Soldiers: Looters took explosives

[Gut Check]

http://www.indystar.com/articles/8/192168-1118-010.html

Soldiers: Looters took explosives
U.S. troops say they were unable to keep munitions from being stolen at Iraqi depot.



Los Angeles Times
November 5, 2004



WASHINGTON -- In the weeks after the fall of Baghdad, Iraqi looters drove off in pickups loaded with powerful explosives from the Al-Qaqaa ammunition site, according to a small group of U.S. soldiers who said they witnessed the looting.

The soldiers said about 12 U.S. troops guarding the sprawling facility could not prevent the thefts because they were outnumbered. Soldiers from one unit said they sent a message to commanders in Baghdad requesting help to secure the site but received no reply.

The witnesses' accounts of the looting are the first provided by U.S. soldiers and support claims that the U.S. military failed to safeguard the powerful munitions. Last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency -- the U.N. nuclear watchdog -- and the interim Iraqi government reported that about 380 tons of high-grade explosives had been taken from the facility after the fall of Baghdad on April 9, 2003. They are powerful enough to detonate a nuclear weapon.

The Bush administration at first suggested the explosives could have been taken by Saddam Hussein's forces before the war began. The Pentagon officials later said U.S. troops destroyed hundreds of tons of explosives at Al-Qaqaa after Baghdad fell.

Asked about the four soldiers' accounts, a Pentagon spokeswoman said Wednesday: "We are looking into the facts and circumstances of this incident."

The soldiers, who belong to two different units, described how Iraqis plundered explosives from unsecured bunkers before driving off in Toyota trucks.

U.S. troops said they could do little to prevent looting from the ammunition site.

"We were running from one side of the compound to the other side, trying to kick people out," said one senior noncommissioned officer who was at the site in late April 2003. "On our last day there, there were at least 100 vehicles waiting at the site for us to leave" so they could come in and loot munitions.

"It was complete chaos. It was looting like L.A. during the Rodney King riots," another soldier said.

He and the other soldiers who spoke to the Los Angeles Times asked not to be identified, saying they feared retaliation from the Pentagon.

A Minnesota television station last week telecast a video of U.S. troops from the 101st Airborne using tools to cut through wire seals left by the International Atomic Energy Agency at Al-Qaqaa, evidence that the high-grade explosives were still inside at least one bunker weeks after the start of the war.

The video was made April 18, 2003, while soldiers from the 101st Airborne searched Al-Qaqaa for chemical and biological weapons. The U.N. nuclear watchdog had placed seals on nine of the bunkers at the complex where inspectors had found high-grade explosives. Other bunkers contained more conventional munitions.

After opening the bunkers, including one containing high-grade explosives, U.S. troops left the bunkers unsecured, the Minnesota station reported.

According to the four soldiers, the looting occurred from late April to early May.

Soldiers from the two units said they visited the ammunition facility soon after the departure of troops from the 101st Airborne Division.

The soldiers interviewed by the Los Angeles Times could not confirm that powerful explosives -- known as HMX and RDX -- were among the materials looted.

One soldier said U.S. forces watched the looters' trucks, loaded with bags marked "hexamine," a key ingredient for HMX, being driven away from the facility. Unsure what hexamine was, the troops later did an Internet search and learned of its explosive power.

"We found out this was stuff you don't smoke around," the soldier said.

A senior U.S. military intelligence official corroborated some aspects of the four soldiers' accounts. The official added that Al-Qaqaa was "one of the top 200" suspected sites for chemical and biological weapons at the outset of the war.

Despite the stockpiles of munitions at the site, no U.S. forces were specifically assigned to guard Al-Qaqaa after the 101st Airborne left the facility.