It gets worse....

Last week, I posted a link to a story about a Defense Department team's discovery that one of Iraqi's nuclear sites had been looted, and there was no idea what all might be missing. Today we learn that in addition to that site, six others have also been looted and it appears that heavy equipment, radiological sources, documentation on making nuclear weapons, chemicals and other materials and may information have vanished.

It is still not clear what has been lost in the sacking of Iraq's nuclear establishment. But it is well documented that looters roamed unrestrained among stores of chemical elements and scientific files that would speed development, in the wrong hands, of a nuclear or radiological bomb. Many of the files, and some of the containers that held radioactive sources, are missing.

Previous reports have described damage at two of the facilities, the Tuwaitha Yellowcake Storage Facility and the adjacent Baghdad Nuclear Research Center. Now, the identity of three more damaged sites has been learned: the Ash Shaykhili Nuclear Facility, the Baghdad New Nuclear Design Center and the Tahadi Nuclear Establishment.

The identities of two other sites, also said to have been looted, could not be learned.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had earlier pressed the US to allow them to come in and handle the inspections of nuclear facilities, since that is what they are trained for, and under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and certain UN resolutions, they are the sole legal authority responsible to conduct such investigations, but they report that they never received a reply from us about doing so.

Recent reports have indicated that the US believes the looting of the art museums was done by "professionals" who knew what they were looking for and most likely had buyers already lined up for it. I honestly don't know if that is the truth or just some spin we're trying to put on the situation to make us look less incompetent and negligent in our handling of the aftermath of the war, but at the moment, I'm almost hoping it's spin. If its not, then it seems to me that it's also more likely than not that the looting of the nuclear sites would also have been done by professionals, who would also have buyers at the ready. That is a bit more frightening than I like to contemplate. Even if the looters are not professionals, though, if we aren't sure what has been taken or by whom, we will have no way to effectively track down the materials or know if or when any of it has been recovered.

Sadly, this may, in a way, turn out to be a boon for the Bush administration, which seems to thrive on having potential boogeymen who potentially have dangerous weaponry. As long as there can be a case made that we could be attacked at any moment by evil madmen bent on the US's distruction and armed with the ability to cause significant damage, they can continue to insist on silencing dissent to their aggressive foreign policy, justify the reduction in our civil liberties, and threaten or actually wage wars in pursuit of their apparent imperial agenda. The administration feeds on the fear of the citizenry, and seven looted nuclear sites very well may buy them enough fear to stretch the "War on Terror™" all the way through the 2004 election.

Posted by thorswitch at May 10, 2003 08:43 AM | TrackBack