Blow to Blair over 'mobile labs'

The Guardian ^ | June 8, 2003 | Peter Beaumont and Antony Barnett

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Blow to Blair over 'mobile labs'

Saddam's trucks were for balloons, not germs

Peter Beaumont and Antony Barnett
Sunday June 8, 2003
The Observer

Tony Blair faces a fresh crisis over Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, as evidence emerges that two vehicles that he has repeatedly claimed to be Iraqi mobile biological warfare production units are nothing of the sort.

The intelligence agency MI6, British defence officers and technical experts from the Porton Down microbiological research establishment have been ordered to conduct an urgent review of the mobile facilities, following US analysis which casts serious doubt on whether they really are germ labs.

The British review comes amid widespread doubts expressed by scientists on both sides of the Atlantic that the trucks could have been used to make biological weapons.

Instead The Observer has established that it is increasingly likely that the units were designed to be used for hydrogen production to fill artillery balloons, part of a system originally sold to Saddam by Britain in 1987.

The British review follows access by UK officials to the vehicles which were discovered by US troops in April and May.

'We are being very careful now not to jump to any conclusions about these vehicles,' said one source familiar with the investigation. 'On the basis of intelligence we do believe that mobile labs do exist. What is not certain is that these vehicles are actually them so we are being careful not to jump the gun.'

The claim, however, that the two vehicles are mobile germ labs has been repeated frequently by both Blair and President George Bush in recent days in support of claims that they prove the existence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

During his whistle stop tour of the Gulf, Europe and Russia, Blair repeatedly briefed journalists that the trailers were germ production labs which proved that Iraq had WMD.

But chemical weapons experts, engineers, chemists and military systems experts contacted by The Observer over the past week, say the layout and equipment found on the trailers is entirely inconsistent with the vehicles being mobile labs. Both US Secretary of State Colin Powell, when he addressed the UN Security Council prior to the war, and the British Government alleged that Saddam had such labs.

A separate investigation published by the New York Times yesterday discloses that the trailers have now been investigated by three different teams of Western experts, with the third and most senior group of analysts apparently divided sharply over their function.

'I have no great confidence that it's a fermenter,' a senior analyst said of a tank supposed to be capable of multiplying seed germs into lethal swarms. The government's public report, he said, 'was a rushed job and looks political'. The analyst had not seen the trailers, but reviewed evidence from them.

Another intelligence expert who has seen the trailers told the US paper: 'Everyone has wanted to find the "smoking gun" so much that they may have wanted to have reached this conclusion. I am very upset with the process.'

Questions over the claimed purpose of trailer for making biological weapons include:

· The lack of any trace of pathogens found in the fermentation tanks. According to experts, when weapons inspectors checked tanks in the mid-Nineties that had been scoured to disguise their real use, traces of pathogens were still detectable.

· The use of canvas sides on vehicles where technicians would be working with dangerous germ cultures.

· A shortage of pumps required to create vacuum conditions required for working with germ cultures and other processes usually associated with making biological weapons.

· The lack of an autoclave for steam sterilisation, normally a prerequisite for any kind of biological production. Its lack of availability between production runs would threaten to let in germ contaminants, resulting in failed weapons.

· The lack of any easy way for technicians to remove germ fluids from the processing tank.

One of those expressing severe doubts about the alleged mobile germ labs is Professor Harry Smith, who chairs the Royal Society's working party on biological weapons.

He told The Observer 'I am concerned about the canvas sides. Ideally, you would want airtight facilities for making something like anthrax. Not only that, it is a very resistant organism and even if the Iraqis cleaned the equipment, I would still expect to find some trace of it.'

His view is shared by the working group of the Federation of American Scientists and by the CIA, which states: 'Senior Iraqi officials of the al-Kindi Research, Testing, Development, and Engineering facility in Mosul were shown pictures of the mobile production trailers, and they claimed that the trailers were used to chemically produce hydrogen for artillery weather balloons.'

Artillery balloons are essentially balloons that are sent up into the atmosphere and relay information on wind direction and speed allowing more accurate artillery fire. Crucially, these systems need to be mobile.

The Observer has discovered that not only did the Iraq military have such a system at one time, but that it was actually sold to them by the British. In 1987 Marconi, now known as AMS, sold the Iraqi army an Artillery Meteorological System or Amets for short.

Additional reporting by Solomon Hughes

[William McKinley]

I care little if the Jordanians and Palestinians like us (Mark Steyn had a great article on this very thing, by the way; you should find it).

I much prefer them to respect the fact that if they are a threat we will dispose of the threat.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Note that Jordan is viewed as one of our friends in the Middle East.

[William McKinley]

I am afraid that W chose very poorly

And now we are off onto a very different topic, which is 'was the war effort wise?' That will become evident over time, which is how I will evaluate it. It is over, and no amount of caterwauling from the peacenicks will change it. We don't need to know if it was wise or not until the next time we are faced with the possibility of the same action. At that point, time will have passed, and the wisdom or foolishness of the endeavor will be more clear.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

The 2 are quite related.

It appears that our gov't decided to invade Iraq. Clearly there was a reason for that, else we would assume that we have a bunch of insane individuals at the top of the government.

Apparently, the 'reasons' for invading Iraq were not viewed as something the people accept and view as sufficient for supporting a war of aggression. Therefore, lower level operatives were asked to find some 'popular' reasons for an invasion. It happened to be WMD.

Now we, as a people, are in the process of paying for what those at the top of our government did on our behalf.

It will be important for these lies to be revealed to us so that future governments may not go on the same path for a while.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Oh, and those responsible for wasting $70 billion + of our money and the lives of our soldiers should be made to pay.

[William McKinley]

Are you Robert Byrd?

In the long term, the war is going to save us money, not cost us money.

And also in the long term, taking care of Saddam now, rather than letting that boil fester, is going to save lives.

[TomB]

Geez, first you quote the Guardian as gospel, and now the USAToday. You need to become more discriminating.

Anyway, the blog "Jim Miller on Politics" disected this study and its coverage in McPaper.

---

Misinterpreting the Pew International Survey:  

Yesterday's USA Today article on the Pew Survey of opinions in 20 nations began with this lead paragraph:

As President Bush plunges into Middle East diplomacy, a survey of 20 nations and the Palestinian Authority shows widespread distrust of his leadership, skepticism in the region about his plan for peace and less regard for the United States around the world.

This is, at the very best, misleadingly incomplete.  Suppose a weatherman was reporting temperatures and had the following four daily highs (in Fahrenheit), 83, 75, 48, and 70.  Would you think it a fair summary if the weatherman said that the weather was getting colder?  But that is precisely what USA Today does in the article.   Here is a table with the data for all 20 nations:

Favorable View of US (per cent)

	1999-	Summer	March	May
	2000	2002	2003	2003
Israel				79
Great Britain	83	75	48	70
Kuwait				63
Canada	71	72		63
Nigeria	46	77		61
Australia				60
Italy	76	70	34	60
South Korea	58	53		46
Germany	78	61	25	45
France	62	63	31	43
Spain	50		14	38
Russia	37	61	28	36
Brazil	56	52		34
Morocco	77			27
Lebanon		35		27
Indonesia	75	61		15
Turkey	52	30	12	15
Pakistan	23	10		13
Jordan		25		1
Palestinian Authority	14			1

If you look at the table, you will find several patterns, with a few interesting exceptions.  In the first two blocks of countries, Israel through Brazil, positive feelings toward the United States fell a bit between 2000 and 2002 in most countries, fell sharply just before the war with Iraq, and have already recovered to near pre-war levels.  In the Muslim countries in the third block, positive feelings collapsed somewhere between 2000 and 2003.  This change in Muslim views is so important that I will analyze it in a separate post, and will limit this discussion to the opinion in the other nations.

The most important pattern that I see is this:  In every single nation for which we have March and May data, the image of the United States improved in that period.  In other words, the trend is in our favor.  Would you have guessed that from reading the lead paragraph I quoted?

Two exceptions in the table are significant.  Views of the United States in Russia now seem to be back to where they were in 2000, after a remarkable rise in 2002.   One wonders if there wasn't some systematic problem in the Russian polling that year.   Nigeria, a country about half Muslim, now has a higher opinion of the United States than it did in 2000.  Since Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa, that probably says something about how we are viewed in the sub-Saharan part of Africa.

The USA Today article was misleading, but other newspapers were simply wrong.  I found the same negative spin in the New York Times, the Seattle PI, and the Washington Post.   The headlines for their three articles were, respectively, "World's View of U.S. Sours After Iraq War, Poll Finds", "Worldwide opinion of U.S. drops since Iraq war, poll finds", and "Arab Hostility Toward U.S. Growing, Poll Finds".  The Seattle PI and New York Times headlines are directly contradicted by the data.  There is no data to support the Washington Post's headline, but, since opinion in every nation for which we do have data is shifting toward the United States, it is likely that opinion is shifting in that direction in Arab countries, too. (If you have seen articles with similar errors in other newspapers, let me know so I can add to this list.)

If you want to do your own analysis, you can download the report from the press release here.

[TomB]

Apparently, the 'reasons' for invading Iraq were not viewed as something the people accept and view as sufficient for supporting a war of aggression. Therefore, lower level operatives were asked to find some 'popular' reasons for an invasion. It happened to be WMD.

Are you saying that the administration gave as the ONLY reason to invade, the (at the time) current posession of WMDs? Nothing else?

[Republican Wildcat]

BS. Hydrogen clings to everything. Anyone with even a basic knowledge of hydrogen knows this--that's why it is so flammable.

It's amazing how you always just make things up on this forum, and then wonder why no one takes you seriously. Either knock it off, or just be quiet.

[Diddle E. Squat]

Yeah right, pretty baby milk balloons.

Don't be stupid. This will simply be the third article in the last week that the Guardian has to retract.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Add to the latest convenient "duel-use" facility the missiles we found tipped with hoses, 55 barrel drums of buried (duel-use) pesticides - and chems. kept in multiple locations ready to mix on site - the Al Samouds, the missiles w/ reservoirs for liquids, the chem. masks and suits, the atropine injectors, the bloody history of chem attacks on his own people, the mass murder spanning 24 years - ENOUGH.

I would ask every critic, how much have YOU done in 80 days? Less than 3 months ago our volunteer troops entered Iraq, risked their lives to liberate the Iraqi people and defend America. They did an outstanding job. Their outstanding work continues daily, unreported by the press. Less than 3 months.

This war was a battle of ideologies - and the LEFT lost. OUR troops - a REPUBLICAN President - liberated the oppressed people, while the left defended a monstrous oppressor.

Our troops are doing awesome work daily - unreported by a partisan press intent on burying the truth of THIS war and THIS President and THE honorable and POWERful American military. This war de-bunked decades of Communist- leftist propaganda....not to mention anti-American lies about racism and sexism peddled by special interest/ NGO anti-American pimps for $$$.

Pre-war analysis - true then, true today:

WILLIAM SHAWCROSS in the Independent describes the world if France and Germany get their way: "[After he kicked out the inspectors again, as he did in 1998,] Saddam would proceed apace on his infernal factories for weapons of mass distruction, financed by his new oil revenues. He would still murder and torture Iraqis. He would soon have nuclear devices and thus the means to terrorise the entire region. He would seek to dominate the world's oil market. He would threaten Israel. He would be untouchable. That's not all. America's friends could no longer trust the United States and its enemies would no longer be daunted by it. Chaos, radicalisation and proliferation would be the name of the new game – it is beginning already in North Korea." These are the likely fruits of a successful "peace" movement--the greatest misnomer of our generation.

---

 

CENTCOM: Two detailed logs - DAILY:

*COALITION EFFORTS AID IRAQ'S RECOVERY (June 8, 2003)

*COALITION AND IRAQI POLICE WORK TO MAKE IRAQ SECURE (JUNE 7, 2003)

 

VOICES OF FREEDOM
Quotes from the grateful Iraqi people. Y

***Operation Infinite Freedom - Situation Room - 7 JUN 03/Day 80*** ^

 

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

'sticky hydrogen'???? That's a new one :)))))))))))))

By the way, you said you worked in a 'hydrogen plant'???? Where's that?

[arete]

You mean, 'finding' those secret moonshine production facilties was worth spending $70 Billion+?

Hope them homeland security people don't go looking out in the barn.

Richard W.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Maybe you should burry that fermenter for the time being.

[itsahoot]

Do some reading on hydrogen embrittlement

Bingo, the plating industry deals with this problem by low temperature heat treating. Chromed springs are a biggie.

[William McKinley]

"So, how do you Iraqis make <insert chemical product here>";

"Oh, we use this facility."

"I see. Couldn't that be used for weapons production too?"

"Yes, it could be classified as a dual use facility. But we use it to make <insert chemical product here>."

"Wouldn't it have been cheaper to build and operate a dedicated facility that could not conceivably be dual purpose?"

"Doesn't matter. We built it this way, but we use it for <insert chemical product here>."

Ok, on to the next thing. How do you Iraqis make <insert another chemical product here>?"

"Oh, we use this facility over there."

"I see. Couldn't that be used for weapons production too?"

"Yes, it could be classified as a dual use facility. But we use it to make <insert the otherchemical product here>."

Etc etc etc.

After a while, a clear picture emerges.

[itsahoot]

carbide + water produced the hydrogen

I think you wil find that it produces... A colorless, highly flammable or explosive gas, C2H2, used for metal welding and cutting and as an illuminant. Also called ethyne.

Also used in Carbide Lamps by miners and coon hunters until the 50's

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

After a while, a clear picture emerges.

Yes it does. Reporters care more about bringing down a "right-wing" President - who de-bunked decades of anti-American leftist lies in Iraq - than in reporting the truth - even if it means further terrorizing the Iraqi people and inciting war by using inflammatory rhetoric lies to stir up anti-American sentiments in the surrounding lands.

Right? (^;