Al Qa Qaa weapons verified on April 5, 2003??

[ciaobox]

Found some interesting links from past stories about looting/Al Qa Qaa

Were the weapons there on April 5, 2003?
Here is a report from 4/5/03 that details A weapons search at Al Qa Qaa. It seems that they DID know the weapons were there and verified it at that time...has anyone contacted Col. John Peabody?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A31589-2003Apr4¬Found=true


"In the first of yesterday's discoveries, the 3rd Infantry Division entered the vast Qa Qaa chemical and explosives production plant and came across thousands of vials of white powder, packed three to a box. The engineers also found stocks of atropine and pralidoxime, also known as 2-PAM chloride, which can be used to treat exposure to nerve agents but is also used to treat poisoning by organic phosphorus pesticides. Alongside those materials were documents written in Arabic that, as interpreted at the scene, appeared to include discussions of chemical warfare.

This morning, however, investigators said initial tests indicated the white powder was not a component of a chemical weapon. "On first analysis it does not appear to be a chemical that could be used in a chemical weapons attack," Col. John Peabody, commander of the division's engineering brigade, told a Reuters reporter with his unit.

U.N. inspectors have surveyed Qa Qaa some two dozen times, most recently last month. But some 1,000 structures there, organized into 10 or more factory complexes, have mainly been devoted to such conventional military industries as EXPLOSIVES and missile fuels. Neither is forbidden under U.N. Security Council mandates. Qa Qaa was last linked to proscribed activity in 1995 -- and somewhat peripherally then.

"Based on you couldn't form any real judgment," said Terence Taylor of Britain, a former inspector with the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM). "It is a place where there would be a lot of chemicals, not necessarily related to chemical or biological weapons. More likely in that place it would relate to some form of rocket propellant."


Here are some more articles from the past.
UN nuclear team checks Iraq looting Friday, 6 June, 2003
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2967956.stm


Iraqi Nuclear sites 'stripped carefully'
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/10/14/iraq.nuclear.reut/

U.N. wants to inspect Iraq nuclear facility
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/special/iraq/1896768

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/08/sprj.irq.int.looting.reut/
http://www1.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=893F4B24-CA59-487E-A0E72485A33D8230

[Lone_Star_Dem]

1. I am wondering too

Could someone explain this article to me, I am so confused. Is this a different al Qa Qaa south of Baghdad?

PBS Link

<http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/chemical_04-04-03.html>

[sandnsea]

6. Same one

I didn't read this whole article, but I've read reports that the seals were still on the buildings. Besides all the other articles about looting over there. There's an editorial in the Globe too, posted in Editorials. It's quite straight-forward. The guy even went to Wolfowitz about it. We now have official reports that all this stuff is missing, alot more than just these explosives. Biological cultures, yellowcake, all kinds of good stuff. They have made a colossal disaster where there was only a nuisance.

[JohnnyCougar]

2. We should be sending this to the media and the local Kerry campaigns

[sonicx]

3. DU has talked about this, the media is ignoring their own reporting

basically

[bigtree]

4. AP- Timeline on Missing Explosives in Iraq

The Associated Press
Published: Oct 27, 2004

- April 10: Troops from the 101st Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade spend 24 hours at the site, search for chemical weapons - but not high explosives - and then head to Baghdad. An NBC reporter embedded with the unit said there's no talk among the 101st of securing the area after they leave.

- May 3: The nuclear agency purportedly notifies the U.S. Mission in Vienna of its concerns about the Al-Qaqaa facility.

- May 8: An American site survey team arrives to inspect the Latifiyah Phosgene Facility - part of Al-Qaqaa - and finds the plant heavily looted.

- May 11: An American site survey team arrives to inspect Latifiyah Missile and Rocket production facility, also part of Al-Qaqaa. The team assesses the facility as non-operational but with possible dual use.

- May 27: U.S. troops search specifically for high explosives. The troops find the seals have been broken. It's not clear whether they did a further accounting of the materials themselves.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBIZVR1U0E.html

[ciaobox]

5. Wow Josh Marshall beat me to it and put it in great context....

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/fast.php