Iraq Unloading WMD Into Syria.

Originally posted by Jakomo

On October 7, 2002, Bush said, "Iraq has trained al Qaida in bomb making, poisons, and deadly gas."

Your right, its a whopper because its true. Lets look at the interviews with the foiled attackers of the Jordanian Intelligence Headquarters.

At least one of the al-Qaida plotters arrested in Jordan earlier this month as part of a weapons of mass destruction plot that Jordanian officials say could have killed 80,000 people revealed on Monday that he was trained in Iraq before the U.S. invaded in March 2003.

In a confession broadcast on Jordanian television, the unnamed WMD conspirator revealed: "In Iraq, I started training in explosives and poisons. I gave my complete obedience to [Abu Musab al] Zarqawi," the al-Qaida WMD specialist whose base of operations was in Iraq.

So I guess that would indicate that the above quote would be true would it not? I mean really how can you disagree with an action that would have limited such training from taking place. Do you desire to see 20-80 thousand Jordanians dead?

Agent47:

"So I guess that would indicate that the above quote would be true would it not? I mean really how can you disagree with an action that would have limited such training from taking place. Do you desire to see 20-80 thousand Jordanians dead? "

Oh yeah, I take "unnamed conspirators" word over anybody else's. Obviously this is the truth. I mean, look at the byline.

Oh wait, no byline. Nobody put their name on this article. Well I'm sure that's not important, it's gotta be a reputable news agency wire that they took it from, right?

Nope, not Reuter's, not Associated Press, nothing. All Newsmax (maybe from some help from their excellent unbiased reporters like Sean Hannity and Michael Savage, hahaha).

Al Qaeda denied the Jordan plot. Wanna try again, agent?

news.bbc.co.uk...

""[Reports] that there was a chemical bomb to kill thousands of people is a mere lie," the taped voice says.

"If we had such a bomb - and we ask God that we have such a bomb soon - we would not hesitate for a moment to strike Israeli towns, such as Eilat, Tel Aviv and others."

The Jordanian intelligence lied twice... to protect their masters and sponsors from the Jews and Christians

'Zarqawi' tape
The voice says the Jordanian authorities fabricated the story in order to create a smokescreen to hide "the sordid face of the Jordanian intelligence services". "

Jordan Airs al-Qaida Suspects' Confessions,

Al Qaida Confessions

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) - State television aired a videotape of four men admitting they were part of an al-Qaida plot.

Notice that the Guardian story was picked up from the AP

Phoenix: Yeah, actually quite a few newswires picked it up, I wanted to see if Agent would bother to look.

They still deny it though.

news.bbc.co.uk...

"The voice says the Jordanian authorities fabricated the story in order to create a smokescreen to hide "the sordid face of the Jordanian intelligence services".

He said the bomb was intended was made of primary substances available on the market - but it was intended not to harm ordinary people but to destroy the "Jordanian Mossad", referring to Israel's spy service"

Well I think Phoenix put that issue to rest.

Now back to the facts.

On Dec. 24, 2002, nearly three months before fighting in Iraq began, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon accused Saddam Hussein's regime of transferring key materials for his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs to Syria in convoys of 18-wheel trucks to hide them from U.N. weapons inspectors. Before talking about this on Israeli television, Sharon gave detailed information to the Bush White House on what Israel knew and what it suspected.

In May 2003, just as major combat operations in Iraq were winding down, new reports surfaced in Israel, this time alleging that convoys of Iraqi water tankers carrying WMD components crossed the border into Syria repeatedly between Jan. 10 and March 10. The tankers reportedly were met by Syrian special forces and escorted to the heroin poppy fields of a Syrian-controlled area in Lebanon's Bek�a Valley, where their contents were dumped into specially prepared pits and buried. Again, INR discounted the reports, U.S. officials tell Insight.

Reports of Iraqi WMD winding up in Syria were not just coming from the Israelis. In October 2003, retired Air Force Lt. Gen. James Clapper, head of the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, revealed that vehicle traffic photographed by U.S. spy satellites indicated that material and documents related to Saddam's forbidden WMD programs had been shipped to Syria before the war. It was no surprise that the United States and its allies had not found stockpiles of forbidden weapons in Iraq, Clapper told a breakfast briefing given to reporters in Washington. "Those below the senior leadership saw what was coming, and I think they went to extraordinary lengths to dispose of the evidence," he said.

"We have had six or seven credible reports of Iraqi weapons being moved into Syria before the war," a senior administration official tells Insight. "In every case, the U.S. intelligence community sought to discount or discredit those reports."

Lets keep this short and sweet.

"We have had six or seven credible reports
"In May 2003, just as major combat operations in Iraq were winding down, new reports surfaced in Israel, this time alleging that convoys of Iraqi water tankers carrying WMD components crossed the border into Syria repeatedly between Jan. 10 and March 10. The tankers reportedly were met by Syrian special forces and escorted to the heroin poppy fields of a Syrian-controlled area in Lebanon's Bek�a Valley, where their contents were dumped into specially prepared pits and buried.
"In October 2003, retired Air Force Lt. Gen. James Clapper, head of the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, revealed that vehicle traffic photographed by U.S. spy satellites indicated that material and documents related to Saddam's forbidden WMD programs had been shipped to Syria before the war.

Well then, just another brick in the wall if you ask me. Another credible individual with expertise in the field of intelligence has come forward and echoed the evidence that several news articles and photographs have indicated. Syria has a stockpile of WMD in the Bekaa Valley, Syrian special forces helped transfer them, and the WMD was transferred from Iraq.

We have captured terrorists testifying to their training in Iraq, we have captured WMD from these terrorists, and the WMD was the same materials that went missing shortly before the weapons inspections started.

Short of taking you to Bekaa and showing you the WMD what more would someone need to draw the conclusion that this event did indeed happen? People believe much more outlandish claims on so much less evidence.

David Kay even stated that there was a transfer of weapons. And I will remind you that Gen. Clapper is not some disgruntled ex Iraqi. Once again the facts speek for themselves.

Link

[Edited on 26-5-2004 by Agent47]

they have the WMDS AND THE STATE DEPARTMENT is giving them an ultimatum hand them over by october,

they are the same bath party as saddam-iraq to the west the same brutal regimen that kills their own people,my friends who escaped from syria tell me that

While telling foreign press that Syria's democratic movement is an accepted opposition, once again Bashar Assads actions show a different story.

Syria has told leaders of unofficial Kurdish parties that the state will no longer tolerate their activities.
Military intelligence officials summoned three leaders to tell them the news on Wednesday, according to a statement by a human rights activist.

If they do not cease, they were told they would be treated as if they were members of other "banned" parties.

Wait I thought this was a country ran by a reformer? Wasnt Bashar Assad western educated? Oh I forgot, he only interned at a Western hospital for a year. Didnt Bashar state in foreign interviews that democratic dialogue was welcome in Syria? Oh I forgot, that was censored in Syrian papers.

Although granted this new post does not relate to WMD, it does relate to the various claims of Bashar's moderate leanings which as has been shown time and time again, are non existent.

Well his old man taught him well. Who really knows who has what?
WITH BLACK MARKETS and bad guys w/ bucks tis only a matter of time till they get some...if they dont already have em

the truth isnt anything, it just is.....reagardless if it come from cnn, ap, fox or reuters....but most wont see what it is cause we are blinded by so much B.S.



i BELIEVE THEY HAVE EM....BUT ARE TRYING TO FIGURE A WAY TO GET THEM IN THE U.S.

In the continuing debate over Syria's alledged transfer of WMD, those opposed to the idea have brought the weight of weapons inspectors to bear, but only David Kay and Hans Blix.

There are other experts in the field, and lets look at ones testimony in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Richard Butler, who served as the chief United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq from 1997 to 1999, said Syria has played a major role in Iraqi oil smuggling. Butler said the revenues earned from Iraqi oil smuggling through Syria have financed Baghdad's military programs.

"Syria has increasingly been a willing participant in Saddam's breaking of the sanctions and running a black market in oil and so on." Butler said.

"And so they have given comfort to him in financial terms. And a good deal of the money that he raises that way outside of the UN escrow account and oil-for-food and so on of course fuels his military and other activities."

Link

This echoes the previous articles that suggested members of Bashar Assads family have been supplying Iraq with millions of bullets and equipment caches in return for funds from the now defunct oil for food program.

Now lets dig a little deeper into Mr. Butlers testimony.

When asked on Australias Datine about Iraqs missing WMD Mr. Butler said

But I think what we are seeing now is the very strong possibility that towards the end, just before the war began, Iraq either began to destroy those weapons or moved them out possibly to Syria.

Now granted he did suggest the weapons could have been destroyed, Mr. Butler has also said that during his years as a weapon inspector he witnessed suspicous materials being transfered from Iraq to Syria. Syria has clearly violated international law and has strong ties with the former regime.

Link

Blah blah blah, none have been found or probably ever will be. It's "faith-based intelligence".

The evidence was ironclad enough to justify a military invasion, apparently, but not ironclad enough to actually be able to FIND once the country was invaded.

And again, this "evidence" is spotty at best.

As to the referenced article in the last post:

MARK DAVIS: I mean, this is the incredible point, I suppose. We've just invaded a country, we've killed thousands of people and, despicable as Saddam Hussein may have been, he was probably telling the truth.

RICHARD BUTLER: We need to know that, that's what I'm saying. It could well be that at that point, immediately prior to the war when they lodged their 12,000 page document, that we may discover they were telling the truth in the sense that at that time they did destroy those extant weapons. We need to know what the facts are to know whether the weapons of mass destruction justification for the invasion was real or not. It's very, very important. We have four people---the US has four key people in custody now---General Saddi, General Rashid, Tariq Aziz and Dr Germ, Rihab Taha. They know exactly what the facts are. We need to know what they're saying. We need to know on what basis they're being interrogated. We need the truth about those weapons, Iraq's programs, did they give them to terrorists, for example, as has sometimes been claimed. We need the truth behind an invasion and occupation by the United States, and its friends, of Iraq.

Again, we have him saying "we need the truth" because what we've got (probably from BOTH sides) is not the truth.

We DON'T have him saying that Saddam still had WMDs, we have him saying we don't know and someone in the administration, after all this time and with all these high-ranking Ba'ath party flunkies incarcerated, should tell us the truth.

If there was ANY evidence of WMD's (physical not journalistic), the US would be plastering it EVERYWHERE because it would justify the invasion. So far nothing, because that's what evidence they had in the first place, they just spun it like some sort of SuperDredel.



Oh and to underscore the spinnin, here's some good quotes:

Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.

Dick Cheney August 26, 2002

Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons.

George W. Bush September 12, 2002

We know for a fact that there are weapons there.

Ari Fleischer January 9, 2003

We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons the dictator tells us he does not have.

George Bush February 8, 2003

Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.

George Bush March 18, 2003

Well, there is no question that we have evidence and information that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical particularly . . . all this will be made clear in the course of the operation, for whatever duration it takes.

Ari Fleisher March 21, 2003

One of our top objectives is to find and destroy the WMD. There are a number of sites.

Pentagon Spokeswoman Victoria Clark March 22, 2003

We know where they are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.

Donald Rumsfeld March 30, 2003

Given time, given the number of prisoners now that we're interrogating, I'm confident that we're going to find weapons of mass destruction.

Gen. Richard Myers,
Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff May 26, 2003

[edit on 11-6-2004 by Jakomo]

Now granted he did suggest the weapons could have been destroyed, Mr. Butler has also said that during his years as a weapon inspector he witnessed suspicous materials being transfered from Iraq to Syria. Syria has clearly violated international law and has strong ties with the former regime.

While I believe that the most "valuable" WMD went to Syria, there is mounting evidence of weapons destruction as Mr Butler suggests.

"U.N. Experts Find 20 Engines Used in Banned Iraqi Missiles in Jordan Scrapyards"

ap.tbo.com..." target="_blank" class="postlink">AP Story

During last week's visit to Jordan, Perricos told the council that U.N. experts visited "relevant scrapyards" with the full cooperation of Jordanian authorities and discovered 20 SA-2 missile engines.

The U.N. team also discovered some processing equipment with U.N. tags - which show it was being monitored - including heat exchangers, and a solid propellant mixer bowl to make missile fuel, he said. It also discovered "a large number of other processing equipment without tags, in very good condition."

"These visits provide just a snapshot of the whole picture since the scrap metal has a short residence time and is re-exported to various countries," Perricos told the council.

In its quarterly report to the council on Monday, the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission which Perricos heads, said a number of sites in Iraq known to have contained equipment and material that could be used to produce banned weapons and long-range missiles have been cleaned out or destroyed.

Omigod more "dual use" equipment.


So, let me get this straight. It's not important at this point whether the WMD's are ACTUAL WMD's, they can be unassembled components that could technically be put together for a delivery system for a WMD.

Or piles of dusty scrap metal? Missiles ENGINES, but not missiles or warheads?


And this is used to justify the thousands of deaths that have come about because of this war? Wow try again.

do they even have to have a BB gun to be attacked? All we do is think--then we move in,, glad we are the police of the world. The bad guys must be much worse.

this isnt all credible information enough to be doing the wrong things america does. ill bet they just flooded syria like mice that didnt even explain why they were there when iraq got taken over, how dirty of those countries to just let passerbys go with weapons and hopes of using its people the same way they are. against america. i bet these guys cant even put together a full wmd. like they said before they prob just have parts/scraps etc.
if they actually had them and used the opportunity to come here. which they probably already are because theyve got cells planted through our country. but probably no wmds. just cells. how long would it take for them to actually devise a plan that will cause such an amount of effective damage? what will they aim for? public events? schools? can they really map all this out without getting caught before something goes ''off.?''

And still more stories of the WMD being shipped out of Iraq both before and during the war just to cause consternation to those that vehemenetly deny the existence of Iraqs WMD even to the point of turning around and finding it stuck up their a..h.....'s!

UN inspectors: Saddam shipped out WMD before war and after

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Friday, June 11, 2004

The United Nations has determined that Saddam Hussein shipped weapons of mass destruction components as well as medium-range ballistic missiles before, during and after the U.S.-led war against Iraq in 2003.

The UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission briefed the Security Council on new findings that could help trace the whereabouts of Saddam's missile and WMD program.

The briefing contained satellite photographs that demonstrated the speed with which Saddam dismantled his missile and WMD sites before and during the war. Council members were shown photographs of a ballistic missile site outside Baghdad in May 2003, and then saw a satellite image of the same location in February 2004, in which facilities had disappeared.

Short of an all expense paid trip to see this equipment for yourselves I think some here would only believe Saddam had WMD about .5 microseconds before it killed them, but then it would be to late to claim it must have been something else.

www.worldtribune.com..." target="_blank" class="postlink">Link

Yeah Jak, I'm still hearing ya'.....

Friday, June 11, 2004
The United Nations has determined that Saddam Hussein shipped weapons of mass destruction components as well as medium-range ballistic missiles before, during and after the U.S.-led war against Iraq in 2003.

The UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission briefed the Security Council on new findings that could help trace the whereabouts of Saddam's missile and WMD program.

The briefing contained satellite photographs that demonstrated the speed with which Saddam dismantled his missile and WMD sites before and during the war. Council members were shown photographs of a ballistic missile site outside Baghdad in May 2003, and then saw a satellite image of the same location in February 2004, in which facilities had disappeared.

UNMOVIC acting executive chairman Demetrius Perricos told the council on June 9 that "the only controls at the borders are for the weight of the scrap metal, and to check whether there are any explosive or radioactive materials within the scrap," Middle East Newsline reported.

UN inspectors: Saddam shipped out WMD before war and after

Oh look, and this just in from May of this year from UNMOVIC:
The UN Did Have WMDs
Btw, need a number to call UNMOVIC yourself, try this one: 212-963-3022. Be nice, be polite....

Hey, whats even more interesting is that Saddam, nor Iraq, never declared any 155mm binary artillery shells...but that finding is squashed, as is this latest information from UNMOVIC will undoubtedly be.....
The 'negative' press continue to harp as Mr. Kay harps now..."we were all wrong"....
I wonder if he is current reading or has read the latest from UNMOVIC? HAs he retracted his statement yet concerning where the WMDs were moved to yet?

....."but there were no WMDs in Iraq".....



seekerof

Originally posted by Seekerof
UN inspectors: Saddam shipped out WMD before war and after

Oh look, and this just in from May of this year from UNMOVIC:
The UN Did Have WMDs
Btw, need a number to call UNMOVIC yourself, try this one: 212-963-3022. Be nice, be polite....

Hey, whats even more interesting is that Saddam, nor Iraq, never declared any 155mm binary artillery shells...but that finding is squashed, as is this latest information from UNMOVIC will undoubtedly be.....
The 'negative' press continue to harp as Mr. Kay harps now..."we were all wrong"....
I wonder if he is current reading or has read the latest from UNMOVIC? HAs he retracted his statement yet concerning where the WMDs were moved to yet?

....."but there were no WMDs in Iraq".....

seekerof

I am really trying to make sense of what you just said, but I haven't been able to do so.

What I have noted though is that:

1. You have cited the World Tribune yet again. The World Tribune is not a reliable source of information, and it is neither global nor "tribunal". It is the fish that the right wing propaganda version of John West rejects because it smells too funny to be used for discerning diners. Most of whom would not go the John West path either.

2. The PDF of the UN security report doesn't support what you were saying. It says they concluded nothing before they were booted out of Iraq because they found nothing. And I am not sure why you linked it as "UN had WMDs", it sounds like it is the UN who seek to aggressively attack sovereign nations rather than the US?????

3. Did you not support the initial Kay report and back the man's credibility to the hilt? Why have you turned so, against the poor guy?



Anyway, another day in the office at ATS. GIGO.

We can see the date on a quarter using satellite, but we can't see WMD on the move between countries? And that is with known technology that is not classified, not to mention what kind of technology we have that is highly classified. Ok. What is wrong with this picture?

Before you try, don�t say that Saddam did it before and after the war. We get our intel from somewhere and of course satellite is one of them. We wouldn�t go blind into a country without conducting major surveillance for quite some time beforehand and I'm sure keeping an eye on it from then on going forward.

So my question is, did we know all along that Syria had Saddam's WMD and invade them anyway or has, behind closed doors, Syria pissed us off recently and now its time for them to pay?

Exploring all angles.

[edit on 11-6-2004 by NeedTruth]

The problem with satellites is they cannot see the quarter inside the truck with a tarpaulin over it, only well placed intelligence operatives can get that kind of info. Saddams secret police were good at ferreting out traitors and spies so it was not likely that we had "eyes" present during the transport of the WMD to Syria.

It is also like fear itself.....we just dont know......some people like to know......till you look .......and look some more.....youll never know..


If the U.S. govt spends billions and billions[ think sagan saying it]....on the war on drugs...and drugs still get through..what makes you think billon dollar satilites will spot all......and no one ever dug a tunnel over there ..right?...


when we get nuked we will know.....