Americans overwhelmingly believe U.S. and coalition
forces have found NO weapons of mass destruction.
(WMD) Weapons of Mass Destruction Found in Iraq
1.77 metric tons of enriched uranium
1,500 gallons of chemical weapons agents
Chemical warheads containing cyclosarin (a nerve agent five times more deadly than sarin
gas)
Over 1,000 radioactive materials in powdered form meant for dispersal over populated areas
This is only a PARTIAL LIST of the weapons verified to have been recovered in Iraq to
date.
The question is: WHY do they believe this lie?
Turn on the TV at any given moment, and you're likely to see some earnest media
"expert" telling you that there was no link between Al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein,
and that Iraq is another Vietnam. None of it is true. Richard Miniter explains why these
and other popular media statements are not only wrong, but severely damaging to our war
effort, in Disinformation: The Media Myths That Undermine the War on Terror. Book Here
UN inspectors
say, "Saddam shipped out WMD before the war and after."
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.
"It's being exported," Perricos said after the briefing. "It's being traded
out. And there is a large variety of scrap metal from very new to very old, and slowly, it
seems the country is depleted of metal."
"The removal of these materials from Iraq raises concerns with regard to
proliferation risks," Perricos told the council. Perricos also reported that
inspectors found Iraqi WMD and missile components shipped abroad that still contained UN
inspection tags.
He said the Iraqi facilities were dismantled and sent both to Europe and around the Middle
East. at the rate of about 1,000 tons of metal a month. Destionations included Jordan, the
Netherlands and Turkey.
Tuesday, August 26, 2003 : Report: U.S suspects Iraqi WMD in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley
The Baghdad missile site contained a range of WMD and dual-use components, UN officials
said. They included missile components, reactor vessel and fermenters – the latter
required for the production of chemical and biological warheads.
"It raises the question of what happened to the dual-use equipment, where is it now
and what is it being used for," Ewen Buchanan, Perricos's spokesman, said. "You
can make all kinds of pharmaceutical and medicinal products with a fermenter. You can also
use it to breed anthrax."
The UNMOVIC report said Iraqi missiles were dismantled and exported to such countries as
Jordan, the Netherlands and Turkey. In the Dutch city of Rotterdam, an SA-2 surface-to-air
missile, one of at least 12, was discovered in a junk yard, replete with UN tags. In
Jordan, UN inspectors found 20 SA-2 engines as well as components for solid-fuel for
missiles.
"The problem for us is that we don't know what may have passed through these yards
and other yards elsewhere," Buchanan said. "We can't really assess the
significance and don't know the full extent of activity that could be going on there or
with others of Iraq's neighbors."
UN inspectors have assessed that the SA-2 and the short-range Al Samoud surface-to-surface
missile were shipped abroad by agents of the Saddam regime. Buchanan said UNMOVIC plans to
inspect other sites, including in Turkey.
In April, International Atomic Energy Agency director-general Mohammed El Baradei said
material from Iraqi nuclear facilities were being smuggled out of the country. |
