Iraq Weapons Looting - NYT Is Two Years Too Late On This Story

[Stephanie]

Proof that DU is about two years ahead of MSM on most stories.

We noted in 1993 the logical inconsistency of Bush invading Iraq in search of WMD, yet failing to guard or inspect the nuclear facilities there. If you are looking for WMD, isn't that the first place you'd look?



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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/13/international/middleeast/13loot.html?hp&ex=1110690000&en=18e0f2e2d3ce7f37&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Looting at Weapons Plants Was Systematic, Iraqi Says
By JAMES GLANZ and WILLIAM J. BROAD

Published: March 13, 2005

AGHDAD, Iraq, March 12 - In the weeks after Baghdad fell in April 2003, looters systematically dismantled and removed tons of machinery from Saddam Hussein's most important weapons installations, including some with high-precision equipment capable of making parts for nuclear arms, a senior Iraqi official said this week in the government's first extensive comments on the looting.

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"They came in with the cranes and the lorries, and they depleted the whole sites," Dr. Araji said. "They knew what they were doing; they knew what they want. This was sophisticated looting."

The threat posed by these types of facilities was cited by the Bush administration as a reason for invading Iraq, but the installations were left largely unguarded by allied forces in the chaotic months after the invasion.

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This article is from an old DU thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=63025



http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/6068775.htm

Looting of Iraqi nuclear facility indicts U.S. goals
If we feared the loss of radioactive materials, why not guard them?
TRUDY RUBIN
Knight Ridder Newspapers
Posted on Thu, Jun. 12, 2003

TUWAITHA, Iraq - On a dusty road, just outside of Baghdad, lies one of the great mysteries of the Iraq war.

<snip> The administration knew full well what was stored at Tuwaitha. So how is it possible that the U.S. military failed to secure the nuclear facility until weeks after the war started? This left looters free to ransack the barrels, dump their contents, and sell them to villagers for storage.

How is it possible that, according to Iraqi nuclear scientists, looters are still stealing radioactive isotopes?

The Tuwaitha story makes a mockery of the administration's vaunted concern with weapons of mass destruction. The U.S. military hastened to secure the Ministry of Oil in Baghdad from looters. But Iraq's main nuclear facility was apparently not important enough to get similar protection.

<snip>And why, in facilities other than Location C, is the looting apparently continuing?

Hisham Abdel Malik, a Iraqi nuclear scientist who lives near Tuwaitha and has been inside the complex, told me that in buildings "where there are radioactive isotopes, there is looting every day." He says the isotopes, which are in bright silver containers, "are sold in the black market or kept in homes." According to IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming, such radioactive sources can kill on contact or pollute whole neighborhoods.

How could an administration that had hyped the danger of Saddam handing off nuclear materials to terrorists let Tuwaitha be looted? Maybe the hype was just hype ... or maybe the Pentagon didn't send enough troops to Iraq to do the job right.

Either answer is damning.<more>

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[TomClash]

1. Come on!

They only had three letters wrong. It wasn't W-M-D. It was O-I-L.

[nostamj]

2. but, you forgot POLAND!

uh, I mean the OIL Ministry.

besides, those who know the unknown knowns know it was the same old WMD technology over and over again anyway.

VASES FOR SALE!

/sarcasm

[punpirate]

3. In the case of the Times...

... it might have been that the administration knew that the UNSCOM and IAEA inspectors were right, but Judith Miller was too busy bossing generals around to support the administration's view instead of writing the real story.

When it gets down to the Times not doing its job of reporting, this one comes straight down to Judith Miller and her editors seeking to make the administration look good, instead of telling the truth.

[Octafish]

4. The Times works for the same people who make money off war.

Keeping America in the dark is their business.

In the 80s, the NYT turds covered up El Mozote.

Death is awin-win for their interests.

May they all rot...


PS: Thanks for a great post and thread, Stephanie!