Russia tied to Iraq's missing arms

Uncle_Sam

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Russia tied to Iraq's missing arms :evil:



By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Russian special forces troops moved many of Saddam Hussein's weapons and related goods out of Iraq and into Syria in the weeks before the March 2003 U.S. military operation, The Washington Times has learned. John A. Shaw, the deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security, said in an interview that he believes the Russian troops, working with Iraqi intelligence, "almost certainly" removed the high-explosive material that went missing from the Al-Qaqaa facility, south of Baghdad.

"The Russians brought in, just before the war got started, a whole series of military units," Mr. Shaw said. "Their main job was to shred all evidence of any of the contractual arrangements they had with the Iraqis. The others were transportation units."

Mr. Shaw, who was in charge of cataloguing the tons of conventional arms provided to Iraq by foreign suppliers, said he recently obtained reliable information on the arms-dispersal program from two European intelligence services that have detailed knowledge of the Russian-Iraqi weapons collaboration.

Most of Saddam's most powerful arms were systematically separated from other arms like mortars, bombs and rockets, and sent to Syria and Lebanon, and possibly to Iran, he said.

The Russian involvement in helping disperse Saddam's weapons, including some 380 tons of RDX and HMX is still being investigated, Mr. Shaw said. The RDX and HMX, which are used to manufacture high-explosive and nuclear weapons, are probably of Russian origin, he said.

Pentagon spokesman Larry DiRita could not be reached for comment. The disappearance of the material was reported in a letter Oct. 10 from the Iraqi government to the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Disclosure of the missing explosives Monday in a New York Times story was used by the Democratic presidential campaign of Sen. John Kerry, who accused the Bush administration of failing to secure the material.

Al-Qaqaa, a known Iraqi weapons site, was monitored closely, Mr. Shaw said.
"That was such a pivotal location, Number 1, that the mere fact of [special explosives] disappearing was impossible," Mr. Shaw said. "And Number 2, if the stuff disappeared, it had to have gone before we got there."

The Pentagon disclosed yesterday that the Al-Qaqaa facility was defended by Fedayeen Saddam, Special Republican Guard and other Iraqi military units during the conflict. U.S. forces defeated the defenders around April 3 and found the gates to the facility open, the Pentagon said in a statement yesterday.

A military unit in charge of searching for weapons, the Army's 75th Exploitation Task Force, then inspected Al-Qaqaa on May 8, May 11 and May 27, 2003, and found no high explosives that had been monitored in the past by the IAEA.
The Pentagon said there was no evidence of large-scale movement of explosives from the facility after April 6.

"The movement of 377 tons of heavy ordnance would have required dozens of heavy trucks and equipment moving along the same roadways as U.S. combat divisions occupied continually for weeks prior to and subsequent to the 3rd Infantry Division's arrival at the facility," the statement said. The statement also said that the material may have been removed from the site by Saddam's regime.

According to the Pentagon, U.N. arms inspectors sealed the explosives at Al-Qaqaa in January 2003 and revisited the site in March and noted that the seals were not broken. It is not known if the inspectors saw the explosives in March. The U.N. team left the country before the U.S.-led invasion began March 20, 2003.

A second defense official said documents on the Russian support to Iraq reveal that Saddam's government paid the Kremlin for the special forces to provide security for Iraq's Russian arms and to conduct counterintelligence activities designed to prevent U.S. and Western intelligence services from learning about the arms pipeline through Syria.

The Russian arms-removal program was initiated after Yevgeny Primakov, the former Russian intelligence chief, could not convince Saddam to give in to U.S. and Western demands, this official said.

A small portion of Iraq's 650,000 tons to 1 million tons of conventional arms that were found after the war were looted after the U.S.-led invasion, Mr. Shaw said. Russia was Iraq's largest foreign supplier of weaponry, he said.
However, the most important and useful arms and explosives appear to have been separated and moved out as part of carefully designed program. "The organized effort was done in advance of the conflict," Mr. Shaw said.

The Russian forces were tasked with moving special arms out of the country.
Mr. Shaw said foreign intelligence officials believe the Russians worked with Saddam's Mukhabarat intelligence service to separate out special weapons, including high explosives and other arms and related technology, from standard conventional arms spread out in some 200 arms depots. The Russian weapons were then sent out of the country to Syria, and possibly Lebanon in Russian trucks, Mr. Shaw said.

Mr. Shaw said he believes that the withdrawal of Russian-made weapons and explosives from Iraq was part of plan by Saddam to set up a "redoubt" in Syria that could be used as a base for launching pro-Saddam insurgency operations in Iraq.

The Russian units were dispatched beginning in January 2003 and by March had destroyed hundreds of pages of documents on Russian arms supplies to Iraq while dispersing arms to Syria, the second official said. Besides their own weapons, the Russians were supplying Saddam with arms made in Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria and other Eastern European nations, he said. "Whatever was not buried was put on lorries and sent to the Syrian border," the defense official said.

Documents reviewed by the official included itineraries of military units involved in the truck shipments to Syria. The materials outlined in the documents included missile components, MiG jet parts, tank parts and chemicals used to make chemical weapons, the official said.

The director of the Iraqi government front company known as the Al Bashair Trading Co. fled to Syria, where he is in charge of monitoring arms holdings and funding Iraqi insurgent activities, the official said.

Also, an Arabic-language report obtained by U.S. intelligence disclosed the extent of Russian armaments. The 26-page report was written by Abdul Tawab Mullah al Huwaysh, Saddam's minister of military industrialization, who was captured by U.S. forces May 2, 2003.

The Russian "spetsnaz" or special-operations forces were under the GRU military intelligence service and organized large commercial truck convoys for the weapons removal, the official said.

Regarding the explosives, the new Iraqi government reported that 194.7 metric tons of HMX, or high-melting-point explosive, and 141.2 metric tons of RDX, or rapid-detonation explosive, and 5.8 metric tons of PETN, or pentaerythritol tetranitrate, were missing.

The material is used in nuclear weapons and also in making military "plastic" high explosive. Defense officials said the Russians can provide information on what happened to the Iraqi weapons and explosives that were transported out of the country. Officials believe the Russians also can explain what happened to Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20041028-122637-6257r.htm
 
I could definetly believe that. Putin has and always will be a lying deceitful bastard. But there could be good news to that. Good news is, assuming Putin was the one who put that in motion, the explosives won't be instantly distrubuted to terrorists (assuming the officers in charge of that aren't out to make a buck). And that's only because the Russians have terrorists issues too and they don't want to hand out bombs that will only be used against them later.
 
You must remember where Putin comes from. Once a spook always a spook. He will do anything if he personally and maby Russia can gain anything on it. Never underestimate the Russians even if they don't have that much money they now how to fix things cheap.

I have personally seen some interesting Russian solution that functions very well, are not hitech at all and very cheap to do.
 
Minor problem with that article, theres video tape showing the explosives being inspected by american troops.
 
egoz said:
I could definetly believe that. Putin has and always will be a lying deceitful bastard. But there could be good news to that. Good news is, assuming Putin was the one who put that in motion, the explosives won't be instantly distrubuted to terrorists (assuming the officers in charge of that aren't out to make a buck). And that's only because the Russians have terrorists issues too and they don't want to hand out bombs that will only be used against them later.
'

Even if it was SF's thw wouldent sell those weapons..
 
I don't think we should blame Fredral Russia, for every stolen military,arms in Iraq. I agree, with post#5 I'm proud to be American, but he should help Russia, and the CIS.
America didn't find any stolen weapons, don't blame Russia.
 
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IF the GRU moved weapons out of the way BEFORE the invasion, was that a bad thing?
As I understand the article the weapons were conventional, that means the US wouldn´t have to face those weapons on the battlefield.
That would have to be construed as positive, right?

I remember the US finding high tech anti air sensors in Baghdad during the air offensive.
Everyone were pissed off as they thought it were Russian.

Complaining now about weapons being REMOVED now just goes to show how the tides turn. Politics.

I got no love for Russia.
But this is getting rediculous.
 
Oh my....

I thought the idea of Saddam having WMD's were dead and buried long ago.
If he had them, or had any hope of gaining them, he wouldn't turned to religion the way he did.

Anyway, the proposed scenario of Russian truck convoys hauling every piece of Saddam's WMD program AND the high explosives mentioned out of Iraq and accross the Syrian border UNDETECTED by ANY western intelligence agencies is just to fantastic to be believed. :p
 
What's wrong with selling your weapons? This stuff was business as usual until the US attained the unenviable position of World Police.
 
I have always assumed Russia, China, Syria, Iran and maybe others have been involved with the disappearance of the WMD's.
 
I have always assumed Russia, China, Syria, Iran and maybe others have been involved with the disappearance of the WMD's.


Or France, yes the French are more likely to have done it.
They don't have to be worried about US intelligence looking over their shoulder, and...
Or Canada, there you go, blame Canada! :cowb:
 
I have always assumed Russia, China, Syria, Iran and maybe others have been involved with the disappearance of the WMD's.

Perhaps I missed something but the article does not mention anything about WMD, only explosives. We never believed you then, we dont believe you now.

Its all about creds guys
 
Ah, you resurected a wich is four weeks old and containing a subject most of us believes to be just as dead as Kentucky Fried Chicken... :)

Don't think it will stirr much tension untill someone actually produce the infamous "smoking gun" here.
 
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