Fox News reporting marines find "weapons grade plutonium"

Fox News ^

[JustRight]

On TV right now.

[Blood of Tyrants]

The ultimate weapon of mass destruction.

[Snerdley]

May I be the first to say, "Holy S**t".

Don't you mean Holy Shi'ite (or is it Sunni?)

[Paraclete]

"In an action that dwarfs the Coalition's military success, Army engineers constructed an underground nuclear complex in only 7 days to fool the world and legitimize this war."

[adam_az]

In addition to Plutonium, a cache of Mickeyium and Minnieum was located, along with another unidentified substance.

[js1138]

Never mind the radiation, plutonium is toxic just for being a heavy metal. Contact with skin is deadly.

I once read a science fiction story -- in Asimov's magazine -- about terrorists attempting to make a dirty bomb. There are many problems. If you just use big chunks, you get big chunks that are east to find and dispose of. To get an effective weapon you have to grind it into powder, an activity not endorsed by OSHA. It is more hazardous to the terrorists than to their intended victims.

And that is why any attempt to manufacture an effective dirty bomb can be traced. The equipment needed is not available at your neighborhood machine shop.

[Dog]

They have run 3 tests on this site and all tests come back postive for weapons grade material.

[Tennessee_Bob]

They're taking their cue from Doug Henning....

It's all an illusion......

[Dolphy]

I think there was a thread on this yesterday based on another report and there were many questions regarding the lack of national media attention.

One just keeps wondering what all will be found. Why are the Iraqi diplomats across the world burning their documents (after the US put out a request for each country to expel them before the war), what validity is there in reports of Russians in Baghdad and then attempting exit via Syria, and what potential discovery so frightened France?

[Tennessee_Bob]

That's just plain old goofy.

[dfwgator]

True. Of course, even if it is true the liberals will still whine that we knew about this site all along but didn't bother to tell the UN because Bush wanted his war.

[SauronOfMordor]

Pu239 - fairly easy to manufacture but hard to make a workable bomb

Hard, as in "technologicly difficult" or as in "requires very sophisticated manufactoring facilities"?

Technology is not a problem -- buy it from the Chinese or Russians or French. Large-scale, sophisticated machining facilities are another story. It might be that it's easier to make a plutonium bomb than set up the enrichment facilities for a U235 bomb

[WildWeasel]

Of the likely culprits, I'd say Russia sold the Iraqis the tech and or the weapons grade plutonium. Put together the story of the Russian diplomatic convoy leaving Baghdad the other day in a big hurry with "confidential" documents as reported by a Russian newspaper.

Too bad the attack didn't stop it so the coalition could get the documents.

[rumrunner]

From December 2002 article

http://nuclearno.com/text.asp?4585

Al-Tuwaitha, a complex sprawling across 50 hectares (120 acres), was the biggest nuclear facility in Iraq and the site of the three Osirak reactors that were bombed by the Israelis in 1981 and the Americans during the Gulf War 10 years later. The plant`s main purpose was to produce the fissionable material needed for making nuclear devices.

The Iraqis say the site is now used for making pharmaceutical products and for experiments in growing mushrooms for the food industry. They say no nuclear work has been done there since 1991.

During their first visit to Tuwaitha last week, agency inspectors took away samples from a German-built furnace which, according to the director of the complex, Faiz al-Barkhdar, has been out of use since the mid-Nineties because of a lack of spare parts.

Dr Barkhdar said: "The truth is that even the harmless work we do now is hampered by lack of resources. When the Israelis bombed us, the IAEA said we had co-operated with them in the past. And that has continued. I do not know why they keep coming back to al-Tuwaitha, but they will not find anything, it does not matter how many so-called satellite photographs Tony Blair produces."

The IAEA said the site had been visited "room by room" but that more time was needed to inspect the dozens of buildings that had been monitored by UN arms inspectors before they pulled out in 1998.

The Iraqis vast declaration to the UN is said to include details of how two methods were used to try to obtain a domestic supply of weapons-grade fuel - electromagnetic isotope separation and gas-centrifuge enrichment.

[finnman69]

I did not think you got plutonium from uranium centrifuges. Plutonium only comes from reactors if I am correct. Someone more technical should step in here to correct me.

[NYC Republican]

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. How often has FOX claimed we've found something, turning out to be a dud? Im my opinion, they've lost an enormous amount of credibility. I still prefer them over the others, but during the war, I've found MSNBC has been the most objective of all of the News Stations. FOX should think about their quality control - it's more important to get the information out right, than first.

[concerned about politics]

Look out, Kim Il Sung! We might have the boys stop by your place for a little prayer meeting on their way home to the States.

He may have been creating his own self-fulfilling prophacy.

[mewzilla]

Well, if this is the site that the French helped build, how about we say Holy Merde!

[L,TOWM]

Masters in Middle Eastern Studies.

[Donna Lee Nardo]

Please see my post # 92

http://www.itshappening.com/forumdisplay.php?s=8312215791f6eaa4eb299fa4332de423&forumid=5

[elbucko]

What about the Palestine Hotel? Are you targeting journalists now? Hhhmmm?

My personal opinion is; "I hope so".