Enriched Uranium Removed From Iraq

[Sgt Schultz]

Enriched Uranium Removed From Iraq
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2...6/230805.shtml

Nearly two tons of low-enriched uranium has been removed from an Iraqi nuclear facility in a secret operation conducted by the U.S. Energy Department.

The quantity of nuclear material, stored at the al-Tuwaitha research complex southeast of Baghdad, was probably enough to give Saddam Hussein the capacity to produce at least one atomic bomb, according to a physicist with the Federation of American Scientists quoted by the Associated Press.

The fear that Saddam could produce nuclear weapons was cited by congressional Democrats two years ago when they voted to authorize the Bush administration to go to war in Iraq.
Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham described the previously undisclosed operation, which was concluded June 23, as "a major achievement" in an attempt to "keep potentially dangerous nuclear material out of the hands of terrorists," the AP said.

Ivan Oelrich, a physicist at the Federation of American Scientists, hesitated to characterize the threat posed by Saddam's enriched uranium because few details were provided by the Energy Department.

But he said that the low-enriched uranium taken from Iraq, if it is of the 3 percent to 5 percent level of enrichment common in fuel for commercial power reactors, could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb.

The Energy Department said that in addition to 1.95 tons of low-enriched uranium, "roughly 1,000 highly radioactive sources . . . [that] could potentially be used in a radiological dispersal device [or dirty bomb]" were also transported out of Iraq.

According to Bryan Wilkes, spokesman for the Energy Department's National Nuclear Security Administration, much of the radioactive material - which had been used for medical and industrial purposes - "was in powdered form, which is easily dispersed."

Wilkes said that some of the other radioactive material - including cesium-137, colbalt-60 and strontium - could have been valuable to a terrorist seeking to fashion a radiological bomb.

The Energy Department refused to say to where the material was shipped.

[FORD]

I'm calling bullshit on this one. There are two major errors in the following paragraph....

The quantity of nuclear material, stored at the al-Tuwaitha research complex southeast of Baghdad, was probably enough to give Saddam Hussein the capacity to produce at least one atomic bomb, according to a physicist with the Federation of American Scientists quoted by the Associated Press.

1) If this is quoted by the Associated Press, where's the original AP article? Why is NewsHax the only one with such information?

2) The Federation of American Scientists describe themselves as an organization which "works to challenge excessive government secrecy and promote public oversight".

Therefore, it would be the direct opposite of that mission statement to aid the BCE - the most secretive administration in history - in their attempt to manipulate stories of alleged weapons finds in Iraq.

Sounds like NewsHax is making shit up again.

[Sgt Schultz]

Originally posted by FORD
I'm calling bullshit on this one. There are two major errors in the following paragraph....



1) If this is quoted by the Associated Press, where's the original AP article? Why is NewsHax the only one with such information?

2) The Federation of American Scientists describe themselves as an organization which "works to challenge excessive government secrecy and promote public oversight".

Therefore, it would be the direct opposite of that mission statement to aid the BCE - the most secretive administration in history - in their attempt to manipulate stories of alleged weapons finds in Iraq.

Sounds like NewsHax is making shit up again.

Right, and the Democratic Underground is a very fair and blanced source.

Anyway here are other sources that have published this story...are these acceptable to you?


Herald Sun

Washington Post

Seattle Post Intelligencer

[FORD]

OK, I stand corrected then. But with three legitimate articles available, why would you post NewsHax crap? :confused:

In any event, the NewsHax article is misleading. There wasn't any capabilities of atomic bombs here.

[Sgt Schultz]

Originally posted by FORD
OK, I stand corrected then. But with three legitimate articles available, why would you post NewsHax crap? :confused:

In any event, the NewsHax article is misleading. There wasn't any capabilities of atomic bombs here.

I dunno, i trusted the source and that's where I saw it first.

"The low-enriched uranium taken from Iraq, if it is of the 3 percent to 5 percent level of enrichment common in fuel for commercial power reactors, could have been of value to a country developing enrichment technology.

"It speeds up the process," Oelrich said, adding that 1.95 tons of low-enriched uranium could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb."

[Mr Grimsdale]

There hasn't been anything said to suggest that the US government regards this as proof of a weapons programme. The material was confiscated to prevent it falling into the hands of terrorists who would want to create a dirty bomb.

Iraqi 'dirty bomb' risk dismissed

The UN's atomic watchdog says it is confident there is not enough radioactive material missing in Iraq to make a nuclear "dirty bomb".
Vilmos Cserveny, a spokesman for the International Atomic Energy Agency, said: "We don't have concerns about any missing uranium" in Iraq.

Earlier, the US revealed that it had secretly removed more than 1.7 metric tons of radioactive material from Iraq.

Some nuclear material remains in Iraq under IAEA control, Mr Cserveny said.

"The remaining sources are not suitable for malevolent purposes," he told BBC News Online.

US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said on Tuesday that the US had removed 1.77 tons of enriched uranium and about 1,000 "highly radioactive sources" from Iraq's former nuclear research facility at al-Tuwaitha on 23 June.

The IAEA and Iraqi officials were informed ahead of the operation, which happened before the 28 June handover of sovereignty.

'Dirty bomb' fears

The threat of a terrorist "dirty bomb" explosion in a city is a major concern of Western intelligence agencies, correspondents say.

Rather than causing a nuclear explosion, a "dirty bomb" would see radioactive material combined with a conventional explosive - probably causing widespread panic and requiring a large clean-up operation.

In June last year, the IAEA said it had accounted for most of the uranium feared stolen from the al-Tuwaitha site, south-east of Baghdad.

A statement from the US energy department (DOE) on Tuesday said 20 of its laboratory experts had repackaged "less sensitive" nuclear materials that would remain in Iraq.

Such materials could be used for medical, agricultural or industrial purposes, it said.

Al-Tuwaitha - dismantled in the early 1990s under UN ceasefire resolutions - played a key role in Iraq's drive to build nuclear weapons prior to the 1991 Gulf war.

The 1,000 "sources" evacuated in the Iraqi operation included a "huge range" of radioactive items used for medical and industrial purposes, a spokesman for the US National Nuclear Security Administration told AP news agency.

Bryan Wilkes said much of the material was "in powdered form, which is easily dispersed".

It was flown out of the country aboard a military plane in a joint operation with the Department of Defense, and is being stored temporarily at a DOE facility.

[Mr Grimsdale]

As for the Federation of American Scientists they're a bunch of wackos that promote the idea that the US is in possession of alien life forms and UFO technology.

[Sgt Schultz]

Originally posted by Mr Grimsdale
As for the Federation of American Scientists they're a bunch of wackos that promote the idea that the US is in possession of alien life forms and UFO technology.

No I think you are mischaracterizing some work they've done on secret aicraft.

”All the talk about UFOs, government secrecy and full disclosure is not welcome news to everyone.
"The UFO cult that is fixated on the notion that 'secret government documents' contain 'the truth' about otherwise 'unexplained aerial phenomena' is, on balance, no friend of freedom of information or government accountability."
That's the view of Steven Aftergood, head of the Project on Government Secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, D.C.
Never-ending requests for documentation on UFOs and similar obsessions, Aftergood suggests, clog up the narrow channels of public access to government information and make a mockery of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).”

[Sgt Schultz]

Originally posted by Mr Grimsdale
The material was confiscated to prevent it falling into the hands of terrorists who would want to create a dirty bomb.

Iraqi 'dirty bomb' risk dismissed

The UN's atomic watchdog says it is confident there is not enough radioactive material missing in Iraq to make a nuclear "dirty bomb".
Vilmos Cserveny, a spokesman for the International Atomic Energy Agency, said: "We don't have concerns about any missing uranium" in Iraq.

Earlier, the US revealed that it had secretly removed more than 1.7 metric tons of radioactive material from Iraq.

Some nuclear material remains in Iraq under IAEA control, Mr Cserveny said.

"The remaining sources are not suitable for malevolent purposes," he told BBC News Online.

US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said on Tuesday that the US had removed 1.77 tons of enriched uranium and about 1,000 "highly radioactive sources" from Iraq's former nuclear research facility at al-Tuwaitha on 23 June.

The IAEA and Iraqi officials were informed ahead of the operation, which happened before the 28 June handover of sovereignty.

'Dirty bomb' fears

The threat of a terrorist "dirty bomb" explosion in a city is a major concern of Western intelligence agencies, correspondents say.

Rather than causing a nuclear explosion, a "dirty bomb" would see radioactive material combined with a conventional explosive - probably causing widespread panic and requiring a large clean-up operation.

In June last year, the IAEA said it had accounted for most of the uranium feared stolen from the al-Tuwaitha site, south-east of Baghdad.

A statement from the US energy department (DOE) on Tuesday said 20 of its laboratory experts had repackaged "less sensitive" nuclear materials that would remain in Iraq.

Such materials could be used for medical, agricultural or industrial purposes, it said.

Al-Tuwaitha - dismantled in the early 1990s under UN ceasefire resolutions - played a key role in Iraq's drive to build nuclear weapons prior to the 1991 Gulf war.

The 1,000 "sources" evacuated in the Iraqi operation included a "huge range" of radioactive items used for medical and industrial purposes, a spokesman for the US National Nuclear Security Administration told AP news agency.

Bryan Wilkes said much of the material was "in powdered form, which is easily dispersed".

It was flown out of the country aboard a military plane in a joint operation with the Department of Defense, and is being stored temporarily at a DOE facility.

I think you are mising the point of the article. NOW they think there isn't enough missing in Iraq to make a "dirty bomb". Before there was.

[Sgt Schultz]

Iraq Confirms U.S. Has Removed Nuclear Material
Reuters

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq (news - web sites)'s interim government confirmed Thursday the United States has removed radioactive material from Iraq, saying ousted dictator Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) could have used it to develop nuclear weapons.

U.S. and U.N. officials said Wednesday Washington had transported 1.8 tons of enriched uranium out of Iraq for safekeeping more than a year after looters stole it from a U.N.-sealed facility left unguarded by U.S. troops.

Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said the uranium and about 1,000 highly radioactive items from the former Iraqi nuclear research facility had been taken to the United States.

"I can now announce that the United States Department of Defense (news - web sites) and Department of Energy (news - web sites) have completed a joint operation to secure and remove from Iraq radiological and nuclear materials that the ousted regime could have potentially used in a radiological dispersal device or diverted to support a nuclear weapons program," Allawi said in a statement.

"Iraq has no intention and no will to resume these programs in the future. These materials which are potential weapons of mass murder are not welcome in our country and their production is unacceptable," Allawi said.

A "radiological dispersal device," or dirty bomb, uses a conventional explosive to disperse radioactive material over a wide area.

U.S. officials said lightly enriched uranium, which could be used in such a bomb, was airlifted to an undisclosed U.S. site after its removal from the Tuwaitha nuclear complex south of Baghdad, a one-time center of Iraq's nuclear weapons programs.

U.S. officials said the move would help keep potentially dangerous nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists.

The Tuwaitha nuclear complex was dismantled in the early 1990s after the first Gulf War (news - web sites).

But tons of nuclear materials remained there under the seal of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, until last year's U.S.-led invasion of Iraq when it was left unguarded and looted by Iraqi civilians.

The IAEA learned a week ago that the transfer had taken place on June 23, the agency said in a letter to the U.N. Security Council made public Wednesday.