Originally posted by DJ RANN
I was just waiting for you to post that so I could post up one of my favourite quotes from that "discovery"....
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If you check into this, you'll quickly find that the uranium a) was not weapons grade and b) was well known and already logged to the UN and IAEA and was being stored legally by Saddam's government prior to the original Gulf conflict. It was legally in Iraq according to international law.
I wondered if the right wing echo chamber would use this as "proof" that the WMD claims were true after all. I got even better than I hoped, as not only do they use it that way, but they reveal how dishonest they are by the way they have done this.
lololololololol. So basically, they "found" something that they knew was legally there. lol, nice "proof".
Actually, I was waiting for you to take the bait on that comment, knowing how you would react, so I could show you how misinformed you are, eager to snap up the headlines without reading the fine print.
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...The fact that the material was under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for more than a decade opens an entirely different line of questioning: Is the entire group of United Nations bureaucrats running the IAEA legally insane?
These issues are somewhat separate from the Plame-Wilson-Rove dust up that's been roiling Washington recently, but nevertheless shed light on why Joe Wilson went to Niger in February of 2002 and why the bureaucratic tussle over those 16 words about the Iraqi-Niger yellow cake connection was so fierce.
The story begins at the end of the first Gulf War when inspectors found a 500 ton cache of refined yellow cake uranium at Iraq's primary nuclear research facility in Al-Tuwaitha outside of Bagdhad. The cache was part of a huge inventory of nuclear materials discovered by UN inspectors that included low-level radioactive material of the type used for industrial and medical purposes as well as a quantity of highly enriched uranium suitable for bomb production.
This Highly Enriched uranium was shipped to Russia where it was made relatively harmless by a process known as 'isotopic dilution' — but only after the Iraqis dragged their heels for more than 6 months following the cease fire by playing a cat and mouse game with the IAEA's inspectors. The history of those early IAEA inspections can be found here (http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Bo...Iraq/event.html) and is an eye opening look at both the gullibility of the IAEA and the lengths to which Saddam sought to keep as much of his nuclear bomb making capability as he could.
The IAEA placed a seal on the nuclear materials in November of 1992. From then until the fall of Saddam, the agency attempted to make sure that Iraq did not use the yellow cake to reconstitute its nuclear program, something the IAEA acknowledged could be done if the Iraqis were able to rebuild its centrifuges and gain access to additional fissile material. Keeping track of the material was made extraordinarily difficult by the Iraqis who regularly impeded IAEA officials from carrying out even the most routine inspections.
Flash forward to 1999 when British intelligence found out through multiple sources that representatives of the Iraqi government had met with officials from the Niger government.
This fact is not in dispute. The mystery is in what they talked about. A memo obtained by the British- later proven to be a forgery- purported to show the Iraqis were interested in purchasing 500 tons of yellow cake uranium from Niger's mines. Forgery or not, since Niger's exports are extremely limited, consisting largely of uranium ore, livestock, cowpeas, and onions, one doesn't have to be an intelligence analyst to figure out in which one of those items the Iraqis might be interested.
Both the Butler Review and the Senate Select Committee on Pre War Iraq Intelligence (SSCI) point to other efforts by Saddam to purchase uranium, most notably from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Butler Review states in 2002 the CIA 'agreed that there was evidence that uranium from Africa had been sought.' In the run-up to war in Iraq, the British Intelligence Services apparently believed that Iraq had been trying to obtain uranium from Africa; however, no evidence has been passed on to the IAEA apart from the forged documents.
This then was the context in which Ambassador Joe Wilson went to Niger in February of 2002. Based on multiple sources and the best judgment of the CIA, Saddam Hussein was trying purchase uranium. Since there were no working commercial nuclear reactors in all of Iraq, his interest could only be based on his desire to reconstitute his nuclear weapons program.
There was no 'fixing' of intelligence or 'shaping' intelligence to fit some preconceived agenda. Despite UN resolutions and sanctions, Saddam was looking to build the bomb.
What about that 500 tons of yellow cake under seal at Al-Tuwaitha? As long as the sanctions were in place, the inspectors would be able to confirm, albeit with great difficulty, that Saddam would not be able to use the material for his bomb building program. But that fact doesn't answer the question: why would any organization charged with keeping a lid on nuclear proliferation allow that much fissile material to be kept by a bloodthirsty tyrant who had already demonstrated a desire to construct a nuclear weapon?
In an article that appeared in The American Thinker on July 20, 2004, Douglas Hanson draws some rather unflattering conclusions about the IAEA and their mission:
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The actions, or more appropriately, the inactions of the IAEA regarding Iraq since the end of Gulf War I, betray the agency's true agenda. Rather than inspect, report, and implement restrictions in accordance with the provisions in the treaty, the agency has in effect become an enabler of rogue nations who are attempting, or who have already succeeded in developing or acquiring special nuclear material and equipment. In other words, the IAEA is simply a reflection of its parent organization, which routinely delays and obfuscates the efforts of the US and the UK in controlling banned substances and delivery systems.
Time after time, the agency has either intentionally or naively bought into the lies and deceptions contrived by nations of the Axis of Evil during IAEA visits and inspections. In most cases, the IAEA avoids confrontation like the plague in order to maintain access to the facilities. If they are booted out, as was the case with North Korea, their impotence is on display for all to see. In other cases, the agency joins in the deception, thereby allowing these rogue states to level the nuclear playing field with the West and Russia.
Clearly then, the IAEA was totally dependent on the sanctions to even carry out the limited inspections it was performing in the 1990's. But how long would the sanctions be in place?
It is an article of faith with critics of the war that 'Saddam was in a box' and there was no need for an invasion to remove him. It's a pity that many of those critics have such a short memory because a review of what many of them were saying about the sanctions prior to September 11, 2001 would show that they were eager to lift the very same sanctions that they now claim was keeping Saddam in check.
Thanks to a remarkable propaganda program that included funeral processions of Iraqi babies whose dead bodies were used over and over again in macabre effort to make it appear that the death toll of infants was higher than it was, the world community was, by 2001, agitating for the lifting of sanctions on the Iraq economy. And while the lifting of economic sanctions would not have meant a lifting of the arms embargo, given the limited resources available to both The United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and the IAEA as well as Iraq's demonstrated ability to impede, obstruct, and deceive inspectors, it stands to reason that the continuation of the arms embargo would have been a sham. Even with the embargo, the Dulfer Report showed that Saddam's ability to evade the sanctions and purchase illicit weapons was extremely troubling.
All of this is important to remember when thinking about that 500 tons of yellow cake uranium sitting under seal at Al-Tuwaitha. How worried was the CIA that Saddam would someday be able to use that material to construct a bomb?
That question goes to the heart of the current controversy over not just who may have 'outed' a covert CIA operative, but whether the Administration was trying to discredit Mr. Wilson so that his charge that the White House manipulated intelligence to fool the American people into support for war would also be disbelieved...
It goes on but you get the point. The devil is in the details.
Comrade Stalin
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Originally posted by hardcore trancer
I don’t think we have all the facts straight in Libya. Mind you this is simply from my own observations and I really don’t want to jump into any conclusions just yet. Time will tell if getting involved in Libya was a wise decision or not.
I truly hope that that everything would have a positive outcome at the end but you cannot simply forget the past conflicts and history has shown us that by getting involved in a country’s political matters and taking sides doesn’t always have happy endings.
We have the facts. It's common knowledge Qaddafi is a tyrant. His people rose up against him and asked the United Nations for a no-fly zone. All the time while being sent into headlong retreat from Qaddafi's tanks, artillery, air superiority, and gun boats. I have to give Obama credit. He didn't shoot first, ask questions later. Qaddafi's forces were at the outskirts of Benghazi before we lifted a finger. Those are plenty of facts and I'm not in the CIA or Pentagon, so imagine what facts they know. I think they acted appropriately. Obama did say, "No ground troops."
The17sss
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Originally posted by srussell0018
Babbling nonsensical pseudo-facts and theories cooked up by right-wing nut jobs doesn't exactly pose a challenge that may disrupt my world view. As for resorting to defensiveness, well, take a look at all of your previous posts ;) I don't need the idiotic and misguided thoughts of people like you to reinforce my beliefs. The only thing you're doing is reinforcing my belief that the US is in the state of that it is right now because of 8 years of "your" thoughts (i.e. the wrong ones). I, unlike you, have the ability to recognize rational thought, no matter the political affiliation it sides with. It just so happens that nothing you're saying is rational.
I'm sorry... 8 years of "my thoughts"? You are wrong again, and using that straw man to reinforce your points. And this fails again because I was not a Bush supporter for the majority of his term as you are assuming. By you deeming that my words are irrational does not make them so.
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It's funny that all you conservatives seem to know how to do is attack. Whether it be war, politics, or news, the conservatives in this country just want to attack anything that goes against them. I could even compare the war in Iraq to the recent slaying of civilians by Muslims protesting the burning of the Qu'ran. A completely unjustified decision made by a few misguided people just looking for an excuse to do some good ol' fashion killin'.
More lies, and more inaccurate assumptions about me; I have no desire to see attacks. You're on a roll buddy. First of all, have you not seen the froth-at-the-mouth attack style of the Left? Intimidation and death threats by union members abound in Wisconsin who go against them. Conservatives and Republicans are attacked on a daily basis from the ivory tower of the Left through all angles of the media, print and visual. I know it's the leftist way to play the victim, but grow up- your side is not overflowing with saints. You're saying that tens of millions of American citizens on the right basically just want to see some good ol' fashion killin' and I'm the one who isn't rationale? LOL!
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I also find it insurmountably hard to believe that you're not a puppet whose strings are firmly held by Rupert Murdoch. Maybe I'm not giving you enough credit. Maybe your misguided thoughts are genuinely original hypotheses cooked up in that delusional head of yours. I guess it's just a coincidence that the people over at Fox tend to think exactly like you in almost every way :stongue:
Typical leftist. I don't see things through your failed hopeandchange policy prism, therefore I must be stupid, misguided, brainwashed by Fox, or something of the sort. Because the "intellectual elite" (that you want to be a part of) simply know better... and to disagree is to take a back seat to intellectualism. You have a lot to learn about the real world that exists outside the classroom.
And have you ever watched MSNBC? Please tell me you don't believe they are fair and balanced.
Lews
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Originally posted by Moongoose
I dont need to go past the first pic where the great argument against the libya op is that it sounds like a stripper name, to know that whoever did this comparison was a ing moron and that most of what follows will be bogus information making fun of the dirty liberal elites who keep bringing the honest god fearing exceptonal tr00 american down...so i didnt even look past the first pic.
It's pretty much completely wrong, exceptionally stupid, and incredibly biased.
Lews
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Originally posted by The17sss
Hmmm. Interesting position. I have to ask you then: since Obama spent the better part of 5 years denouncing Bush's policies on Guantanamo, renditions, tribunals, preventive detention, Predators, and the Patriot Act... and despite promises to limit/end/stop such affronts to civil rights, has either expanded or continued ALL policies, will you condemn Obama now as strongly as you like to condemn Bush for the same things? Will you condemn him for spending $600 million in 1 week in Libya and authorizing a bombing campaign?
I criticize him for the parts I think are wrong and/or bad. I applaud him for keeping the parts I think are necessary and important. He's definitely not perfect, and he's disappointed me in many ways, but I'm going to vote for him again, unless there is a Republican candidate who is surprisingly good (which I think there is a 1% chance of happening), because I think he's done a fairly good job dealing with a lot of extremely difficult problems, especially when he's not getting any help from across the aisle.
There is a big difference between Iraq and Libya. I'm really not sure why that's such a hard idea to grasp :conf:
Joss Weatherby
The best part about that image series is that it fails to mention that the US is no longer actively engaged in combat in Libya... :stongue:
The17sss
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Originally posted by Lews
It's pretty much completely wrong, exceptionally stupid, and incredibly biased.
Kind of like most Democrats.
Back to Libya. The topic of "who are these rebels" is starting to take shape. Two former Afghan Islamists and a former Guantanamo detainee are leading the rebels in Libya. And this is who we are reportedly training and arming in Libya. Former Gitmo detainee Sufyan Ben Qumu being released from Libyan prison last year:
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Two former Afghan Mujahedeen and a six-year detainee at Guantanamo Bay have stepped to the fore of this city’s military campaign, training new recruits for the front and to protect the city from infiltrators loyal to Col. Moammar Gadhafi.
The presence of Islamists like these amid the opposition has raised concerns, among some fellow rebels as well as their Western allies, that the goal of some Libyan fighters in battling Col. Gadhafi is to propagate Islamist extremism.
Abdel Hakim al-Hasady, an influential Islamic preacher and high-school teacher who spent five years at a training camp in eastern Afghanistan, oversees the recruitment, training and deployment of about 300 rebel fighters from Darna.
Mr. Hasady’s field commander on the front lines is Salah al-Barrani, a former fighter from the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, or LIFG, which was formed in the 1990s by Libyan mujahedeen returning home after helping to drive the Soviets from Afghanistan and dedicated to ousting Mr. Gadhafi from power.
Sufyan Ben Qumu, a Libyan army veteran who worked for Osama bin Laden’s holding company in Sudan and later for an al Qaeda-linked charity in Afghanistan, is training many of the city’s rebel recruits.
Both Messrs. Hasady and Ben Qumu were picked up by Pakistani authorities after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and were turned over to the U.S. Mr. Hasady was released to Libyan custody two months later. Mr. Ben Qumu spent six years at Guantanamo Bay before he was turned over to Libyan custody in 2007.
I'm feeling really good about the power vacuum soon to be filled in Libya.
The17sss
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Originally posted by Lews
I'm going to vote for him again, unless there is a Republican candidate who is surprisingly good (which I think there is a 1% chance of happening), because I think he's done a fairly good job dealing with a lot of extremely difficult problems, especially when he's not getting any help from across the aisle.
I mean, sure... why wouldn't you vote a 2nd time for a guy who has increased government spending 84% (including 'stimulus' money), added 200,000 more government workers, and done this to our economy in a short 2 years?
Leadership baby! I don't get it... why would you vote for more of that when it's obviously financially destructive and other candidates will be trying to go in the other direction? How are you better today than you were 2 years ago? What has he accomplished that is worth voting for again???
srussell0018
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Originally posted by The17sss
Kind of like most Democrats.
OOOOOH sick burn.
Joss Weatherby
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Originally posted by The17sss
Kind of like most Democrats.
Back to Libya. The topic of "who are these rebels" is starting to take shape. Two former Afghan Islamists and a former Guantanamo detainee are leading the rebels in Libya. And this is who we are reportedly training and arming in Libya. Former Gitmo detainee Sufyan Ben Qumu being released from Libyan prison last year:
I'm feeling really good about the power vacuum soon to be filled in Libya.
Ok NOW I can post this and it will be 100% what I was saying you were going to do.
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Originally posted by Joss Weatherby
Also Kevin, I am keeping note of how much you were going "GOD DAMN IT, GOD GOD DAMN IT BRAH BRAH BRAH OBAMA NEEDS TO TAKE CARE OF THIS GHADFI FELLA RIGHT NOW BRAH BRAH BRAH!"
That is so when in a few months or a year or whenever it happens you can't come back and be like "Obama supported anti-americans that took over Libya" cause you are mr. rush-the--in-there-and-help-whoever-the--is-fighting-ghdafi.
You are a ing GOP hack and you know it Kevin.
srussell0018
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Originally posted by The17sss
Leadership baby! I don't get it... why would you vote for more of that when it's obviously financially destructive and other candidates will be trying to go in the other direction?
You mean by giving tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans and raising taxes for the "average" worker? Or perhaps by cutting government funding for education, so that Americans can get progressively less intelligent, right up until the point that they're so incredibly stupid that they don't even know any better than to blindly accept these moronic policies as "good."
Just because Republicans have a plan to get the economy back on track doesn't make it a good plan. Maybe they should add a 6th work day to the week too, yeah that'll help.
To answer your typical Republican ignoramus question of "What has he done that's worth voting for again?"
I give you:
The17sss
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Originally posted by Joss Weatherby
Ok NOW I can post this and it will be 100% what I was saying you were going to do.
You are a ing GOP hack and you know it Kevin.
Really? 100% what you were saying I would do? Show me where I am rabidly demanding Ghaddafi be uprooted.
As for supporting the anti-Americans, I suspect maybe you theorized I would say something along those lines because the likelihood of it actually happening was pretty high? Don't shoot the messenger face- I'm simply showing an update of new information that is coming to light. FACT: anti-American Islamists, including one who was locked up at Guantanamo for killing/trying to kill Americans is helping leading the Rebels. We are training/arming them. How does relaying that make me a hack? Because you don't like to hear the hard truth!?
