http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2000/02/20/stifgnmid02003.html?999

Saddam's elite troops prime poison missiles

Marie Colvin and Uzi Mahnaimi

AN IRAQI defector last week provided the first real evidence that Saddam Hussein has continued building his clandestine chemical weapons since United Nations inspectors left Iraq more than a year ago. The defector said his unit had delivered warheads to a secret launch site where they were loaded with chemicals, then returned them to their hiding place in the Baghdad area. The operation appeared to be a "practice run" for a future attack.

The information confirms suspicions that Saddam has used the absence of UN inspectors to revive his dream of a non-conventional arsenal that would allow him to dominate the region.

A military source who reviewed the defector's testimony said: "It seems that he is credible. From the terms he uses, this is obviously a man who is knowledgeable about this subject." The source called the information "horrifying, but maybe not so surprising".

The defector, whose name is being withheld for security reasons, is travelling with his wife and children to what he hopes will be a better life in another Arab country. Now 37, he has served in the Iraqi army since he was 17 and until his defection worked in Amn al-Has, Saddam's special security organisation.

The elite force's responsibilities include espionage, counter-espionage and putting down rebellions. But the defector said that in recent years his unit was mostly concerned with hiding non-conventional weapons from UN inspectors who, under the terms of the agreement that ended the Gulf war, were charged with finding and destroying Saddam's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and missiles with a range of more than 150 miles.

The defector's unit had been trained since 1990, he said, to guard the hidden sites of the warheads and ballistic missiles and to deliver the warheads to launch sites.

During the Gulf war, he said, Iraq had come far closer to launching a missile strike with chemical and biological weapons than had ever been realised.

In 1990, he and his comrades had loaded four trucks with chemical and biological warheads and driven them to a secret launch site. However, none of the missiles was launched. It was reported later that the United States warned Tariq Aziz, then foreign minister, that it would respond with a nuclear strike if Saddam launched chemical or biological weapons at the Desert Storm troops.

The defector's recent orders reveal that Saddam has retained the lethal chemical weapons of sarin and a related gas called GF. "The last time we trained on the warheads was just last summer," he said.

"We collected from a site near Baghdad six warheads containing sarin and also GF. We drove the trucks to a remote desert location, where the experts prepared the warheads. I know that the warheads contain one component of the sarin gas and the GF gas.

"For safety reasons, the rest has to be added a short time before the actual launch. In the morning we returned the warheads to the Baghdad region."

The defector said he was told that the weapons he transferred were a type called "muzdawage", Arabic slang for binary weapons.

Intelligence experts suspect Saddam has not just stepped up his manufacturing programme of chemical and biological weapons but has also moved his arms cache since UN inspectors were forced out of Baghdad in December 1998, triggering four days of bombing by American and British jets.

A new inspection body, the UN monitoring verification and inspection commission (Unmovic) has yet to begin work in Iraq, but faces immediate problems when it does. Iraq says it has completely disarmed and will not co-operate with any more inspectors.

Military sources believe Saddam has rebuilt hundreds of military and industrial sites bombed in 1998. "He has had a lot of time to operate without inspections," one source said.

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), February 21, 2000

Answers

Great post Donna.

Clinton has done a very poor job of dealing with Saddam.

-- Dana (A_Non_O_Moose@xxx.com), February 21, 2000.

>> Clinton has done a very poor job at dealing with Saddam. <<

What do you suggest he do that he hasn't done?

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), February 21, 2000.

Any administration which inherited George Bush's foolish decision to suspend the Gulf war leaving Saddam Hussein in power would find itself in the same bind. We had the troops on the ground, the hardware, the fuel,the equipment in place, we had the momentum, we had the international and domestic support, we even had the Saudi's support-- and threw it away. Clinton may be many things, but a magician is not one of them.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), February 22, 2000.

Two things we didn't have:

1. Support from the United Nations, which if you recall is where the political part of that time was played out. It was a different time.

2. Assurance that the Iranians wouldn't take advantage of the power vacuum that the loss of Sadaam would cause and take over Iraq, becoming a bigger problem than Sadaam was.

Maybe it would have been best to get rid of him, maybe not. I think that Iran is the real threat in the Gulf, not Sadaam. Time will tell.

-- Mark (markmic@kynd.net), February 22, 2000.