Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

CIA warns Iraqi insurgents trying to fashion chemical weapons

What goes around....

George Galloway writes: "If there were a genuine accounting for the many crimes committed in Iraq, it would be a trial not seen since Nuremberg. It would involve those who sold Saddam the gas he used at Halabja; those who encouraged him to invade Iran when its revolution threatened to sweep away the corrupt kings and puppet presidents of Arabia propped up and profited from by the west; those, like Donald Rumsfeld, who twice visited Saddam during that war to help him target the terrible weapons the west had sold him; and those whose hands are covered with the blood of all those buried in the biggest of all the mass graves in Iraq - slaughtered by sanctions. We who saw and cried out about this slaughter were traduced as fabricators; and later, when it could no longer be denied, as 'mouthpieces', 'apologists' or even 'paid agents' of Saddam."
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At the same time that the U.S. government had knowledge of that the Iraqi military was using chemical weapons, it was providing intelligence and planning assistance to the Iraqi armed forces. (Patrick Tyler, "Officers Say U.S. Aided Iraq In War Despite Use Of Gas," New York Times, Aug. 18, 2002, p. 1.)

When Iraq used chemical weapons in March 1988 against Halabja, there was no condemnation from Washington. (Dilip Hiro, " which at least 50,000 and possibly 100,000," The Observer, September 1, 2002, p. 17.) "In September 1988, the House of Representatives voted 388 to 16 in favor of economic sanctions against Iraq, but the White House succeeded in having the Senate water down the proposal. In exchange for Export-Import Bank credits, Iraq merely had to promise not to use chemical weapons again, with agricultural credits exempted even from this limited requirement." (Rubin, "The United States and Iraq: From Appeasement to War," p. 261.)]
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-Am

CIA warns Iraqi insurgents trying to fashion chemical weapons

WASHINGTON (AFP) Apr 26, 2005
Insurgents engaged in a guerrilla campaign against US forces and the new government in Iraq are making a concerted effort to gain chemical weapons capability and have already used old Iraqi chemical munitions in their attacks, the top US weapons investigator warned Monday.

Charles Duelfer, head of a CIA-led expert team that unsuccessfully searched for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in the aftermath of the March 2003 US-led invasion of the country, said the danger that rebels could gain the know-how for manufacturing crude chemical devices "remains an important concern."

The warning is contained in a final installment of last year's report by the Iraq Survey Group, which concluded that alleged massive stockpiles of Iraqi chemical and biological weapons used by the administration of President George W. Bush to justify the war simply did not exist.

The addendum reaffirms that conclusion, with Duelfer pointing out that the investigation "has gone as far as feasible" and the reservoir of available data about Baghdad's weapons programs "has been exhausted."

But for the first time, the group showcases evidence that insurgents are trying to set up chemical weapons laboratories with the help of Iraqi scientists who worked for the Saddam Hussein regime, and that on at least two occasions used chemical munitions remaining from the 1980s Iran-Iraq war in attacks against coalition forces.

According to the report, the assailants most likely "did not know the rounds contained CW agent because the rounds were not marked to indicate they contained" it.

During one of these attacks, a round containing mustard gas was used as part of an improvised explosive device outside Abu Ghurayb barracks on May 2, 2004, the document said.

The agent, Duelfer noted, was old and "degraded to such an extent to be ineffective." Nevertheless, the rebels were taking specific steps to come up with a new and more potent arsenal.

"There are multiple reports of Iraqis with general chemical and biological expertise helping insurgents to produce chemical and biological agents," warned the weapons investigator.

The CIA was aware of one unnamed Iraqi scientist associated with the country's pre-Gulf War weapons of mass destruction program assisting guerrillas while another was involved in clandestine attempts to produce chemical mortar munitions, according to the report.

In addition, a string of underground chemical laboratories allied with Sunni extremists known as the Al Abud network was found in and around Baghdad.



http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050426034654.10eft6iq.html