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Weapon Updates - Old Political Updates
Excerpts from previous weapon updates, by subject:
Nuclear Weapons
Radiological Weapons
Chemical Weapons
Biological Weapons
Missiles
Procurement
News clips
Evidence at the United Nations
Powell's U.N. Security Council Presentation
The Post-war Weapon Search
The Iraq Survey Group
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At the end of April 2001, a top secret Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission report on the radiological bomb Iraq built and tested in 1987 was revealed in the New York Times. The report was provided to the Times by the Wisconsin Project. The Times article, citing the Wisconsin Project, concluded that the bomb did not work - the radiation levels were considered too low - but the existence of the radiological bomb program showed Iraq's intention to develop weapons of mass destruction. The Iraqi government immediately denied the report as false, and sent an official letter of denial to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, stating that while the idea of a radiological bomb had been explored, it was abandoned as "not efficacious" and because it "would cause soil contamination that it would be difficult to clean up." The letter said that no bombs were made or tested.
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In his October 2003 interim report, chief U.S. weapon inspector David Kay said that Iraq was prepared to use low-tech solutions in order to produce chemical weapons, such as stainless steel substitutes for more corrosion-resistant equipment.
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In the chemical weapon domain, U.N. inspectors found that Iraq refused to account for at least 3.9 tons of VX, the deadliest form of nerve gas, and at least 600 tons of ingredients to make it. Iraq produced the gas but had claimed it was of low quality and that all of the ingredients to make it were either destroyed or consumed during production attempts. Also missing were up to 3,000 tons of other poison gas agents that Iraq had admitted producing but said were used, destroyed or thrown away, and several hundred additional tons of agents Iraq could have produced with the 4,000 tons of missing ingredients it admitted was at its disposal. Iraq also admitted producing or possessing 500 bombs with parachutes to deliver gas or germ payloads, roughly 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas, 107,500 casings prepared for various. chemical munitions, and 31,658 filled and empty chemical munitions – all of which Iraq claimed were destroyed or lost, a fact that inspectors have been unable to verify. Many key records were also missing. These included "cookbooks" showing how Iraq operated its poison gas plants.
- In 1999, two Russian scientists were reported to be at an Iraqi pesticide plant in the al-Saklawiyah region. The two Russians appeared to be experts in the Novichok class of Russian chemical agents, a new group of weapons said to be five times as deadly as VX nerve gas. The two men were also reported to have worked under retired Russian General Anatoly Kuntsevich, the former deputy commander of the Russian Army Chemical Corps, who Russian authorities stopped from shipping CW components to Syria. While this account has not been confirmed, it suggests one of the many routes through which Iraq may seek to jumpstart its interrupted weapons programs.
- In an August 2000 report to Congress, the C.I.A said Iraq was continuing to rebuild former dual-use chemical weapon plants and missile production facilities, as well as installing or repairing necessary dual-use equipment. In January 2001, Iraq was reported to have rebuilt two factories in the Falluja complex, which produced chemical and biological agents before the Gulf War, and to have resumed the production of chlorine at a third factory. Iraq claimed one of the factories was making castor oil used in brake fluid, but castor beans also contain ricin, a biological agent. The other factory is believed to be producing pesticides and herbicides.
- In April 2001, August Hanning, the director of German intelligence (BND), was reported by the press as saying that Iraq was developing new chemical weapons and that "German companies apparently delivered important components for the production of poison gas to Iraq's Samarra plant." Iraq denied these allegations as "obnoxious lies" intended "to prolong the unjust blockade."
- In early September 2001, it was reported that at least 20 Iraqi soldiers based in the Zaafarniyah region were dead and up to 200 had been admitted to hospitals suffering from severe respiratory problems after taking part in a chemical weapons exercise around May or June. It was also reported that training did not cease with the incident, but continued with new soldiers. The same report said that during the summer, several military factories began working at almost full strength, including one near Al Qaim said to be building chemical weapons and missiles.
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The September 2002 British dossier had a lot to say about Iraq's chemical weapons. It alleged that in violation of U.N. resolutions, Iraq had continued to produce chemical agents since 1998 (without saying which agent, or where it was produced). The dossier also said that Iraq had chemical agents available for use in war that could be deployed within 45 minutes. These agents could be delivered by "artillery shells, free-fall bombs, sprayers and ballistic missiles." It also said that Iraq's military planning "specifically envisages the use of chemical and biological weapons." The dossier also alleged that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons left over from the Gulf War period, which tallies with the conclusions of U.N. inspectors, who concluded that Iraq is still hiding key parts of its chemical weapon program.
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Iraq created suspicion about its chemical weapon program in November 2002, when it ordered one million doses of atropine, mostly from Turkish suppliers, according to U.S. officials cited in the New York Times. The drug can counter the effects of nerve gas (Iraq had worked on both sarin and VX nerve gases). And the large number of doses exceeded what would be needed for normal hospital use. Iraq had reportedly already managed to buy some atropine, legally, through the oil-for-food program between late 1997 and November 2001. Firms in France, Russia and Italy signed contracts to supply more than 3.5 million ampoules, of which more than 2 million units had reportedly been delivered. Because these sales went through the U.N., they also had U.S. approval. While the doses purchased appeared suitable for medical uses, and the U.N. says no auto-injectors (devices used to administer the drug as an antidote to VX, but not for medical purposes) were purchased, the sale raised concern in light of Iraq's recent procurement attempts in Turkey. As a result, the United States tried to get atropine put on the list of goods that required U.N. approval before shipment to Iraq. Other Security Council members, notably Russia and France, may have agreed, but in turn tried to negotiate the removal of other items.
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On February 14, 2003, Hans Blix submitted closely watched status reports to the U.N. Security Council. Blix revealed that the inspectors had destroyed mustard gas-filled shells and a quantity of mustard gas precursor during the preceding weeks.
- Though the Iraqi
military did not use any chemical weapons against advancing coalition
forces in the Spring of 2003, there were rumors that chemical artillery
shells - filled with mustard gas and sarin, or other nerve agents -
had been dispersed to Iraqi troops.
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U.N. inspectors never learned the total amount of germ warfare agent that Iraq produced (anthrax, botulinum, gas gangrene, aflatoxin). The inspectors learned only that Iraq's production capacity far exceeded what it admitted producing. Iraq simply alleged that its production facilities were not run at full capacity, a claim directly contradicted by its all-out drive to mass-produce germ warfare agents. Inspectors concluded that Iraq retained at least 157 aerial bombs and 25 missile warheads filled with germ agents, spraying equipment to deliver germ agents by helicopter, and possessed enough growth media to generate three or four times the amount of anthrax it admitted producing. Iraq either claimed that these items were destroyed unilaterally, claimed they were used for civilian purposes or simply refused to explain what happened to them. Nor could the inspectors account for the results of a known project to deliver germ agents by drop tanks or account for much of the equipment Iraq used to produce germ agents. Finally, Iraq contended that many essential records of its biological weapon program, such as log books of materials purchased, lists of imported ingredients, and lists of stored ingredients, simply "cannot be found."
- According to the New York Times, a secret U.S. intelligence assessment completed in late 1998 concluded that Iraq was probably concealing the smallpox virus. The assessment was said to be based on evidence that Iraq had recently manufactured smallpox vaccine. Dr. Richard Spertzel, former head of biological inspections in Iraq, added some weight to this assessment in December 2001, pointing out that there was a smallpox outbreak in Iraq in the 1970's (just after Iraq's BW program began), from which it would have been easy to retain clinical samples.
- In August 2000, when making its semi-annual
report to Congress, the C.I.A. warned that Iraq was still developing
an unmanned aerial vehicle, converted from an Eastern European L-29
trainer jet, which the C.I.A. believed was intended to deliver chemical
or biological agents. This effort took place at the Al-Faris Factory,
located in Al-Amiriyah, Baghdad, the same site where Iraq built drop
tanks to deliver biological agents before the Gulf war. Iraq actually
deployed L-29s to an air base in November 1997 when threatened with
attack by the United States.
- In March 2001, Iraq created considerable suspicion when it wrote the U.N. Secretary General to make a case for the "renovation of the laboratories for the production of foot-and-mouth vaccine." Iraq sought approval to pay for the expense with U.N. oil-for-food monies. The laboratories in question were at the Daura site, which Iraq had admitted converting in 1990 to its secret biological weapon program. Daura, installed in 1982 by a foreign firm to make foot and mouth disease vaccine, was converted to a biological weapon site where Iraq conducted research on haemorraghic conjunctivitis, human rota virus, and camelpox, as well as enterovirus 70. Iraq also produced thousands of liters of botulinum toxin and admitted to having undertaken genetic engineering research and development there. As a result, U.N. inspectors destroyed some of its key equipment and its air handling system in 1996. Several large fermenters were left at Daura untouched, however, because the inspectors were not able to explicitly link them to use in Iraq's offensive BW program. The U.N. Security Council was divided over how to respond to Iraq's request, so the Council took no action.
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In May 2001, Iraq took over several Russian-built crop-dusting helicopters from the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization. While only about half of the original six helicopters are still airworthy, the remaining three could possibly be used to disseminate biological or chemical agents. Before the Gulf war, Iraq's Technical Research Center at Al Salman developed an aerosol generator for the dispersal of biological agents by modifying helicopter-borne disseminators for chemical insecticides.
- Iraq's anthrax program came under suspicion in the autumn of 2001, when the United States was attacked via anthrax in the mail. While never tied to Iraq, the letters raised questions about Iraq's past work on anthrax, and about any similarities or links to the strain found in the U.S. letters. What U.N. inspectors know for certain is that Iraq did not account for all the biological agents it made before the Gulf War, and that it produced anthrax on an industrial-scale and loaded it into warheads. In addition, Iraq admitted filling R-400 bombs and developing drop tanks to deliver anthrax, as well as developing and testing the so-called "Zubaidy" device for helicopter dissemination. Finally, Dr. Rihab Taha, a senior Iraqi biologist, told inspectors that one goal of the Iraqi genetic engineering team was to develop a strain of anthrax that was resistant to antibiotic treatment. Less clear is exactly how Iraq made and processed its anthrax. The New York Times reported that Iraq first processed anthrax into a "wet slurry" that it loaded into bombs and warheads. UNSCOM inspectors were monitoring Iraq's "ability to isolate micro-organisms from fermenter slurry . . . and to create particles of a size appropriate for biological warfare," among other biological capabilities, until December 1998. The Times has also reported that Iraq initially had trouble drying anthrax for dissemination as an aerosol (despite buying special nozzles to outfit crop dusters) but that Iraq learned to make high-grade dried anthrax thereafter. Dr. Spertzel confirmed that Iraq had made progress in drying anthrax; he said that instead of grinding anthrax into a fine powder, Iraq used a dryer and chemical additives. According to Dr. Spertzel, the Iraqi technique was a novel one-step process that dried the spores in the presence of aluminum-based clays or silica powders. He said inspectors destroyed one of two industrial dryers that Baghdad used in its static-free experiments, but had not managed to destroy or remove the other, which would still be available for Iraqi use. Thus, Iraq had learned how to dry anthrax and get it to a size that would allow it to be an effective weapon. Federal scientists have determined that the anthrax in the letters received in the United States came from the Ames strain, which was discovered in Iowa in 1980. The Ames strain is not the strain Iraq was known to be developing. According to Dr. Spertzel, Iraq was turned down when it tried to buy it. What Iraq is known to have procured was the Vollum strain, and it is reported to have also bought the Sterne strain and the A-3 strain from France's Institut Pasteur. However, the Ames strain is widely available, and Iraq had many procurement sources around the world.
- New concern about the Iraqi biological weapon program may have been a factor in President George W. Bush's November 2001 demand that Iraq readmit weapon inspectors, a demand that Baghdad promptly rejected. In January 2002, President Bush also singled out Iraq in his State of the Union address as part of an "axis of evil" that threatened the West. In the speech, President Bush promised to "prevent the terrorists and regimes who seek chemical, biological or nuclear weapons from threatening the United States and the world." The president cited Iraq's hostility toward America, support of terror, and its work with anthrax, nerve gas, and nuclear weapons. He also cautioned that the United States would "not . . . permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons."
- In July 2002, the Financial Times reported a second Iraqi attempt to develop an unmanned airplane. Iraq had been working on its "al-Baya" project, which would have produced drones from Czech-made aircraft. However, the factories making the drone were bombed by the United States and Britain in December 1998, and it is unknown whether any al-Bayas are still in existence.
- In late July 2002, according to the Washington Post, U.S. intelligence analysts were poring over satellite photos of the west bank of the Tigris River in Baghdad for signs of a laboratory called Tahhaddy, or "Challenge." According to Iraqi defectors and exiles cited by the Post – including the Iraqi National Congress – the lab makes biological weapons in its underground test chambers. The defectors and exiles say Tahhaddy is working on the "Blue Nile" virus, which the Post reported seemed "suspiciously like the Ebola virus." However, the United States has not been able to identify the lab's location from satellite photos.
- The September 2002 British dossier explicitly
asserted that "we know from intelligence that Iraq has continued to
produce biological warfare agents" (without
saying which agent, or where it was produced).
It also said that Iraq had the ability to design and construct the necessary
equipment, such as "fermenters, centrifuges [and] sprayer dryers." This
capability was judged sufficient to provide "self-sufficiency in the
technology required to produce biological weapons." The dossier also
mentioned three specific sites in Iraq (the Castor Oil Production Plant
at Fallujah; the al-Dawrah Foot and Mouth Disease Vaccine Institute;
the Amariyah Sera and Vaccine Plant at Abu Ghraib) that it said were
"of concern." In addition to these findings, the dossier confirmed earlier
reports that Iraq had made its biological laboratories mobile.
The dossier also said that Iraq
had chemical and biological agents available for use in war that could
be deployed within 45 minutes. These agents could be delivered by "artillery
shells, free-fall bombs, sprayers and ballistic missiles." It also said
that Iraq's military planning "specifically envisages the use of chemical
and biological weapons." It also
asserted that Saddam Hussein may have delegated authority to use chemical
and biological weapons to his son Qusai.
- Some reports suggested additional categories of biological weapons in Iraq's arsenal, including smallpox. In November 2002, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency was reported to have confirmed for the first time that it had "high" confidence that Iraq possessed smallpox. The assessment was said to be based on discoveries by the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM) and on intelligence data. Previously, suspicions about Iraqi work on smallpox were confined to the media. Then in December 2002, the CIA was reported to be looking into an informant's accusation that Iraq obtained the vaccine-resistant Aralsk strain of smallpox from a Russian scientist.
- During the last week of February 2003, Iraq reported the discovery of intact R-400 aerial bombs, including some possibly filled with germ agent, and some letters containing new information on Iraq's claimed unilateral destruction activities in the past. Hans Blix welcomed the new information but said it did not represent "full cooperation or a breakthrough," nor did it signal "evidence of a fundamental decision" to disarm.
- As they departed Iraq in December 1998, the U.N. inspectors estimated that Iraq could still possess up to nine ballistic missiles, plus imported guidance components. Iraq has argued that these missiles were secretly destroyed, but the missiles' remains could not be found in the sites where Iraq claimed it dumped them. In addition, the inspectors could not account for up to 150 tons of missile production materials, or for Iraq's stockpile of liquid rocket fuel. With U.N. permission, Iraq has continued to develop the short-range Ababil-100 solid-fuel missile and the short-range Al Samoud liquid-fuel missile under U.N. monitoring. But allowing Iraq to produce these missiles (less than 150 kilometers in range) has enabled Iraq to retain the manufacturing skill needed to produce longer-range missiles.
There is evidence that this ability is being used. In May 2000, the British press cited former UNSCOM Executive Chairman Richard Butler as reporting that – in the absence of inspectors – Iraq was increasing the range of its missiles to 375 miles. Mr. Butler also said that he had "seen evidence they have been attempting to procure missile manufacturing equipment from the West through front companies."
- Iraq's missile sites figured prominently among the targets of Operation Desert Fox, the American and British bombing campaign of December 1998. After the strikes, U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen estimated that the bombing "delayed Iraq's development of ballistic missiles by at least a year." That time, of course, has long passed. By January 2000, the media began to cite statements by U.S. officials that Iraq was rebuilding. Satellite photographs and U.S. intelligence reports revealed that Iraq had reconstructed many of the 100 military and industrial sites that the bombing had damaged or destroyed. Twelve of the sites were either missile factories or industrial plants previously used in Iraq's mass destruction weapon programs. The giant Al Taji missile complex was among those being refitted.
- Iraq has continued to test its short-range Al Samoud ballistic missile. In June 2000, it was reported to have been flight-tested for the eighth time. Iraq first tested the missile under UNSCOM supervision in 1997 and then resumed test flights in 1998. In December 2000, Iraq demonstrated the progress it had made. At the Al-Aqsa Call military parade, several short-range missiles, including the Al Samoud, Al Fath and Al Raad, were displayed, as well as jet fighters and helicopter gunships.
- In December 2000, Iraq demonstrated the progress it had made. At the Al-Aqsa Call military parade, several short-range missiles, including the Al Samoud, Al Fath and Al Raad, were displayed, as well as jet fighters and helicopter gunships.
- The uncertainty about Iraq's missile plans has led to considerable speculation. A rumor that Iraq is financing a Scud missile assembly plant in Sudan with North Korea's help has made the rounds. And Western intelligence sources were reported to have said that Iraq was negotiating with Russian firms to set up a plant for making gyroscopes, a key component of ballistic missiles. These sources say the factory is to be built south of Baghdad, though no evidence of such a plant is yet apparent.
- New interest in Iraq's missile programs was sparked in June 2001 by the revelation that Iraq continued to buy prohibited weapon components throughout the 1990s despite U.N. sanctions. An article in Commentary magazine described a series of deals to buy missile and conventional weapon components from companies in Ukraine, Belarus and Romania. The deals also included high-tech machine tools useful in building both nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Jordanian middlemen played a key role in most of the sales. Those sales included a sensitive plasma spray machine manufactured by Visoky Vacuum (Belarus) that turned up in Iraq's Badr State Establishment in 1996. Badr produced components for making Iraqi nuclear weapons before the Gulf War.
- In January 2002, the U.S. intelligence community predicted that the United States could face a ballistic missile threat from Iraq by the year 2015, making the threat from Iraq more distant than the ones predicted from Iran or North Korea. The January 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) said Iraq could try to test a missile developed from its failed Al-Abid space-launch vehicle, but would be unlikely to try such a test, because it would probably fail. The NIE predicted that Iraq would be more likely to emulate North Korea and try a three-stage rocket. The time it would take to develop an ICBM would depend on the path Iraq chose to pursue: one to two years if it bought a North Korean Taepo-Dong 2, a few years if it bought North Korean Nodongs or tried to develop its own Taepo-Dong 1 system, about five years if it managed to buy TD-2 engines, and around 10 years to develop a TD-2-type rocket indigenously. U.S. intelligence agencies judged that Iraq could flight-test a medium-range missile by 2005 and was likely to do so by 2010, unless such a missile were imported, in which case a test could occur within months of acquisition.
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In March 2002, the administration had put on a show for the U.N. Security Council in which Iraqis were revealed to be converting Russian and German trucks imported for peaceful purposes to missile components and artillery delivery vehicles. According to the Washington Post, the proof was contained in satellite photos and a video.
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The most explicit questions about the missiles Iraq was trying to develop were posed in the September 2002 British dossier. The British alleged that in 2002 Iraq had begun to develop missiles with a range of more than 1,000 km, a violation of the 150 km range permitted under U.N. resolutions. The dossier predicted that if sanctions against Iraq remained in effect, Iraq would not be able to field such a missile before 2007. Iraq had been permitted under U.N. resolutions to produce missiles with a range not exceeding 150 km, but in mid-2001, Iraq drastically increased its effort to produce engines for missiles exceeding this range, according to the dossier. The allegations also said that a shorter-range Iraqi missile, the liquid propellant al-Samoud, had been deployed to military units and that at least 50 had been produced. Iraq was also trying to extend its range to at least 200 km, another violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 687. The solid-fueled Ababil-100 missile was also being produced, with plans to extend its range as well to 200 km. As proof of its findings, the British dossier presented a photograph of a new Iraqi rocket test stand capable of testing engines with ranges exceeding 1,000 km. In addition to these shorter-range missiles, the dossier said Iraq had retained up to 20 al-Hussein missiles in breach of U.N. Security Council Resolution 687. These missiles have a range of up to 650 km and can carry conventional, chemical or biological warheads. They could reach as far as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Israel. The dossier's estimate conflicts with the estimate of U.N. inspectors, who when they left in December 1998 said that Iraq could still possess up to nine ballistic missiles, plus imported guidance components. Also unaccounted for were up to 150 tons of missile production materials and Iraq's stockpile of liquid rocket fuel.
- Blix had accused Iraq in January 2003 of testing two missiles to proscribed ranges (the Al Samoud II to 183 km and the Al-Fatah to 161 km (150 km being the legal limit)). Blix also said that Iraq had increased the diameter of the Al Samoud to 760 mm, which was greater than the 600 mm maximum permitted by a 1994 letter from the executive chairman of UNSCOM. According to Blix, both of the missiles had been deployed, though the Iraqis claimed they were only in a development stage. Iraq had made these advances by keeping its missile production lines open. Iraq had resurrected equipment that previous inspectors had attempted to destroy, and Iraq was found to have imported chemicals used for making rocket propellants, as well as test instrumentation, guidance and control systems for rockets. Iraq had also bought 380 rocket engines in violation of the military embargo.
- In February 2003, chief U.N. weapon inspector Hans Blix emphasized Iraq's missile activities. Earlier in the week, a panel of international experts had determined that Iraq's liquid-fueled Al Samoud 2 missile was in violation of U.N. resolutions. Thus, Blix announced that 380 rocket engines illegally imported for the missile were also proscribed, and so were casting chambers (formerly "rendered harmless" by UNSCOM), capable of making motors for long-range rockets. On the other hand, Blix said he needed more data to make a determination on the permissibility of the Al Fatah missile, and found that a missile test stand, while capable of testing proscribed engines, had not so far been associated with any proscribed activity. Blix has not yet said how he plans to handle the proscribed items, though he has the right to order them destroyed. .
- On February 21, 2003, Blix ordered Iraq to destroy its liquid-fueled Al Samoud II missile system because its range exceeded the limit permitted by U.N. resolutions. Also to be destroyed were some 380 illicitly imported rocket engines for the missile and some casting chambers suitable for making motors for long-range rockets. Blix ordered the destruction to begin on March 1, and Iraq obliged. Under U.N. supervision, Iraq had destroyed some 65 of the missiles before the war began, as well as two proscribed casting chambers for making missile engines, at least five proscribed rocket engines, 35 missile warheads and one rocket launcher. Blix hailed these such steps as a "very significant piece of real disarmament."
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In mid-March 2003, Iraqi officials fulfilled a promise to submit a report on Iraq's claimed unilateral destruction of VX nerve agent, though a similar report on anthrax was never provided, due to the onset of hostilities.
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In April 2003, two operational missiles marked with U.N. serial numbers were reportedly found some 90 miles outside Baghdad. Their reported length, about 25 feet, is approximately the length of the Al Samoud missile (ordered destroyed by UNMOVIC in its final days in Iraq), but the missiles have not yet been officially identified.
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In September 2002, the press revealed that Iraq had been shopping for spare parts and services for its MiG-21 military aircraft in violation of the U.N. arms embargo. The alleged sellers were Jugoimport and the Orao Company, both in the Former Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Bosnia). The companies' officers denied culpability, but the episode led to the resignations or firings of several key officials and a government takeover of the control of exports. In addition, senior government ministers in Serbia reportedly said that U.S. officials presented evidence that help with Iraqi air defense networks, surface-to-air-missile technology, and munitions was also involved.
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In October 2002, Croatian officials seized the "Boka Star," a ship bound for Iraq bearing Tonga flags and a Montenegrin crew and reportedly carrying 208 tons of nitrogen-based explosive powder used for artillery and fueling missiles. At about the same time, the U.S. government sent an aide-memoire to the Yugoslav government accusing several firms of participating in a two-year effort to develop a cruise missile for Iraq.
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In November 2002, the press reported that a Bulgarian state-run company, Terem, had sold armored personnel carriers to a middleman in Syria, possibly for delivery to Iraq, but that the shipment was intercepted. Also in November, the U.S. State Department issued a report on an investigation by a British-American team charged with looking into the alleged sale by Ukraine of advanced radars to Iraq. The report was inconclusive, but it noted that four radar units that Ukraine said it had sold to China may have been re-transferred, that the Ukrainian data on the number of radar units it produced was unverified, and that Ukrainian officials had lied about a visit in June 2001 by Iraqi scientists to the Ukrainian plant that made the radars. The report also said that U.S. and U.K. investigators had been unable to interview key people, including Leonid Derkach, Ukraine's former security service head, and Yuri Orshansky, Ukraine's former consul to Iraq. The Bush administration had already suspended its annual $55 million aid program to Ukraine in September 2002 because Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma had been caught on tape in July 2000 approving the sale of the "Kolchuga" anti-aircraft radar to Iraq. According to the New York Times, the U.S. government had at least "some indications" that the radar actually reached Iraq. Kuchma's bodyguard, who made the tape, was granted asylum by the United States and testified in court in California. According to press reports, the radar, made by the Ukrainian firm Topaz, locks on aerial targets at a range of 500 miles and is mobile. It is a "passive" radar, meaning it detects an aircraft's own emissions rather than bouncing a signal off the craft, which would alert its pilot.
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Two German businessmen, Bernd Schompeter (an employee of Alriwo GmbH) and Willi Heinz Ribbeck (formerly of Germany's Burgsmueller GmbH) were convicted on January 31, 2003 of breaking German arms export laws and violating the U.N. embargo by helping to buy cannon-boring equipment in 1999 and 2000 that wound up in Iraq. Schompeter was sentenced to five years and three months in prison; Heinz was sentenced to two years probation. The equipment can be used to make cannon tubes for Iraq's al-Fao cannon, a 209mm weapon capable of firing a 240-pound projectile 35 miles. The prosecution argued that the two men set up front companies in Jordan and used an Iraqi middleman to deliver German drills to Iraq in 1999. If convicted, each could face 15 years in jail. Five others are reportedly under investigation in connection with the case, including Sahib Abd al-Amir al-Haddad, who was arrested on November 25 in Bulgaria. Germany has requested his extradition. Schompeter also faces separate charges for allegedly selling Iraq parts for MiG fighter jets in 1997 and 1998.
- Other news about Iraq's chemical and biological efforts surfaced in December 2001, when allegations by an Iraqi defector were reported by the New York Times. According to the Times, Iraqi defector Adnan Ihsan Saeed al-Haideri told Western officials that as recently as a year previously, he had been renovating sites that he believed were part of Iraq's chemical and biological weapon programs. His company's job was to seal rooms, making them leak-proof and resistant to corrosion. He said some of the sites appeared to be hidden production and storage facilities, located behind private villas or in underground "wells" lined with lead-filled concrete. He claimed to have seen at least 20 different facilities that he judged to be WMD-related, based on their characteristics and what he was told about them, though most of the sites were not operating while he was present. The sites included a biological "clean room" (renovated in 1998) in a residential area known as Al Qrayat and a laboratory hidden under Saddam Hussein Hospital in Baghdad, from which he said he was shown biological materials. Mr. Saeed was hired by Iraq's Military Industrialization Organization (MIO) and the Al Fao company.
- In August 2002, as momentum built for military action against Saddam Hussein, confirmed reports about his mass destruction weapon programs were still scanty. There were, however, numerous rumblings in the media and by the Bush Administration to the effect that more was going on in Iraq than met the eye. On July 30, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the press that Iraq had "mobile missiles" and "mobile radars," and that it would be "reasonable" to conclude that Iraq had mobile laboratories for making biological weapons.
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In August and September 2002, Iraq began taking journalists on tours of former weapon sites in order to rebut charges that it was again in the business of making mass destruction weapons. The reporters visited sites including Daura (a former biological weapon factory, where they were shown a single destroyed building), Taji (a former germ site where they viewed one building full of baby milk and sugar), Falluja-3 (a former chemical weapon site where they saw an intact insecticide factory), Al Qaim (a former uranium extraction plant where they saw one destroyed building), Salman Pak (a former germ plant and site of a plane alleged to be for terrorist training), and Tuwaitha (a former nuclear site where they saw buildings said by the Iraqis to be for medical tests on animals, drug production, electronic drafting, and mushroom farming).
Evidence at the United Nations
- In a January
27, 2003 address before the U.N. Security Council,
Blix declared that Iraq had failed to explain what happened
to missing stocks of anthrax, weaponized VX nerve gas, and mustard
gas-filled artillery rounds. In addition, Blix noted that the inspectors
had discovered some 16 empty chemical warheads for 122 mm
rockets that had apparently not been declared. Iraq claimed it had
forgotten the warheads because they were in boxes similar to those
used for conventional warheads. Blix also reported that inspectors
had found "a laboratory quantity of ... a mustard [gas] precursor" and
a long lost document, finally turned over by the Iraqis in December,
which showed that about 6,500 chemical bombs had not been accounted
for, which he estimated would hold about 1,000 tons of poison gas.
- Before the onset of military
action on March 7, Blix filed a 173 page document claiming that Iraq
might still possess 10,000 liters of anthrax, Scud missile warheads,
and pilotless drone aircraft. The report concluded that Iraq's anthrax
and any clostridium perfringens (gas gangrene) stores would still
be viable if they had been properly stored, and that Iraq could easily
reproduce manufacturing capability equal to the scale of its pre-1991
production of anthrax and botulinum toxin. The report also revealed
that Iraq had built three new genetic engineering facilities and
had resumed research on high grade missile fuel.
- In a parallel report to
the Security Council, Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General of the
International Atomic Energy Agency, announced once again that he
had found no evidence of an active Iraqi nuclear program at sites
his teams had inspected. ElBaradei also attacked much of the evidence
presented in recent months by the American and British governments
to make the case that Iraq was actively importing items to make nuclear
arms.
- In his final report to the U.N. Security Council on June 5, 2003, chief weapon inspector Hans Blix emphasized that a number of questions regarding Iraq's disarmament remained unanswered. In more than 730 inspections covering 411 sites and 14 interviews with Iraqi officials, inspectors from the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) were unable to verify Iraqi claims that stores of chemical and biological agents, and their munitions, were unilaterally destroyed. The report detailed activities undertaken by UNMOVIC inspectors from November 27 through March 18, including: the excavation of 128 R-400 bombs (of 157 Iraq declared it had destroyed) at the Al Azziziyah firing range; soil sample analysis at the Al Hakam dump site where Iraq claims to have disposed of anthrax stores; the destruction of 50 (of 75 deployed) Al Samoud 2 missiles; the destruction of two large propellant casting chambers at the Al Mamoun site; and the destruction of 24 chemical shells and the 49 liters of mustard gas contained in them at the Muthanna State Establishment. Blix also concluded that Iraq had been less than forthcoming about who supplied its dual-use equipment, particularly equipment that "could have contributed significantly to any missile development program." For example, in its December 2002 declaration, Iraq failed to explain the origin or the actual number of Volga engines it imported for use in the banned Al Samoud 2 missile.
Powell's U.N. Security Council Presentation
On February 5, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell made a detailed case that Iraq had an active and continuing effort to produce mass destruction weapons. This evidence was used by the Bush administration as one of the justifications for going to war, though its validity has been questioned in light of the unsuccessful weapons hunt. In particular, Powell described:
- Mobile
production facilities: According to four eyewitness accounts, Iraq
has some 18 trucks and an unknown number of rail cars devoted
to biological agent production, and possibly research. Some
of these mobile
labs were manufactured as late as the summer of 2002. Each "factory" consists
of two to three trucks, meaning that the United States believes
Iraq has about seven mobile factories. These are thought capable
of making
enough dried anthrax and botulinum toxin in a month to kill thousands
of people.
- Smallpox:
Iraq has the "wherewithal to develop smallpox."
- Tareq State Establishment: A dual-use site with key sections rebuilt,
including "facilities designed specifically for Iraq's chemical
weapons program," and employing "key figures from
past programs."
- Al Musayyib: A site "used for at least three years to transship
chemical weapons from production facilities out to the field." Satellite
photos show activity there in May 2002 and a razed area (including
the removal of topsoil) in July 2002.
- Procurement: Iraq has purchased "equipment that can
filter and separate microorganisms and toxins involved in
biological weapons,
equipment that can be used to concentrate the agent, growth
media that
can be used
to continue producing anthrax and botulinum toxin, sterilization
equipment for laboratories, glass-lined reactors and specialty
pumps that can
handle corrosive chemical weapons agents and precursors,
as well as large amounts
of Thionyl Chloride, a precursor for nerve and blister agents
and other chemicals such as sodium sulfide, an important
mustard agent
precursor."
- Aluminum tubes: New details on Iraqi-required specifications include
having the tubes made to a "tolerance that far exceeds U.S. requirements
for comparable rockets," and having "an anodized coating on
extremely smooth inner and outer surfaces" unneeded
for rocket uses.
- UAVs: Iraq flight-tested a small UAV to 500 km on autopilot without
refueling on June 27, 2002
(the U.N.-imposed
limit is 150 km and Iraq
declared only an 80 km range on December 7). These
UAVs
are small enough to transport for use in foreign
countries.
- In an intercepted conversation on November 26, 2002, two senior Iraqi
officers acknowledged having a "modified vehicle" and that
they "evacuated everything" the day before inspections recommenced.
- Qusay Hussein, Saddam's son, had ordered the removal of all weapons
from the much-disputed presidential sites.
- Homes and cars of Iraqi officials were being used to hide documents
and computer hard drives.
- Rocket launchers and warheads filled with biological agents had been
hidden in palm groves and moved periodically to escape detection.
- Satellites showed the clearing of Iraqi weapon sites, including four active chemical weapon bunkers at Taji and a poison gas trans-shipment site at Al-Musayyib.
Since the end of combat operations, coalition search teams have visited hundreds of sites. Searches have uncovered mostly protective chemical suits, documents and other suspicious material that has not proved dangerous after testing.
- At the Latifiya
Explosives and Ammunition Plant Al Qaa Qaa, thousands of boxes of
white powder, initially thought to be the nerve agent antidote
atropine, turned out to be explosives.
- At an abandoned
branch of the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission near Salman Pak, Marines
discovered gas masks, chemical suits,
vats of industrial
chemicals and a map listing buildings that contained "radioactive
material." Tests revealed normal levels of radiation and chemical
contamination.
- At a military
training camp in Muhawish, east of Karbala, large amounts of chemical
protection gear and fourteen large drums
of clear liquid
were discovered. Initial reports conducted by Fox detection vehicles
indicated the presence of the nerve agents sarin and tabun and the
choking agent phosgene. Reuters reported the presence of the blister
agent lewisite
as well. However, more thorough tests by the Mobile Exploitation
Team Alpha concluded that the material was organophosphates,
which are used
in pesticides.
- Eleven large
containers were found buried at an ammunition plant near Karbala
by U.S. forces. Initial reports speculated that they
could be
the mobile chemical and biological weapons laboratories described
by Secretary of State Colin Powell during his Feb. 5 presentation
at the
United Nations. However, follow-up investigations by a team from
the 75th Exploitation Task Force found large quantities of documents,
sophisticated
dual-use biological equipment, and seven canisters of cesium, a
radioactive material, but no "smoking gun."
- At the Tuwaitha
nuclear site south of Baghdad, U.S. Marines discovered a series of
underground bunkers and laboratories, where they
recorded high-levels of radiation. Early speculation that a
secret nuclear
weapons laboratory had been discovered was quashed by more knowledgeable
follow-on
reports that Tuwaitha is the legal repository for Iraq's remaining
nuclear material, including low-enriched uranium, natural uranium
and some radioactive
isotopes and equipment.
- In an open
field near the town of Baiji, U.S. forces uncovered a number of suspicious
barrels, hidden among missiles and missile
parts.
Initial
tests on one 55-gallon drum on April 25 came back positive
for the nerve agent cyclosarin and a blister agent that could
have
been mustard
gas.
Nearby, two vans containing chemical mixing equipment and a
building with gas masks added to suspicions. However more thorough
follow-on
tests, conducted by the Mobile Exploitation Team Bravo showed
no positive results
at all. It is now believed that the barrels could contain rocket
fuel and that the vans could have been rocket fuel mixing stations.
- A tractor-trailer
painted in a military color scheme, suspected of being a mobile biological
weapons lab, was handed over
to U.S. forces
by Kurdish allies near the norther Iraq town of Tallkayf
on April 19. Under Secretary of Defense Stephen Cambone said
that
while
the equipment
found in the trailer could be used for civilian purposes,
experts have concluded that the unit itself "does not appear to perform any function
[...] beyond the production of biological agents." The trailer contained
several suspicious elements, including a fermenter, gas cylinders to
supply clean air for production and "a system to compress exhaust
gases." According to a tag on equipment in the trailer, it was manufactured
in 2002.
- U.S. forces
found a second trailer on May 9 near the al-Kindi Rocket and Missile
Research and Development Center near
Mosul. Though stripped
by looters, this trailer resembles the first and contains
similar equipment: a 2,000 liter vessel believed to be
a fermenter,
a 5,000 pounds-per-square-inch
compressor, a small feed tank, a 3,000 liter water tank
and a refrigeration unit. According to a tag on equipment in
the trailer,
it was manufactured
in 2003.
- On May 28,
the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency
released their six-page assessment
of the trailers, calling
them the "strongest evidence to date that Iraq was hiding a biological
weapons program." According to the report, each mobile production
unit could brew enough germ agent to produce (with further processing)
one or two kilograms of dried agent each month. But the report also conceded
that no pathogens were found in the equipment and that a technical assessment "would
not lead you intuitively and logically to biological warfare." Nevertheless,
the report concludes that coalition experts were "unable to identify
any legitimate industrial use" for the trailers, and that the production
of biological weapons agent "is the only consistent, logical purpose
for these vehicles." (For additional details about these mobile
units, see the complete report: Iraqi mobile biological warfare agent
production plants.)
- A number of
reports disputing the C.I.A.'s assessment of the trailers have emerged.
According to the New
York Times, the State
Department's
intelligence bureau wrote a classified memorandum
to Secretary Powell on June 2, in which it objected to
the report's
conclusions that
the trailers had no other purpose than to produce
biological weapons. According
to an unnamed British weapons expert quoted in the
Observer, an official British investigation into the trailers
has
concluded that they were
meant to produce hydrogen rather than germ weapons.
David Kay's interim findings concede that "the origin
of and intended use for the two trailers ... has yielded
a number of explanations."
- Mahdi Shukur Ubaydi, a scientist who headed Iraq's centrifuge uranium enrichment program before 1991, turned over gas centrifuge parts and design plans to U.S. forces in Baghdad in early June. In an interview with CNN, Ubaydi said he hid these items in his garden in 1991, under orders from Qusay Hussein. He also said that other scientists had been asked to hide similar types of equipment as well.
Early news reports suggested that the search effort had not been given resources commensurate with its stated importance. The 75th Exploitation Task Force was the first group deployed to search for weapons in Iraq. Its teams were reportedly plagued with problems during their tenure: they were understaffed, lacked the ability to move quickly around the country, and were often diverted to tasks unrelated to the weapons search. Worse still, in many instances sites discovered by U.S. forces were not properly secured pending the arrival of expert teams, which led to looting and the destruction of potential evidence. The hunt for banned weapons was boosted with the deployment of the Iraq Survey Group (ISG) in June 2003. The ISG was initially led by Maj. Gen. Keith Dayton and guided by former U.N. chief nuclear inspector David Kay.
- In October 2003,
Kay delivered a progress report on the Iraq
Survey
Group's hunt for banned weapons.
Kay's admission
that no stocks of mass destruction weapons had been found in Iraq
reinforced allegations that the Bush administration exaggerated the
threat posed
by Saddam Hussein. However, Kay, who testified at several closed-door
Congressional hearings about the weapon search, insisted that his
teams were "not yet at the point where we can say definitively
... that such weapon stocks do not exist." Rather, he argued,
his findings should be taken "in the context of an ongoing investigation." Kay
announced that the search effort would continue, and that its goals
would be to shut down Iraq's procurement network, to compare what
was found
in Iraq to what prewar intelligence predicted would be there, and
to ensure that no part of Iraq's remaining unconventional arsenal
was used
inside or outside the country. Kay estimated that the search would
take an additional six to nine months to complete, and Congress reportedly
approved $700 million for the effort.
- In January 2004,
Kay stepped down as the head of U.S. weapon inspectors in Iraq.
One of Kay's reasons for leaving the ISG was the diversion of elements
of his staff to counterinsurgency efforts. However, Kay said he never
felt pressured by the Bush administration to shape his reports, nor
did he dispute conclusions about Iraqi weapons made by government officials
on the basis of existing intelligence. Rather, Kay cited failures
in prewar intelligence by U.S. and foreign agencies as having misled
the Clinton and Bush administrations into thinking that Iraq still
had illicit weapons.
- In an interview with the New York Times in January, Kay said U.S. intelligence efforts were severely limited by the lack of American spies on the ground and over-dependence on inspectors at the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM). He went so far as to say that data from the inspectors "was like crack cocaine for the CIA" and that the quality of information fell after inspectors withdrew in 1998. He also said that U.S. intelligence was oblivious to the corrupt and delusional state of Saddam Hussein's control over Iraq's unconventional weapon programs in the late 1990s. By this time, Iraqi scientists could obtain large amounts of money from Hussein for ambitious projects that went nowhere, and then use the money for other purposes. Kay also said that Iraq abandoned its weapon programs because of concern over U.N. inspections and fear of the disclosures made after the defection of Hussein Kamel, Hussein's son-in-law, who had helped run the programs.