Posted on 04/21/2004 7:35:16 PM PDT by Anti-Bubba182
Syria and the WMD Shell Game
April 21, 2004
Since the day the first American soldier stepped across the Kuwait-Iraq border in March 2003, everyone who supported the removal of Saddam Hussein from power has been under a relentless attack from the Left. Led by the "mainstream" media, the attack began on the very first day, at the very first CENTCOM briefing, and has continued like a relentless mosquito whining to this day. Despite the fact that every intelligence service in the world agreed, members of the US government agreed, the United Nations agreed and Iraqi officials admitted that Iraq had created weapons of mass destruction and never provided any proof that they had been destroyed, the Left has been using "where's the WMDs?" as an attack against President Bush. Every time a plausible reason for not stumbling across warehouses full of gleaming ICBMs and vats of glowing green gunk marked "DANGER! WMD" right away was offered, the Left ignored it. They refuse to consider, even today, that Saddam may have hidden, moved or destroyed his arsenal, though it became clear months before the war in Iraq began that the Coalition was serious about forcing Saddam to comply with all those violated UN resolutions (including the 1991 cease-fire with the US). When those on the Left ask where Saddam's WMDs are, they don't actually want to know... they just want an excuse to bash Bush and claim that he "lied".
Every time evidence of illegal weapons (like the ricin in north Iraq) or dual-use material (like the so-called "pesticide" in south Iraq) was discovered, the Left brushed it off. Even Dr. David Kay's reports of Iraq's undisclosed WMD research (including Brucella and Congo Crimean Hemorrhagic Fever) could not penetrate their intransigence. They demanded that President Bush quickly produce huge stockpiles of WMDs or be branded a liar. Note that the kind of stockpile the Left demanded as evidence of Saddam's non-compliance would have been impossible to hide even from the bumbling Hans Blix. As Paul Leventhal testified before the Senate in March 2000, "he was in charge when the IAEA totally missed Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program before the Gulf War and accepted unsubstantiated Iraqi disarmament claims after the war." The Left ignored Hans Blix's background. The Left ignored every piece of evidence that Saddam had ever had WMDs. The Left has ignored everything that justified the Iraq war so far, because a just war doesn't fit their predetermined position. (You know the position: Bush is evil, he's controlled by Halliburton, aliens and/or Israel, Iraq was all about oil, world imperialism and/or personal revenge, etc.)
Well, this may prove a little harder for them to ignore.
An al-Qaeda cell linked to Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi (currently hiding out in Iraq), recently planned to set off simultaneous chemical weapon attacks in Jordan which might have killed up to 20,000 people. It might have been the worst terrorist attack ever, had it not been foiled by Jordanian officials before the plot could be carried out. One of the attack points was to have been the US embassy in Amman; the rest were public and government buildings. Where did these would-be bombers come from? Where did they get their chemical weapons? According to Jordan... from our old friend, Syria. But how did Syria get chemical weapons?
During the last few months leading up to the Iraq war, some of Saddam's arsenal of WMDs was apparently being shipped across the Syrian border for safe-keeping. The Israelis believed that the bulk of it kept going, to be buried in Lebanon's Beka'a Valley, under Hezbollah control.
Now, our intelligence sources can disclose exclusively that the relocation of Iraq’s WMD systems took place between January 10 and March 10 and was completed just 10 days before the US-led offensive was launched against Iraq. The banned arsenal, hauled in giant tankers from Iraq to Syria and from there to the Bekaa Valley under Syrian special forces and military intelligence escort, was discharged into pits 6-8 meters across and 25-35 meters deep dug by Syrian army engineers. They were sealed and planted over with new seedlings. Nonetheless, their location is known and detectable with the right instruments. Our sources have learned that Syria was paid about $35 million to make Saddam Hussein’s forbidden weapons disappear.
The first part of this report matches what David Kay learned after spending several months in Iraq searching for the whereabouts of Saddam's arsenal. "We are not talking about a large stockpile of weapons," he said. "But we know from some of the interrogations of former Iraqi officials that a lot of material went to Syria before the war, including some components of Saddam's WMD programme. Precisely what went to Syria, and what has happened to it, is a major issue that needs to be resolved." The report was further corroborated by CIA satellite photos showing fleets of trucks moving from Iraq to Syria during February and March 2003. A Syrian journalist named Nizar Nayuf defected to the West in January 2004. He claimed to know of three locations in Syria where Saddam's WMDs were buried in February 2003.
US officials have repeatedly warned Syria that their covert support of the terrorists in Iraq will not be tolerated. Syria has consistently worked against the Coalition and against the formation of a new democracy in Iraq. They provided safe haven for former members of Saddam's regime and have probably been hiding Saddam's WMD arsenal all along. If Bashar Assad has allowed terrorists to acquire some of it, things will go very badly for him... and in the very near future.
The problem is, such a discovery will be when it will be.
Of course we may never know if the Jordanians sit on this.
In spite of King Abdullah's belief that President Asad of Syria did not know about the attack, the Jordanians do know the trucks came through Syria. If I were King there is no way I could ignore that fact or the consequences had the attack been successful.
Any government could fairly regard this action as an act of war.
Nah. These guys could ignore the elephant in the bedroom. There are none so blind as those who will not see.
Amen!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.