Doctors treat dozens every day for suspected radiation symptoms (Iraq WMD found)

KCAU-TV News ^ | June 21, 2003 | AP

[FairOpinion]

Al-Mada'in, Iraq-AP -- Doctors say dozens of Iraqis with symptoms of radiation poisoning are turning up every day at a hospital near a defunct nuclear plant.

The Tuwaitha nuclear facility is 12 miles south of Baghdad. It was left unguarded after Iraqi troops fled the area just before the war.

It's believed the facility contained tons of natural uranium and nearly two tons of low-enriched uranium, which could be used to make nuclear weapons. Looters stripped it of much of its contents, including uranium storage barrels they later used to hold drinking water.

The International Atomic Energy Agency sent a team to Iraq earlier this month to see if any of the uranium was missing, and experts found most of it on or near the site.

But doctors say many patients suffering from things like rashes and bloody noses are probably suffering from exposure to nuclear radiation.

[meenie]

This site was the nuclear power plant that Israel bombed in the '70's. Any power plant has high levels of radioactivity if it is not contained in shielded containers. Our intelligence surely knew of this site.

[okie01]

"The low-enriched uranium cannot be used to make a nuclear weapon."

But it can be used to make even more highly enriched uranium, which could be used to make a nuclear weapon, no?

[Gorzaloon]

nearly two tons of low-enriched uranium, which could be used to make nuclear weapons.

Quack Quack.

LEU is not weapons grade.

Another breathless journalist practicing Science again.

LEU requires much less enrichment, that's all, or it could fuel a breeder reactor. No problem, we'll just order one from Sears.

[mware]

Batchalor and Alexander (talk show hosts at WABC) have speculated that the International Atomic Energy Agency may have made a deal regarding the findings at this site.

They indicated that the Agency had been turning a blind eye to what was at the site. For the US not make a stink over it, the Agency is spilling the beans over what Iran really has.

[FairOpinion]

"They indicated that the Agency had been turning a blind eye to what was at the site. For the US not make a stink over it, the Agency is spilling the beans over what Iran really has."

---


I think this is very likely. There is some evidence that El Baradai, head of IAEA was on Saddam's payroll. And since we haven't heard anything, it's likely that the US decided that rather than go public, use the information to pressure the on Iran.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=484


The Americans are sitting tight on the extremely valuable Iraqi intelligence archives discovered at Iraqi intelligence headquarters in Baghdad and at sub-departments of Saddam’s clandestine machine never before known to exist. The only data released are a few leaks to the British media calculated to help prime minister Tony Blair stand up to anti-war campaigners at home and around Europe.

To subscribe to DEBKA-Net-Weekly, click HERE .

From this treasure trove, America has distributed to its war allies some materials relevant to their national security. But no decision has been taken as to the disposition of documents attesting to the clandestine ties of collaboration maintained with the Saddam regime by a whole range of foreign government and public office-holders, academics, media figures, financiers and industrialists the world over, many deeply involved in sanctions-busting. By and large, Washington is not inclined to bare these secrets or make use of them at the moment, except in some notable cases. One is French president Jacques Chirac; another is the head of the International Atomic Energy Commission in Vienna, Dr. Mohammed ElBaradai, who led the nuclear weapons inspection in Iraq before the war.

In addition, the administration has secretly handed over to various Middle East and Persian Gulf governments the names of ministers and public figures who were handsomely rewarded by Saddam Hussein for supporting his case in deliberations at the United Nations, other international bodies and inter-Arab forums. Washington was given to understand that these public officials would be held to account by their governments. This process has started quietly in Qatar and Jordan, where our intelligence sources expect overnight resignations of senior cabinet members.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly has been reliably informed that the nature of the relationships the French president and members of his family wove with Saddam Hussein and members of his regime is due to be revealed quite soon, drawing on the materials in the secret Iraqi files. Some sources say that the ties linking the two families were deep and ramified. Their exposure is likely to raise a storm.

As for Dr. ElBaradai, our sources report that, even before the Iraqi archives were examined, Washington had compiled a dossier on the chief nuclear inspector from discoveries made in the course of crises over the North Korean and Iranian nuclear weapons programs.


In the meantime, US officials believe they have sufficient grounds for demanding Dr. ElBaradai’s removal and have already set this process in motion. According to DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s Washington sources, their preferred candidate for his replacement in Vienna is Prince Hassan of Jordan, brother and former crown prince of King Hussein and uncle of King Abdullah. We have learned that senior representatives of the Bush administration have interviewed the prince in London and Amman and obtained his consent to the appointment, which has also been endorsed by the king.

[FairOpinion]

That is exactly the point: our intelligence knew of this site, and sure enough, there it was, with the enriched uranium, which Saddam could use to make highly enriched uranium and a nuclear bomb within a year, using the centrifuge, tubes for which Saddam ordered last year. We invaded Iraq in a nick of time.

[FairOpinion]

"LEU requires much less enrichment, that's all, or it could fuel a breeder reactor. No problem, we'll just order one from Sears. "
----

Saddam DID order centrifuge tubes last year. Experts said that with those he could have had two nukes within a year.

From 1999:


"Dr. Edwin Lyman, NCI Scientific Director, calculated that Iraq’s low-enriched uranium stocks would be sufficient to produce over 45 kilograms of bomb-grade HEU, enough for two nuclear weapons. Only about 260 small centrifuges would be required to enrich this material to bomb-grade in one year. Iraq’s known stocks of natural uranium could be converted into an additional 70 kilograms of bomb-grade HEU over a somewhat greater length of time. Some 25 kilograms of HEU is officially considered the amount needed for a bomb, although nuclear weapons can be built with less."


http://www.nci.org/pr/pr121799.htm

[Beaker]

Another breathless journalist practicing Science again.

It's such a time honored tradition after all. ;-)

[simonX]

Since the existence of the site is well documented and we went to war in such a great hurry to keep WMD from getting into the wrong hands, why didn't WE secure the site sooner?

I've read that our military commanders were unable to protect their troops while fighting a war AND secure these various sites. Members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff pointed this sort of thing out in the planning stages. Someone in the DoD decided that we didn't need as many troops as the professional soldiers of the JCoS said we did.

This is a Bush admin eff-up, specifically Rumsfeld's.

[Salvation]

Someone tell "ketchup kerry" quick!

[American in Israel]

I understand that the French delivered weapons grade uranium to the Reactor that they built and the Israeli's blew up. The contract stated six sets of fuel rods were to be part of the deal.

That is enough weapons grade uranium for 5 hiroshima bombs. Nobody is talking about that. Where is it? Was it ever delivered? One load had to be delivered, as they were bringing the reactor online.

Or are the nukes in Pakistan, built by Saddams scientists, also built with Saddams nuclear fuel?

[Gorzaloon]

Saddam DID order centrifuge tubes last year. Experts said that with those he could have had two nukes within a year.

Yes, but did he have the additional infrastructure needed to use them?

Converting the LEU to UF6 for the centrifuges, then after separation, scrubbing the gas and reducing it back to uranium requires a huge investment and a physical plant capable of doing so. That tubing may or may not have been intended for gas centrifuges; Knowing him it probably was, but this is not the sort of operation one can hide in a tent or trailer.

[R. Scott]

The material had not yet been assembled into a weapon.

[joesbucks]

As Much as I believe finding definitive proof of an active WMD program is essential, this is a reach. Even the PResident yesterday said that the search is yet to find the WMD's we are looking for.

I feel more sorry for Blair than Bush. The US saw the war as unfinished business from 91. It would take a lot to derail that. But if the deaths keep happening and other events keep taking place, Bush may be in as much deep heat as Blair.

[meenie]

There it was 2% enriched and only needed to be enriched to 90%+ to be used for a nuclear bomb.

[meenie]

There it was 2% enriched and only needed to be enriched to 90%+ to be used for a nuclear bomb.

[FairOpinion]

"The material had not yet been assembled into a weapon. "
---

Maybe we should have waited until Saddam did manage to build fully functioning nuclear bombs, right? Is that your point? Maybe we should have waited until he used them too?

[FairOpinion]

"I understand that the French delivered weapons grade uranium to the Reactor that they built and the Israeli's blew up. Where is it?"
---

Exactly. It seems like people are going out of their way to defend Saddam, that this nice, friendly, loving and lovable dictator would never build any WMD, and after all, nukes aren't really WMD, and after all, he didn't even nuke Israel, so what's the big deal, we should have waited until he did. And seems like some Freepers have this same attitude. It really makes you wonder. And it actually makes me mad, how can people be either so blind or so much on Saddam's side.

Saddam may have had highly enriched Uranium, which you were pointing out. We have absolute proof, and we knew beforehand that he had significant amount of low enriched uranium, which in and of itself was a breech of the 1991 cease fire agreement, the UN's incompetence of letting him keep it nonwithstanding.

He ordered those centrifuge tubes, that experts said could be used for enriching uranium, and he could have built two nuclear bombs within a year, we went in and of course the uranium was still there.

Obviously if we waited another year, very likely he would have had full nukes, so how can people say that there wasn't enough justification for getting rid of him?!

[Fresh Wind]

The cat's been out of the bag, what else does the media need?

A Democratic administration, that's what.