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Saddumb's weapons of mass destruction

Discussion in 'Political Debate & Discussion' started by freedom's cause, Sep 7, 2005.

  1. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    lookey looky another nukey - freedom's cause

    7:57 pm - Posted by John
    The Uranium Joe Wilson Didn't Mention
    Our AC is out and my house is 92 degrees…and it’s 9pm. It sucks. So all you get is this article from Newsmax…say what you will about Newsmax…but at least it’s a place where they name their sources.
    Here’s an excerpt.

    If the average American were aware of these undisputed facts, the debate over Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction would have been decided long ago - in President Bush’s favor.
    The Uranium Joe Wilson Didn’t Mention

    By April 2003, when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Saddam Hussein had stockpiled 500 tons of yellowcake uranium at his al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development plant south of Baghdad.

    That intriguing little detail is almost never mentioned by the big media, who prefer to chant the mantra "Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction" while echoing Joseph Wilson’s claim that "Bush lied" about Iraq seeking more of the nuclear material in Niger.

    Story Continues Below


    The media’s decision to put the Wilson-Plame affair back on the front burner, however, may turn out to be a blessing in disguise for President Bush - giving his administration a chance to resurrect an important debate they conceded far too easily about the weapons of mass destruction threat posed by Saddam Hussein.

    First, the facts - from a reliable critic of the White House, the New York Times, which covered the story long after the paper announced it was tightening its standards on WMD news out of Iraq.

    "The United States has informed an international agency that oversees nuclear materials that it intends to move hundreds of tons of uranium from a sealed repository south of Baghdad to a more secure place outside Iraq," the paper announced in a little-noticed May 2004 report.

    "The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapons program until it was largely shut down after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, holds more than 500 tons of uranium," the paper revealed, before insisting: "None of it [is] enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon."

    Well, almost none.

    The Times went on to report that amidst Saddam’s yellowcake stockpile, U.S. weapons inspectors found "some 1.8 tons" that they "classified as low-enriched uranium."

    The paper conceded that while Saddam’s nearly 2 tons of partially enriched uranium was "a more potent form" of the nuclear fuel, it was "still not sufficient for a weapon."

    Consulted about the low-enriched uranium discovery, however, Ivan Oelrich, a physicist at the Federation of American Scientists, told the Associated Press that if it was of the 3 percent to 5 percent level of enrichment common in fuel for commercial power reactors, the 1.8 tons could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb.

    And Thomas B. Cochran, director of the nuclear program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the Times that the low-enriched uranium could be useful to a nation with nuclear ambitions.

    "A country like Iran could convert that into weapons-grade material with a lot fewer centrifuges than would be required with natural uranium," he explained.

    Luckily, Iraq didn’t have even the small number of centrifuges necessary to get the job done.

    Or did it?

    The physicist tapped by Saddam to run his centrifuge program says that after the first Gulf War, the program was largely dismantled. But it wasn’t destroyed.

    In fact, according to what he wrote in his 2004 book, "The Bomb in My Garden," Dr. Mahdi Obeidi told U.S. interrogators: "Saddam kept funding the IAEC [Iraq Atomic Energy Commission] from 1991 … until the war in 2003."

    "I was developing the centrifuge for the weapons" right through 1997, he revealed.

    And after that, Dr. Obeidi said, Saddam ordered him under penalty of death to keep the technology available to resume Iraq’s nuke program at a moment’s notice.

    Dr. Obeidi said he buried "the full set of blueprints, designs - everything to restart the centrifuge program - along with some critical components of the centrifuge" under the garden of his Baghdad home.

    "I had to maintain the program to the bitter end," he explained. All the while the Iraqi physicist was aware that he held the key to Saddam’s continuing nuclear ambitions.

    "The centrifuge is the single most dangerous piece of nuclear technology," Dr. Obeidi says in his book. "With advances in centrifuge technology, it is now possible to conceal a uranium enrichment program inside a single warehouse."

    Consider: 500 tons of yellowcake stored at Saddam’s old nuclear weapons plant, where he’d managed to partially enrich 1.8 tons. And the equipment and blueprints that could enrich enough uranium to make a bomb stored away for safekeeping. And all of it at the Iraqi dictator’s disposal.

    If the average American were aware of these undisputed facts, the debate over Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction would have been decided long ago - in President Bush’s favor.

    One more detail that Mr. Wilson and his media backers don’t like to discuss: There’s a reason Niger was such a likely candidate for Saddam’s uranium shopping spree.

    Responding to the firestorm that erupted after Wilson’s July 2003 column, Prime Minister Tony Blair told reporters:

    "In case people should think that the whole idea of a link between Iraq and Niger was some invention, in the 1980s we know for sure that Iraq purchased round about 270 tons of uranium from Niger."


    is this what ended up in Iran or syria Freedom's cause
     
  2. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    :confused:
    So, do you HONESTLY believe that Saddam had this yellowcake uranium, yet when faced with invasion, he moved it all away? You believe that he chose total defeat over using the WMD's he had? Put another way, despite a track record of using WMD's against his enemies (and his own people), he simply had them moved to other countries?

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  3. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    perhaps he was not able to complete the job
    otherwise I cannot answer that but He had
    the yellow cake I would like to know more about
    the nuclear physicist who worked for Saddam
     
  4. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    You really didn't answer my questions, did you?

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  5. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    shouldn't have to the post says it all but I wasn't there I am sure I could find someone if
    I dug deep enough may I say Thank God Saddumb is
    behind bars and soon to be executed read the post
    on Saudi doodi
     
  6. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    Ah, but to paraphrase the radio host "Lionel," this is not a case of we didn't find anywhere near the amount of WMD's we thought we would, this is a case of we didn't find any WMD's at all.

    Think about that: we didn't find anything. Now why would Saddam, who has a history of using these WMD's, not use a single WMD on an overwhelming force overrunning his country? Am I to believe that he preferred that spider hole over using everything in his arsenal?

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  7. Daisy

    Daisy New Member

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    500 tons is a lot of uranium. If he had so much, why was he seeking, unsuccessfully, more?
    Iran was Iraq's arch nemesis.

    Dr. Mahdi Obeidi has changed his story from time to time (linkie) and is shilling his book.

    Where is the link to this story where they name their sources? Or at least a link to John's post, whoever he may be, where ever it is he posted....a link to something, some source?
     
  8. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    what about the commissars Russia and the French
    had a lot to lose if they were caught with their
    pants down Saddumb had more than enough time to realize russia wasn't going to help and that he
    rather than lose WMD give it to his allies for a time better to his advantage I think he thought he would somehow stay on his throne thinking bush would do the same thing clinton did and that is threaten only Thank God Saddumb my very well be paying the ultimate price with his life
    and the people of Iraq will have their first chance at democracy even though I am pessimisstic and a realist its' possible and hopefully we and they the iraqi's will achieve democracy and yes I know that the bible has the final say that is the God of our bible Thanks be to God
     
  9. TCassidy

    TCassidy Late-Administator Emeritus
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    He didn't have 500 tons of uranium. He had 500 tons of yellow cake.

    Uranium occurs in nature as pitchblende. The pitchblende ore is then crushed, run through a ball mill, then is hydrated (water is added), then, after a settling and evaporation period, sulfuric acid is added to leach out amphoteric oxide. The liquid is then allowed to thicken via evaporation then it is run through a filter and into a solvent extraction process. The heavier uranium is them allowed to precipitate out and the resultant sludge is then allowed to thicken even more via evaporation. The product is put through the centrifuge and a drier to produce yellowcake.

    That is what Saddam had. 500 tons of yellowcake. That means it had already been through at least a dozen of the steps to extract the enriched U235 weapons grade uranium.

    The next step would be to dissolve the yellowcake in nitric acid then put it through a solvent extraction process. The uranium is washed out of the solution with nitric acid and concentrated by evaporation and heating to produce uranium trioxide. This uranium trioxide is then refined into weapons grade (80% or greater enrichment) U235.

    In other words, 12 of the 17 steps to produce weapons grade U235 had already been completed.

    The 500 tons of yellowcake could make at least one, and possibly more, atomic bombs. Why did he want more? Because 1 or 2 bombs were not enough for that madman to destroy all of his enemies. Why did the US have several thousand of them? Probably the same reason.

    Anybody who thinks Saddam having that much potential weapons grade nuclear material is not a serious threat to the entire world is living with his head in the sand.
     
  10. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    Thank you DR TCassidy I greatly admire your work
    regards fc
     
  11. TCassidy

    TCassidy Late-Administator Emeritus
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    Thank you. This thread just happened to stumble into my area of expertise. Prior to entering the ministry full time, I was a Nuclear Engineer. [​IMG]
     
  12. freedom's cause

    freedom's cause New Member

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    good timing ehhh Praise the Lord He is always right on time this must have been a moadim

    Shalom Shalom
     
  13. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    Ritter didn't think so....

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  14. TCassidy

    TCassidy Late-Administator Emeritus
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    You seem to have added a superfluous word to your sentence. Did you mean to write "Ritter didn't think?" If so, I agree. Telling the truth did not fit his personal political agenda.
    Let's see:
    What exactly did Ritter think 500 tons of yellowcake was? Cornmeal? And in the 5 years from 1998 until 2003 what did he think Saddam was going to do with that yellowcake? Eat it?
     
  15. Daisy

    Daisy New Member

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  16. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    What exactly did Ritter think 500 tons of yellowcake was? Cornmeal? And in the 5 years from 1998 until 2003 what did he think Saddam was going to do with that yellowcake? Eat it? </font>[/QUOTE].............and yet, where are those WMD's?

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  17. TCassidy

    TCassidy Late-Administator Emeritus
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    Uh, have you been reading the thread? 500 tons of yellowcake ring a bell? What was he going to do with 500 tons of yellowcake? Could it be, well, uh, maybe, possibly, somehow, perhaps . . . make nuclear bombs with it? If not, what else is it good for? I understand it makes very poor fertilizer! Tends to make the soil radioactive!
     
  18. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    Seriously, where are all the WMD's? We haven't found a single one, have we?

    Regards,
    BiR
     
  19. TCassidy

    TCassidy Late-Administator Emeritus
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    You don't seem to be paying attention. What do you think 500 tons of yellowcake is for?
     
  20. Baptist in Richmond

    Baptist in Richmond Active Member

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    No, actually I am paying attention.
    I keep hearing about this yellowcake, but where is it? It is one thing to say it, but quite another to actually locate it.
     
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