Saddam had nuke program

[The_Paineful_Truth]

This from another forum:

@Jack

July 06, 2008
Disconfirmations Disconfirmed: Saddam Had Nuke Program
By Randall Hoven

Excerpt:

"The media have been telling us for years that Saddam had no WMD, so “Bush’s War”: was based on a “lie.” And those who believed Saddam did have WMD or WMD programs were delusional or worse.

But today, on July 6, 2008, the Associated Press reports that

Saddam Hussein had a nuclear program
At the Tuwaitha nuclear complex just south of Baghdad
Which included 550 metric tons (over 1.2 million pounds) of “yellowcake”, or concentrated uranium
And multiple devices that could be used in a nuclear weapon.

The AP does not say alleged nuclear program. It does not add “according to military experts.” It simply says “Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program.”

That’s pretty big news, isn’t it?

For about five years now, those of us who thought Saddam Hussein probably had at least WMD programs, if not WMD themselves, have been called not only wrong, but illogical and insane."

Here is the link to the AP story…

seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/ … ssion.html

Excerpt:

AP Exclusive: US removes uranium from Iraq
By BRIAN MURPHY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

"In a Monday June 9, 2003 file photo, UN inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) work at the nuclear facility in Tuwaitha, Iraq, 50 kms east of Baghdad. The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program - a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium - reached a Canadian port Saturday, July 5, 2008, to complete a secret U.S. operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a ship voyage crossing two oceans. (AP Photo/Saurabh Das, file)
The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program - a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium - reached a Canadian port Saturday to complete a secret U.S. operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a ship voyage crossing two oceans.

The removal of 550 metric tons of “yellowcake” - the seed material for higher-grade nuclear enrichment - was a significant step toward closing the books on Saddam’s nuclear legacy. It also brought relief to U.S. and Iraqi authorities who had worried the cache would reach insurgents or smugglers crossing to Iran to aid its nuclear ambitions.

What’s now left is the final and complicated push to clean up the remaining radioactive debris at the former Tuwaitha nuclear complex about 12 miles south of Baghdad - using teams that include Iraqi experts recently trained in the Chernobyl fallout zone in Ukraine.

“Everyone is very happy to have this safely out of Iraq,” said a senior U.S. official who outlined the nearly three-month operation to The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.

While yellowcake alone is not considered potent enough for a so-called “dirty bomb” - a conventional explosive that disperses radioactive material - it could stir widespread panic if incorporated in a blast. Yellowcake also can be enriched for use in reactors and, at higher levels, nuclear weapons using sophisticated equipment.

The Iraqi government sold the yellowcake to a Canadian uranium producer, Cameco Corp., in a transaction the official described as worth “tens of millions of dollars.” A Cameco spokesman, Lyle Krahn, declined to discuss the price, but said the yellowcake will be processed at facilities in Ontario for use in energy-producing reactors.

“We are pleased … that we have taken (the yellowcake) from a volatile region into a stable area to produce clean electricity,” he said.

The deal culminated more than a year of intense diplomatic and military initiatives - kept hushed in fear of ambushes or attacks once the convoys were under way: first carrying 3,500 barrels by road to Baghdad, then on 37 military flights to the Indian Ocean atoll of Diego Garcia and finally aboard a U.S.-flagged ship for a 8,500-mile trip to Montreal.

And, in a symbolic way, the mission linked the current attempts to stabilize Iraq with some of the high-profile claims about Saddam’s weapons capabilities in the buildup to the 2003 invasion.

Accusations that Saddam had tried to purchase more yellowcake from the African nation of Niger - and an article by a former U.S. ambassador refuting the claims - led to a wide-ranging probe into Washington leaks that reached high into the Bush administration." "

[capslockf9]

Do you know what a throw-down gun is?

[The_Paineful_Truth]

You sayin’ they planted 550 tons of radioactive evidence? I knew the Left would come up with some “explanation”, but I didn’t figure they’d try to pull this off. Even the NY Times refers to it as: “American and Iraqi officials have completed nearly the last chapter in dismantling Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program with the removal of hundreds of tons of natural uranium from the country’s main nuclear site”.

Amazing how matter-of-fact they are about something that never existed. Now all of a sudden it’s being dismantled?

[stephenstillwell]

I find no indication of the origin of this material.

There is no doubt that Saddam had a nuclear program, Israel bombed the reactor complex at Osirak in 1981.

‘‘The attack is thought by some to have delayed the Iraqi nuclear program by over a decade. Others, however, suggest that the reactor’s destruction speeded up Iraq’s program and helped spur Saddam to create the industrial-scale type effort that was uncovered by UN inspectors after Gulf War I.’’ (The Role of Preventive Strikes in Counterproliferation Strategy: Two Case Studies
Strategic Insights, Volume II, Issue 10 (October 2003) by Claire Rak)

Tons of yellow cake that had been neglected enough to significantly degrade the containers does not suggest much of a program, but it does suggest that Saddam had no reason to be looking for more of the stuff, since he had no way of processing what he already had.

This material may well have been monitored since the post GW I inspections, and deemed safer left in place.

Since the Canadians had irradiation facilities there it seems unlikely that we were unaware of this material, or that it posed a significant threat.

[Impenitent]

we ought to store the 550 tons of yellow cake uranium that iraq didn’t have in denver and have the gitmo “prisoners with equal rights” run the concession stands at the dnc convention.

-Imp

[The_Paineful_Truth]

In any case, this looks like a dead issue. Rush Limbaugh, in about the only major media coverage, answered a caller’s question about why the Republicans weren’t shouting this from the rooftops, said, because the White House wasn’t. I agree. Bush’s lack of use of the “bully pulpit” over his entire administration, is a huge mystery. I can only come up with it may be a part of his “new tone”.