Posted on 10/25/2004 6:26:01 PM PDT by Timeout
KERRY SPOT
Jim Miklaszewski of NBC News pretty much dismantled the New York Times attack on behalf of Kerry today.
NBC News: Miklaszewski: “April 10, 2003, only three weeks into the war, NBC News was embedded with troops from the Army's 101st Airborne as they temporarily take over the Al Qakaa weapons installation south of Baghdad. But these troops never found the nearly 380 tons of some of the most powerful conventional explosives, called HMX and RDX, which is now missing. The U.S. troops did find large stockpiles of more conventional weapons, but no HMX or RDX, so powerful less than a pound brought down Pan Am 103 in 1988, and can be used to trigger a nuclear weapon. In a letter this month, the Iraqi interim government told the International Atomic Energy Agency the high explosives were lost to theft and looting due to lack of security. Critics claim there were simply not enough U.S. troops to guard hundreds of weapons stockpiles, weapons now being used by insurgents and terrorists to wage a guerrilla war in Iraq.” (NBC’s “Nightly News,” 10/25/04)
If Jill Abramson, managing editor of the New York Times, had a shred of concern over her paper's reputation for getting the facts right never mind objectivity or fairness, she would be running the correction - or at least this blatantly contradictory information - in the giant headline font and above-the-fold location that today's story got. But I guess the interest in echoing the sentiments of Maureen Dowd is more important than getting it right at the Old Gray Lady.
You're welcome. T'was my pleasure. :D
I have a 4.5 hr meeting tomorrow. Yeehaw.
I always rush out after my meetings and hit Drudge (FR blocked at work). I have to be careful with him during the day as his page often refreshes while I'm talking with clients, with understandable distraction.
ROTFLMAO!!!!!! Dementia, senility, short term memory.......yep, they done got it all.
Today: October 25, 2004 at 12:23:42 PDT
U.N.: Tons of Explosives Missing in Iraq
By WILLIAM J. KOLE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -
1025iaea-iraq Several hundred tons of conventional explosives were looted from a former Iraqi military facility that once played a key role in Saddam Hussein's efforts to build a nuclear bomb, the U.N. nuclear agency told the Security Council on Monday.
A "lack of security" resulted in the loss of 377 tons of high explosives from the sprawling Al-Qaqaa military installation about 30 miles south of Baghdad, International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei said.
The IAEA fears "that these explosives could have fallen into the wrong hands," said spokeswoman Melissa Fleming.
The development immediately became an issue on the U.S. presidential campaign trail, with the White House downplaying the threat from the missing cache of weapons but Sen. John Kerry's campaign calling the disappearance a "grave and catastrophic mistake."
ElBaradei told the council the IAEA had been trying to give the U.S.-led multinational force and Iraq's interim government "an opportunity to attempt to recover the explosives before this matter was put into the public domain."
But since the disappearance was reported in the media, he said he wanted the Security Council to have the letter dated Oct. 10 that he received from Mohammed J. Abbas, a senior official at Iraq's Ministry of Science and Technology, reporting the theft of the explosives.
The materials were lost through "the theft and looting of the governmental installations due to lack of security," the letter said.
The letter from Abbas informed the IAEA that since Sept. 4, 2003, looting at the Al-Qaqaa installation south of Baghdad had resulted in the loss of 214.67 tons of HMX, 155.68 tons of RDX and 6.39 tons of PETN explosives.
HMX and RDX can be used to demolish buildings, down jetliners, produce warheads for missiles and detonate nuclear weapons. HMX and RDX are key ingredients in plastic explosives such as C-4 and Semtex - substances so powerful that Libyan terrorists needed just 1 pound to blow up Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, killing 170 people.
ElBaradei's cover letter to the council said the HMX had been under IAEA seal and the RDX and PETN were "both subject to regular monitoring of stock levels."
"The presence of these amounts was verified by the IAEA in January 2003," he said.
At the Pentagon, an official who monitors developments in Iraq said U.S.-led coalition troops had searched Al-Qaqaa in the immediate aftermath of the March 2003 invasion and confirmed that the explosives, under IAEA seal since 1991, were intact. Thereafter, the site was not secured by U.S. forces, the official said, also speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Iraqis told the nuclear agency the materials were stolen and looted because of a lack of security at governmental installations, Fleming said.
"We do not know what happened to the explosives or when they were looted," she told AP.
A European diplomat familiar with the disappearance of the explosives said their presence was widely known.
The Associated Press drove past the compound Monday and saw no visible security at the gates of the site, a jumble of low-slung, yellow storage buildings that appeared deserted.
Iraq's interim government warned the United States and U.N. nuclear inspectors earlier this month that the explosives had vanished.
"Upon receiving the declaration on Oct. 10, we first took measures to authenticate it," Fleming said. "Then on Oct. 15, we informed the multinational forces through the U.S. government with the request for it to take any appropriate action in cooperation with Iraq's interim government.
Bush's national security adviser, Condoleeza Rice, was informed after Oct. 15, and then she notified Bush, the White House said.
During an Air Force One trip Monday between Texas and Colorado, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the administration's first concern was whether it was a nuclear proliferation threat, and it had determined it was not.
"Remember at the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom there was some looting, and some of it was organized," McClellan said. "There were munitions caches spread throughout the country, and so these are all issues that are being looked into by the multinational forces and the Iraqi Survey Group."
The probe will include finding out what happened to the weapons and whether they are being used against U.S. forces, he said.
In Washington, a spokesman for Kerry's campaign said the Bush administration "must answer for what may be the most grave and catastrophic mistake in a tragic series of blunders in Iraq."
"How did they fail to secure ... tons of known, deadly explosives despite clear warnings from the International Atomic Energy Agency to do so?" senior Kerry adviser Joe Lockhart said in a statement.
"They were urgently and specifically informed that terrorists could be helping themselves to the most dangerous explosives bonanza in history, but nothing was done to prevent it from happening."
Before the war, inspectors with the Vienna-based IAEA had kept tabs on the so-called "dual use" explosives because they could have been used to detonate a nuclear weapon. Experts say HMX can be used to create a highly powerful explosion with enough intensity to ignite the fissile material in an atomic bomb and set off a nuclear chain reaction.
IAEA inspectors pulled out of Iraq just before the 2003 invasion and have not yet been able to return despite ElBaradei's repeated urging that the experts be allowed back in to finish their work.
ElBaradei told the Security Council before the war that Iraq's nuclear program was in disarray and that there was no evidence to suggest it had revived efforts to build atomic weaponry.
Saddam was known to have used the Al-Qaqaa site to make conventional warheads, and IAEA inspectors dismantled parts of his nuclear program there before the 1991 Gulf War. The experts also oversaw the destruction of Iraq's chemical and biological weapons.
The nuclear agency pulled out of Iraq in 1998, and by the time it returned in 2002, it confirmed that 35 tons of HMX that had been placed under IAEA seal were missing.
ElBaradei told the United Nations in February 2003 that Iraq had declared that "HMX previously under IAEA seal had been transferred for use in the production of industrial explosives, primarily to cement plants as a booster for explosives used in quarrying."
"However, given the nature of the use of high explosives, it may well be that the IAEA will be unable to reach a final conclusion on the end use of this material," ElBaradei warned at the time.
"A large quantity of these explosives were under IAEA seal because they do have a nuclear application," Fleming said Monday.
The nuclear agency has no concrete evidence to suggest the seals were broken, Fleming said, but a diplomat familiar with the agency's work in Iraq said the seals must have been broken if the explosives were stolen.
IAEA analysts have viewed satellite photographs of Al-Qaqaa, and only two storage bunkers showed damage that may have occurred in bombing during the war, an agency source told AP. The other bunkers were intact.
---
Personally, I'd be much happier if the WashTimes wasn't owned by Reverend Sun Moon, who is, there is no other way to put this, a whacko.
I'm sure they'll find a way to blame Bush. For example "why didn't we secure the weapons BEFORE liberating the country?" or "If we wouldn't have invaded, the weapons would still be there."
"I'm sitting here watching Scarborough and on their "newsbreak" the ditz that was reading the news, repeated the missing weapons cache story and said that Kerry said that it "proved" Bush's incompetence in the war in Iraq and that Clinton agreed that this proved that Bush blew it. (paraphrased) Anyway, MSNBC LIVE is still reporting is as a big story."
I fear they'll be more of the same tomorrow. I think we're all kidding ourselves to think the MSM will have some "HUGE" retraction tomorrow. Anything positive for Bush won't make the headlines. The NYslimes provided Kerry's daily stump talking points, as usual. No matter if the story is true or not, it's already provided the smear intended. I just hope the Bush people use this to their advantage.
Babu, ala Seinfeld?
Just a reminder, This is the last day that you can contribute to the Swift Vets for Truth!!! www.swiftvets.com Sent my last 25.00 to them, I hope everyone thats able to, will!
How can we turn this into the media even for the next few days? Who do we need to run with it, or do you think it will be news by virtue of how much it was built up today? We need to hammer this and make it about a sinister agenda against the President.
While I do not disagree with your assessment of the future of print media, the problem is not the medium, rather it is the lack of integrity in the message (or the messenger).
It would not take long for the blogosphere to become every bit as biased - if we let it.
Truthfully, I am surprised that NBC didn't just shut up and let it go.
The point isn't when the war started. It's when a contingent of OUR TROOPS arrived at the installation.
DUh!
They really are stupid over there.
As did Wes Clarke tonight on Foxnews blasting the administration for not having enough boots on the ground. Me thinks Lockhardt's decision to run hard with this story for the balance of the week may last as long as his tenure with the campaign. I suspect he's packing it in as we speak.
How can we turn this into the media even for the next few days? Who do we need to run with it, or do you think it will be news by virtue of how much it was built up today? We need to hammer this and make it about a sinister agenda against the President.
[Kerry gives the thumbs up toward the gaggle of reporters and photographers]
At the very end of Scarborough tonight, Pat Buchanan talked about the violent episode with O'Donell last week when O'Neil was on. He said that MSNBC talked to him and said his behavior was unacceptable and I guess O'Donnell agreed. I thought Pat was gonna say he was fired. Darn.
I would agree about Clinton, the lose of weight and surgery really made him look older. Botox time, I bet he know someone! BTW Kerry said Clinton was going to about 3-4 states. Kerry is the most selfish person - I would never ask someone who had major surgery to do that much traveling so soon. He must reeeeeeeeally be desparate.
Rather... BUSTED
Koppel... BUSTED
NYTimes... BUSTED
Stories where the "facts" are provided by someone speaking on "condition of anonymity" always make me suspicious.
And DOWN GOES Kerry! A vicious left hook from Ali landed squarely on John's chin and out he goes.
Ali's rope-a-dope tactics paid off once again.
Go figure?
This from Drudge--
A top Bush official e-mailed DRUDGE late Monday: "Let me get this straight, are Mr. Kerry and Mr. Edwards now saying we did not go into Iraq soon enough? We should have invaded and liberated Iraq sooner?"
"Initial DNC spin on Wolf Blitzer CNN: Still bad for administration for making Saddam disperse explosives, rather than safely have them stored. Eeeegads!"
Lame spin. Lame. Not gonna work lame.
Hey people,
I hail from Canada and am a HUGE Bush supporter. If only I could vote!!! Anyway, I hope this news drowns out that rat Kerry and carries him to where he belongs: the gutter!
hmmmmmmmmm now that you mention it....that's a tough one
Good question. Maybe Patrick Fitzgerald can include that in his ever growing investigation into classified information leaks. In that I include the "leak" of DIS-information, ala Plame/Wilson.
I'm not sure if you're sincere. I'm dead serious.
Only when the terrorism is directed toward Israel and now the U.S.
NBC may have blunted the last big hit against the President.
Now if Karl Rove has those military records Wednesday would be a good day to leak them.
They knew the numbers
Dem vp hopeful John Edwards blasted Bush for not securing the explosives: "It is reckless and irresponsible to fail to protect and safeguard one of the largest weapons sites in the country. And by either ignoring these mistakes or being clueless about them, George Bush has failed. He has failed as our commander in chief; he has failed as president."
A top Bush official e-mailed DRUDGE late Monday: "Let me get this straight, are Mr. Kerry and Mr. Edwards now saying we did not go into Iraq soon enough? We should have invaded and liberated Iraq sooner?"
What's the take on DU in light of the NBC blowhole? Suicide pacts? More gnashing of teeth?
Ay ay ay Cielito Lindo!!! It looks like Kerry was caught chewing excrement with this story; I imagine that Maricon Edwards probably dropped his compact when he found out that he jumped the gun again...like premature ejaculation. I hope the Republicans blast Kerry and Bubba and The NC Hustler tomorrow for their shameless behavior.
Is anybody keeping count of all the sKerry lies? There are already a few books out.
ping
Are you Flippin' kidding me or what? He didn't say that did he? Now I've heard it all!
Alternate caption for your photo:
Clinton to himself..."There you go John, that KICK ME sign looks real good..."
My gratitude to your son for his service and for his family who waits at home..God bless our armed forces.
that's where I get mine now as I can't take the chance of turning on the TV and seeing Rather-not or Lurch etc., - bad for the heart.
Not to mention - get our side in Internet too...but had no idea such a large % does! Super!
Hardy Har Har Har! Keyboard alert for me.
I'm simple minded...
They were probably reminded by the Bush campaign that reports from their reporter existed. If they didn't report it, the Bush people certainly were going to (and will continue to point to it).
"Truthfully, I am surprised that NBC didn't just shut up and let it go."
They couldn't do that as there were embeds WITH the 101st when they arrived at the weapons dump(s). While the soldiers from the 101st aren't apt to come out to the press (though I know a few who would relish the opportunity!) there is the brass at DoD and others who know this didn't happen the way the Times portrays it...
If NBC didn't speak up- it would have gotten REALLY ugly...
Rush was in on this piece. That's the proof that this is a Karl Rove moment.
Rush Limbaugh has interviewed VP Cheney several times this past year. In one, Cheney warned about October surprises...that "we've got a few things at our disposal" (paraphrased).
You have 15 grandchildren? WOW!
No yawning here when NBC comes out to correct the NYSlimes in favor of this administration.
AAAAAAAGH!
"Lockhart was correct, but not in the way he intended."
Hehe :)
What's bad for Democrats is GOOD for AMERICA!
The same guy who went with Kerry on his “Mystical” tour of Cambodia on Christmas Eve 68
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.