Missing Weapons? Blame the Russians

washingtondispatch.com ^ | October 28, 2004 09:43 AM | Shane Cory

[Destro]

News Analysis by TWD's Editor, Shane Cory.

Missing Weapons? Blame the Russians

October 28, 2004 09:43 AM

The Washington Times dropped to the bottom of the integrity scale by leading with a story that definitively blamed the loss of hundreds of tons of high explosives (HE) on the Russian military. Their story was based mainly on the views of one controversial Pentagon staffer, John A. "Jack" Shaw.

Earlier this year Shaw was reportedly involved in a controversy involving the former Iraqi golden boy and now criminal, Ahmed Chalabi. The scandal involved the awarding of cell phone contracts to three companies with close ties to Chalibi. According to the L.A. Times, he was put under investigation by the FBI.

From reports of Shaw, it would seem that this government employee runs fast and loose. When investigating a contracting matter, he allegedly was refused entry into Iraq and then dressed up as a Halliburton employee in order to gain entry into the country.

[Destro]

I think this is being done to hurt President Bush by certain groups allied to Chalabi who don't like the relationship Bush has with Putin.

[Poincare]

Not the Russians, Russian mercenaries. Big difference.

[Lance Romance]

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20041028-115519-3700r.htm

Gertz seems to be sticking with it. I will take his word over anybody else in the media any day of the week.

[Bronzewound]

The Washington Times dropped to the bottom of the integrity scale

Would that be the John Kerry integrity scale? I guess nobody told him…you have to turn it upside down for it to read correctly.

[Destro]

Gertz is sticking to what? His interview? That is all he did - He only interviewed Shaw - no investigation on his own - and Shaw is basing his speculation on the hearsay evidence from 2 European sources. If a Democratic operative based a story on specualtion based on hearsay from someone under FBI investigation we would be outraged.

[Destro]

bump

[Grim]

Romania's former spy chief spilled the beans on this early in October:

Russia Hid Saddam's WMDs
By Ion Mihai Pacepa
Washington Times | October 2, 2003

[Grim]

Oops, my bad, I left out the link:

http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=10111

[Destro]

again - the Washington Times. Rev. Moonie may be the New Jesus Christ but I don't worship at his alter.

[familyop]

I've seen a few left/liberal conspiracy stories against the President and Republicans from the Washington Dispatch.

[Destro]

Thanks for the link.

[Destro]

Simple - do you trust the source. The one and only source for this story? If a Democratic operative based a story on specualtion based on hearsay from someone under FBI investigation we would be outraged. My theory? I think this is being done to hurt President Bush by certain groups allied to Chalabi who don't like the relationship Bush has with Putin.

[familyop]

Hey, thanks! David and his writers do good work at exposing anti-American menaces that too many have ignored over the past 35 years or so--especially those menaces who hide/misrepresent their intentions. I liked the following (part of a series at FrontPage) and keep it near.

EURABIA Anti-American,anti-semitic Europe explained http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1223220/posts

[familyop]

Oops...formatting.

EURABIA Anti-American,anti-semitic Europe explained
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1223220/posts

[greeneyes]

Well I do not know if I trust the source, but I do know that this is has been a standard operating procedure in the past. So my instincts say this is a very good possibility.

I also know the Wall Street Journal posted as a news article that if the US did not hurry up (while we were doing the UN Shuffle) that there might not be anything left in Iraq to find. Best I remember the WSJ also noted the huge numbers of truck convoys leaving via Syria.

Common sense would also make one think that Russia might want to hide the extent of their cooperation with Saddam, so it would not be a surprise. Also there have been several other news sources talking about the WMD etc. being hauled away before the war.

So I say well this just may be the explanation, but I will
wait and see. What is absolutely clear to me is that what skerry is claiming is 100% inaccurate(not sure of the margin of error-LOL)

[familyop]

Destro, here are some comments made by Senator Kerry during the First Presidential Debate (link below). President Bush only had good things to say about Russia. And in the context of the current news, the President knows what is happening. If he has any issue, he will personally contact President Putin about it, but I don't think he has any issue. Please read the following comments made by Kerry on US television.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/10/20041001.html
Record of First 2004 Presidential Debate

Excerpts of Kerry's comments follow:

SENATOR KERRY: Nuclear proliferation. Nuclear proliferation. There are some 600-plus tons of unsecured material still in the former Soviet Union, in Russia. At the rate that the President is currently securing that, it will take 13 years to get it.

I did a lot of work on this. I wrote a book about it several years ago -- maybe six or seven years ago -- called, "The New War," which saw the difficulties of this international criminal network. And back then, we intercepted a suitcase in a Middle Eastern country with nuclear materials in it. And the black market sale price was about $250 million. Now, there are terrorists trying to get their hands on that stuff today.
[...]
Not this President. I'm going to shut that program down and we're going to make it clear to the world we're serious about containing nuclear proliferation. And we're going to get the job of containing all of that nuclear material in Russia done in four years. And we're going to build the strongest international network to prevent nuclear proliferation. This is the scale of what President Kennedy set out to do with the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. It's our generation's equivalent. And I intend to get it done.

[...]

SENATOR KERRY: Weapons of mass destruction, nuclear proliferation. But again, the test of the difference between us -- the President has had four years to try to do something about it, and North Korea has got more weapons. Iran is moving towards weapons. And at his pace, it will take 13 years to secure those weapons in Russia. I'm going to do it in four years, and I'm going to immediately set out to have bilateral talks with North Korea.

[...]

SENATOR KERRY: Well, let me just say quickly that I've had an extraordinary experience of watching up close and personal that transition in Russia, because I was there right after the transformation, and I was probably one of the first senators -- along with Senator Bob Smith of New Hampshire, a former senator -- to go down into the KGB underneath Treblinka [sic] Square and see reams of files with names in them, and it sort of brought home the transition to democracy that Russia was trying to make.

I regret what's happened in these past months, and I think it goes beyond just the response to terror. Mr. Putin now controls all the television stations. His political opposition is being put in jail. And I think it's very important for the United States, obviously, to have a working relationship that is good. This is a very important country to us and we want a partnership. But we always have to stand up for democracy. As George Will said the other day, freedom on the march, not in Russia right now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~end excerpts~~~~~~~~~~~

[Destro]

I don't think the Iraqis and the Russians are that good that they can sneak out over an estimated 40 heavy trucks from this arms dump and drive it all the way to Syria without getting caught. The story is not plausable to me. Russian mercenary advisors? Possible - whole transfers out of Iraq on the eve of invasion? If this story is true (and for some reason Freepers who jumped on this story don't make this connection) then Bush admin screwed up in A) making nice with Putin and B) Not being able to detect the move or C) They knew what Russia was up to and allowed it to happen (just in case someone throws that theory into the ring).

[Destro]

I appreciate you post but I don't see how it adds anything to this story - the story's source for Russia moving high explosives out of Iraq on the eve of invasion is suspect as is the motive, IMHO. That is all my point is.

[MarMema]

I'm going to shut that program down and we're going to make it clear to the world we're serious about containing nuclear proliferation. And we're going to get the job of containing all of that nuclear material in Russia done in four years

And he thinks Bush is arrogant? Putin must have his plan B for an assassination of Kerry if he wins.

[streetpreacher]

I don't see the point of your post either. Who cares if Destro thinks Kerry does or doesn't like Russia? On this particular issue (freedom in Russia), Kerry (along with George Will) was dead right. And President Bush did not disagree with him. In fact, he said he was troubled himself by developments in Russia.