Inspectors have not reported any violations at the site.”
03. Iraqis appeared to have scraped away topsoil.
Allegation. The Washington Post summarized: “In one series of photos taken last spring and summer, Iraqis appeared to have scraped away a layer of topsoil from what was described as a transshipment point near Al Moussaid chemical complex -- a move intended to eliminate evidence that might be discovered later by inspectors.” [Washington Post 2/6/03h]
...Criticism. The act of scraping topsoil does not necessarily imply the act of eliminating evidence.
04. Removal of truck and guard.
Allegation. The Washington Post summarized: “[A] weapons bunker near the town of al-Taji appeared to have been furnished with a special guard station and a decontamination truck. In a later photo of the same facility -- taken on Dec. 22, when U.N. inspections were well underway -- the decontamination truck and guard had disappeared.” [Washington Post 2/6/03h; see also Washington Post, 2/6/03]
...Criticism. Powell did not explain how he knew the truck in the photograph was a ‘decontamination truck’. The subsequent disappearing of a truck and a guard does not necessarily imply covering up of illegal activities.
<hr></blockquote>
[ 02-10-2003: Message edited by: giant ]</p>
[quote]Mobile biological weapons facilities.
(a) Evidence.
(i) Colin Powell said that U.S. intelligence had “first-hand descriptions” of mobile biological weapons factories mounted on trucks and railroad cars. He said that there were some 18 vehicles in all configured as such. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; New York Times 2/6/03; New York Times 2/6/03; Reuters 2/8/02]
(ii) Information about the mobile weapons labs were based on the testimonies of at lease 4 human sources [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d] including an Iraqi chemical engineer. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; New York Times 2/6/03]
(iii) According to Colin Powell, the mobile units are capable of producing enough dry biological agent in a single month to kill several thousands people [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d]
(iv) Two weeks before Powell’s presentation to the UN Security Council, U.S.A. Today reported that U.S. Intelligence had photos of tractor-trailers configured with unusually large roof-mounted air vents, which according to the Bush administration, indicated possible mobile biological weapons labs. [USA Today 1/20/03] These photos, however, were not shown to the UN. Instead Powell displayed computer-generated sketches of the alleged labs based on descriptions from unnamed sources. [U.S. Secretary of State 2/5/03; Washington Post, 2/6/03; Washington Post 2/5/03d; New York Times, 2/6/03b] The Times of London described the pictures as “childlike graphic of lorries laden with fiendish-looking tanks and tubes.” [Times, 2/6/03]
(v) Colin Powell said that during the late 1990s, Iraq’s biological weapons scientists would often begin the production of pathogens on Thursday nights and complete the process on Fridays in order to evade UNSCOM inspectors whom Iraq believed would not conduct inspections on the Muslim holy day [Washington Post 2/5/03d] But Raymond Zilinskas, a microbiologist and former U.N. weapons inspector, challenged this account, arguing that significant amounts of pathogens such as anthrax, could not be produced in such a short span of time. He said, “You normally would require 36 to 48 hours just to do the fermentation … The short processing time seems suspicious to me.” He also explained: “The only reason you would have mobile labs is to avoid inspectors, because everything about them is difficult. We know it is possible to build them -- the United States developed mobile production plants, including one designed for an airplane -- but it's a big hassle. That's why this strikes me as a bit far-fetched.” [Washington Post 2/5/03d]
(b) Criticisms
(i) Prior to Colin Powell’s presentation, Hans Blix had dismissed suggestions that the Iraqis were using mobile biological weapons labs. He explained that he had already examined two alleged mobile labs and discovered nothing. “Two food-testing trucks have been inspected and nothing has been found,” Blix said. [Guardian 2/5/03]
(ii) Sources were not named and no pictures were provided [Pitt 2/6/03] in spite of USA Today having reported earlier that U.S. intelligence allegedly had such pictures. [USA Today 1/20/03]
(iii) Scott Ritter, a former Marine intelligence officer and chief weapons inspector, speaking to an audience in the United Arab Emirates, contended that no evidence existed to back this claim. He said, “These labs exist purely in the minds of inspectors. We hypothesized their existence. There is no information to say they ever existed. We made them up. But they have taken on a life of their own.” [Reuters 2/8/02]
(c) Observations
(i) The Washington Post noted, “The mobile labs were the highlight of a presentation on biological weapons that otherwise yielded little new information.” [Washington Post 2/5/03d]
<hr></blockquote>
Bush is the bad guy : Saddam is a good guy?!
Saddam is the root fo all evil: Bush is our savior?
Don't even try to tell me that Saddam is without a lot of these weapons. But don't tell me that he has been indesputably collaborating with Al Qaeda and crap like that. The man uses these weapons to hold power. Why can't we have some levity? Hopelss. No wonder we're all ****ed.
[quote]After weeks of investigation, U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq are increasingly confident that the aluminum tubes were never meant for enriching uranium, according to officials familiar with the inspection process. … New evidence supporting that conclusion has been gathered in recent weeks and will be presented to the U.N. Security Council ….The quantity and specifications of the tubes -- narrow, silver cylinders measuring 81 millimeters in diameter and about a meter in length -- made them ill-suited to enrich uranium without extensive modification, the experts said. But they are a perfect fit for a well-documented 81mm conventional rocket program in place for two decades. Iraq imported the same aluminum tubes for rockets in the 1980s. The new tubes it tried to purchase actually bear an inscription that includes the word ‘rocket,’ according to one official who examined them. <hr></blockquote>
Washington Post 1.24.3 from lexis-nexis
[quote]So frustrated have the inspectors become that one source has referred to the U.S. intelligence they've been getting as "garbage after garbage after garbage." In fact, Phillips says the source used another cruder word. <hr></blockquote>
some examples include: [quote]
Example: satellite photographs purporting to show new research buildings at Iraqi nuclear sites. When the U.N. went into the new buildings they found "nothing."
Example: Saddam's presidential palaces, where the inspectors went with specific coordinates supplied by the U.S. on where to look for incriminating evidence. Again, they found "nothing."
Example: Interviews with scientists about the aluminum tubes the U.S. says Iraq has imported for enriching uranium, but which the Iraqis say are for making rockets. Given the size and specification of the tubes, the U.N. calls the "Iraqi alibi air tight."
[Example:] Discovering that the al-Samoud 2 has been flying too far in tests has been one of the inspectors' major successes. But the missile has only been exceeding its 93-mile limit by about 15 miles and that, the Iraqis say, is because it isn't yet loaded down with its guidance system. The al-Samoud 2 is not the 800-mile-plus range missile that Secretary of State Colin Powell insists Iraq is developing
<hr></blockquote>
from <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/01/18/iraq/main537096.shtml"; target="_blank">cbsnews.com</a>
[ 02-21-2003: Message edited by: giant ]</p>
<a href="http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/022303A.htm"; target="_blank">http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/022303A.htm</a>;
<strong>Inspectors now complaining that US intelligence sending them on "wild goose chases".
<a href="http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/022303A.htm"; target="_blank">http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/022303A.htm</a></strong><hr></blockquote>;
deja vu.
If they say anything in favor of a liberal position, it is a lie.
Saddam is breaking the terms of the 1991 Gulf War cease-fire, therefore hostilities AUTOMATICALLY resume.
Screw the pacifists (they like it).
"Hi, I'm from the Iraqi government. I'd like to order some aluminum tubes."
"What size, sir?"
"Well, I really need some that are 79 mm, with the following specs." Hands paper to supplier.
"Sir, these specs are for enriching uranium. I can't sell you these."
"Can you meet all the same specs, except make them 81 mm and market as rocket bodies?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good. We'll just grind them down to 79mm after the Inspectors leave."
"Cash or charge, sir?"
"Do you take oil?"