About Saddam's 550 Ton Yellowcake Stockpile . . .
that seems to have been missed by all of the MSM's eagle-eyed reporters: from the New York Sun:
Here's a story you may have missed over the long holiday weekend: 550 metric tons of yellowcake uranium worth tens of millions of dollars were shipped out of Iraq to Canada. The material was transported in 37 military flights in 3,500 secure barrels, according to the Associated Press.There hasn't been much of a fuss about this material because it had been discovered already by United Nations inspectors after the first Gulf War. But it took a second American war in Iraq to move the material out of the Middle East. For all the talk about America's failure to discover Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, this is a big deal.
This is not the Niger yellowcake of Wilsonian legend, apparently. It is, however, 550 tons of processed, refined and concentrated nectar of uranium that was steps from weapons-grade, depending on the refinement process used.* Enough to make 142 atomic bombs. Yellowcake that was in Iraq. Under Saddam Hussein's control before he was deposed. And that isn't there now because of the Iraq war.
Attempts to trivialize this are welcome, as always.
EDIT: Whoops, my mistake for saying the MSM seemingly missed this - here's the NYT's take on the story in response to the original AP reportage. Nothing new, but have fun with it.
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*Saddam's concerted efforts to develop the gas centrifuge technology needed for the next and final HEU refinement step have been fully documented by exportcontrol.org. Details of Iraq's development of HEU technology prior to the first Gulf war can be found here.
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Oh, that's a good one. Steps. Sounds like "up to 50% off". Right.
What matters is what steps, how many steps, how visible would those steps be, what infrastucture would be required, and so on.
What also matters is the fact that nothing was actually happening with this. It was untouched the whole time, and known about.
Is it trivial? No, it's not trivial. Does a non-trivial fact justfy a full-blown invasion, hundreds of thousands of deaths, billions in stolen funds, a trillion dollars spent, more influence for Iran, torture, destruction of our credibility, and so on?
North Korea ring a bell? Did we invade?
Of course not. Countries present challenges all the time around the world. If your entire set of options is limited to either trivialize these challenges or to mount an invasion, you've got a piss-poor foreign policy toolset. The whole point of an intelligent foreign policy is to maximize benefit at minimum cost and risk.
Bush's invasion was the act of a criminally negligent imbecile because it has achieved precisely the opposite. You are dreaming if you think that a stockpile of yellowcake identified 16 years ago changes that.
--Of course not!
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)any statement saying that the movement of this ore out of the Mideast justifies the Iraq war. So your principal argument is against a straw man. One example:
Bush's invasion was the act of a criminally negligent imbecile because it has achieved precisely the opposite. You are dreaming if you think that a stockpile of yellowcake identified 16 years ago changes that.
You are dreaming if you think I said that. I challenge you to find where I've said words to that or similar effect, or even implied it from a reasonable person's perspective.
Your problem with "steps from weapons-grade language" doesn't make sense either. The diary is not about the chemical processes required to make fissile material from yellowcake, nor did I say or imply that yellowcake is a WMD. There are only two reasons why anyone would accumulate this volume of yellowcake: to make reactor fuel, or to make a nuclear weapon. There are countries that have that capability, including Iraq's nextdoor neighbor. the Canadians are not going to make bombs from the uranium in the yellowcake. I used pretty simple words and concepts in the diary because I like them. Straining to make the diary into something it's not so you can air your arguments against what you wish it said seems like a waste of time.
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| parent )This is not a big deal, and it is nutball to pretend otherwise.
The yellowcake in question was identified as part of the post Gulf War I inspection regime, sequestered by the inspectors, and remained sequestered thereafter. After Gulf War II, it was physically seized still in its storage containers since 1992; i.e., Saddam did not disturb it after 1998 when the inspectors were thrown out.
Its presence in Iraq was KNOWN by everyone, and yet I note that Bush and crew never referred to it in order to justify the WMD claim for Gulf War II. Its presence does truly footnote the stupidity of the claim concerning alleged efforts to get more yellowcake from Niger. Why would they be doing that since they could simply break the seals on the yellowcake already stored in the country?
Yellowcake is not useful for a weapon. It is partially processed uranium ore. You cannot put yellowcake into a reactor and get anything useful as the concentration of uranium is too low. Modern yellowcake typically contains 70 to 90 percent triuranium octoxide (U3O8). Uranium used for unenriched fuel rods has to be further refined into uranium dioxide (UO2) or other refined uranium products.
That end product is still not "enriched" in the slightest. Enrichment refers to isotope separation to get a higher concentration of U235, which naturally occurs at a rate of around 1% -- the balance is U238 which cannot be made into a bomb no matter how hard you try. Enrichment for fuel purposes typically raises that figure to 5%. Enrichment for bomb purposes probably requires a 90+% enrichment.
Isotope separation is exceedingly difficult and is the primary reason why nuclear bombs are not readily built. Uranium ore is very prevalent, but the trick is refining it so as to extract the tiny portion of U235 which is useful for bombmaking.
And to repeat, even when WMD hysteria was at a fever pitch, the Bush liars did not see fit to even mention this yellowcake. That shows you how big a risk it presented.
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)It's usually a good idea to read comments to a diary before posting your own so you don't show how far behind the curve you are. Read below for a response to every point you raise, definitions of yellowcake more detailed than yours, links to the isotope separation processes Iraq was capable of, the issues w/r/t what the IAEA had under seal, and so forth. the Niger point is mentioned in the diary and raised many times as well.
After getting up to speed, you can take your turn at arguing that the stuff (1) didn't exist, (2) was safer in the hands of Saddam Hussein than the Canadians, (3) it was dispersed through the desert sands, (4) the IAEA shipped it to Canada, etc.
Interesting that you cite Bush's actions as proof that this tonnage of uranium ore didn't present a risk to anyone. Can't say I buy your logic, though.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Yes, portions were written above, which I read. So what.
I looked at the links concerning isotope processes (EMIS), and was already aware of the issue. This is technology considered so inadequate that it was largely under the radar of anti-proliferation efforts in the 80s and 90s (it was the original method used at Oak Ridge in the Manhattan Project (Calutrons), until centrifuges and cascades were implemented). What was interesting after the end of Gulf War I was to see how much effort the Iraqis had put into this method since it could be pursued without sparking anti-proliferation oversight -- technology considered so primitve that no one was controlling the mechanisms for such devices.
Per the Iraq Survey Group final report, no effort was made in Iraq post 1991 to restart EMIS.
Other than the initial aborted effort in the Manhattan Project, I do not think anyone has successfully made bombs using this method. It is grossly inefficient.
Uranium ore is widespread in the crust, and processing it to make yellowcake is no big deal. Yes, I am glad that the yellowcake has been taken out of Iraq, but no one in 1992 when it was put under seal thought it important enough to get it out of Iraq then.
And yes, citing Bush is relevant here because if the presence of yellowcake represented any kind of danger, then we would have heard about it in 2002-2003.
Try to keep your commentary fact based.
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| parent )You now:
Try to keep your commentary fact-based.
You above:
Yellowcake fruitcake: This is not a big deal, and it is nutball to pretend otherwise.
Fact-based?
I can't tell if you agree or disagree w/r/t the cites to exportcontrol.org, which contain extensive information of Iraq's centrifuge prograams as well as its EMIS capabilities. Including the trivia that the Iraqis called them "Baghdadtrons" instead of calutrons.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )They were called Calutrons because the idea originated at the Lawrence Livermore Labs of the University of California (see Rhodes The Making of the Atomic Bomb). Funny that some wag in Iraq riffed off the idea to call them Baghdadtrons. There is no particular scientific name for these things -- they operate on the same principle as mass spectrometers.
What is there to agree/disagree with regarding the pre-1991 effort by Iraq on its nuclear program? I believe the consensus is that they were making serious progress even though crippled with ancient EMIS technology and a few centrifuges for isolating the needed U235. One of the reasons they flew under the radar on this was the use of outmoded EMIS technology -- the non-proliferation controls were not set up to detect traffic in materials for that activity. Pretty sneaky. Gulf War I shut it down, and it was never resumed.
This is your diary in which you puffed the alleged significance of the yellowcake with misleading references to is alleged utility in making atom bombs, and how the story was allegedly ignored and would be trivialized further. The justification for that posture was not fact based, as noted in detail above by many commentators. I supplied some of the facts as well as repeated those from others, and added my opinion on the merits of your claims based on those facts. Funny how you mistake my opinion as "fact."
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| parent )Watch out conservatives!
First I'm going to Canada, then I'm gonna yellowcake every single one o yer buttcheeks together!!
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)
--~At times like these I am reminded of the immortal words of Socrates when he said...."I drank what?"
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| parent )I'm disappointed that a minor disagreement over a mere kiloton of pseudo-refined unobtanium would make you go back on your promise.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )We knew it was there and it was there legally.
What's the story again?
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)Awesome.
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )I agree
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| parent )It's about violently attacking people who might have even a 1% chance of thinking about attacking us one day. Same reason we should go after any country that doesn't like us and has deposits of lead. In case they decide to make bullets and shoot at us.
After that, we'd better start sizing up our so-called allies. You never know down the road who might turn on you.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )After all, they've got all that Yellowcake. Multiply that comment by 142.
--To think is not enough; you must think of something -- Jules Renard
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| parent )There was an old, old site post to that effect, having to do with the country looking like a series of lo-rise parking structures, our invading soldiers giving out t-shirts to the grateful populace, and so forth, but the details escape me. Anyway, I'll let Micky Love defend his homeland.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )It proves whatever you want it to prove.
--To think is not enough; you must think of something -- Jules Renard
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| parent )...the Bishop of Hollywood!
;-)
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )Someone spoofed your account.
At least that's what I'm hoping happened here.
If you check into this, you’ll quickly find that the uranium a) was not weapons grade and b) was well known to the UN and IAEA and was being stored legally by Saddam’s government. It was legally in Iraq according to international law.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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)I link to the Sun, AP and Yahoo News, and you respond with cite-less Crooks and Liars cant and some left-foil site I've never even heard of? Get some real links instead of wasting time on silly "someone spoofed your account, dude" stuff and we'll talk.
Where in the diary did I call yellowcake weapons-grade uranium? Maybe you did in fact read a spoofed diary.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )I suggest you do, if only to save further embarrassment.
The Google is always a good start, then there's Wikepedia (the real one NOT conservapedia).
'one step from weapons-grade' - not even close. Due to sanctions and intrusive inspections the IAEA were able to give Saddam a clean bill of health regarding the nuclear element of his supposed WMD. That was immediately prior to the launch of the Messinpotamia but went largely unnoticed or was ignored amidst the administrations false propaganda about smoking guns and mushroom clouds. It wouldn't surprise me to learn this diary had its origin in a smoked mushroom or two.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )Your link sucked, and you dodged my question. Spend the time finding a credible link instead of lefty echo-chamber claptrap and on lame insults and maybe we'll get somewhere.
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| parent )Was the lefty quoted in the link pretty accurate in his analysis of the AP story and its impact on wingnutia? Or are there significant factual errors you would dispute?
Edit the diary to take out the triumphalism and inaccuracies and the piling on they have engendered will likely stop. Because we all want the old Tomsyl back, not this faux Redstate version.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )I had nothing to do with it; all I've done is commented (correctly , at least so far) how hard it would be for some to acknowledge this as a positive development. Maybe people are pissed at the tone of the Sun article. But like I said, this one wasn't in the MSM, so I had to find it somewhere, didn't I?
Your first para left me breathless. Who cares about the impact of the AP story on wingvilles of either persuasion? You posted it (in fact, quoted it) to support two factual assertions you made, neither of which are in the AP story. And an opinion piece on C&L doesn't support any fact without it's own link to a source, for obvious reasons. When the link given is to an even more biased source of opinion, my suspicion is usually that the statement doesn't have any support. But you offered the cite; all I did was pee on it.
Piling on? What piling on? I may look like the proverbial one-legged man in an a$$-kicking contest, but I'm actually cool as a cucumber.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )My link: Open left via Crooks and Liars
Your links: New York Sun & RealClearPolitics via Yahoo News
GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )You are missing a major difference between my citation and yours: I've cited the exact portion of Crooks and Liars that you quoted in your post, and which you rely on for factual statements. You, OTOH, quoted a part of the Sun article that was not referenced anywhere in my diary, had nothing to do with it's subject, and is not part of any point I was making. C'mon, S - you see the difference here.
And you don't seriously claim that C&L and the other lefty site have remotely the same level of credibility as even a second-rate rag like the Sun, do you? Based on quoting a part of the Sun article I didn't even refer to or offer as an argument or opinion?
Also note that the C&L cite you're relying on starts with "if you check into this, you'll quickly find that . . ." Did you?
BTW, you ignored the AP cite I also provided.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Ignored?
The only cite in your diary is to the editorial in the New York Sun (hint - opinion piece) which doesn't even reference the AP story. The Yahoo News/RealClearPolitics link you provide (hint - headed, Opinion - Good News in Iraq) also contains no reference to the AP story, but does quote extensively from the New York Sun editorial. In comparison, the piece I link to actually begins with a reference and a further link to the AP original while the cite itself is entirely factual (and easily verifiable) and hasn't been challenged by you or anyone else commenting on this diary, save for its paternity ie. shoot the messenger style.
Further, when you link to an opinion piece (Yahoo News/RealClearPolitics) in order to support a factual contention, don't act all hurt and surprised when someone cites from the same opinion piece in order to impeach its credibility.
Didn't need to as I already knew the information was correct, and I confess I just used the 1st link that popped up from a quick Google search. Granted, I could perhaps have provided a link from a more reputable source. But nonetheless the factual information would have been the same, it being factual and easily verifiable as such and all.
And if it makes you feel any better, then yes I agree the removal of the yellowcake to Canada is good news. Just doesn't match the Breaking News!, WMD Found!, Bush is Vindicated! billing you packaged it in is all. A diary based on the more sober analysis of the NYT's story linked in your diary update, or perhaps more appropriately to the original AP story itself would have been just fine.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )Just doesn't match the Breaking News!, WMD Found!, Bush is Vindicated! billing you packaged it in is all.
You said that; I didn't, not anywhere in the diary. Making stuff up and then arguing against it isn't an effective way to make your point.
Despite all the verbiage, you still haven't produced a cite to support the facts you claim your C&L link establishes. If it's so obvious and easy, why not just do it, instead of giving long expositions about why you can't, shouldn't or won't? Saying that something is "factual and easily verifiable" doesn't substitute for actual, factual verification.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Are you really asking me for a link proving the yellowcake under discussion was actually material declared by Iraq and held legally under IAEA seal? Is this even seriously under dispute? cos I gotta know exactly what basement level of understand about the supposed nuclear WMD activities of Saddam's Iraq immediately prior to operation Messinpotamia you may be operating from.
Read the conclusion here if you still harbor any doubt the IAEA essentially announced Saddam's Iraq to be clear of any proscribed WMD(nuclear) activities in early March 2003.
The link you provided to support your contention that Iraq's yellowcake was but one step from enough weapons grade material to make 142 atomic bombs, contained all that and more.
Live by the link, die by the link.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )because you normally are pretty fair and reasonable IMO. Too much so not to realize the key differences between my MSM links and yours to liberal blogs.
You've been pressed three times for a cite to a factual source for the assertions you quoted from Crooks & Liars; now your argument has degraded to "how can you be so dumb as to not know this?"
Why are you still arguing as if I said Iraq had WMD capabilities in 2003 when I've never remotely said that?
Your "live by the link etc" statement is completely nonsensical in this context. I provided a link in which a physicist said 142 bombs could be made from 550 tons of yellowcake. If you dispute that number, fine. But arguing that by providing a link for that number, I somehow incorporated everything on any subject that was in that link into my diary is just silly. All it shows is your inability to back down when confronted with proof that you are arguing against points not raised in or suggested by my diary. No law against OT arguments; what's bogus, though, is to claim that I made those points when I so obviously did not.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )MSM links?
I will just close by pointing out that the RealClearPolitics opinion piece reproduced on Yahoo News which you linked to support your claim, is the exact same kind of partisan venue you are complaining about me linking to. Except that my link goes to a brief, factual summary which I think I can safely conclude isn't in dispute by anyone but you and the wilder reaches of wingnutia. While you link to a cite that is but one sentence of a substantial partisan opinion piece containing a whole smorgasbord of winger nuttiness on the issue. And the New York Sun opinion piece is hardly any better or less partisan, Just Sayin'.
There, I'm done with this stupid diversion.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )but it's still disingenuous for you to post a clearly inflammatory diary which did imply precisely what was inferred -- and then decry that people were inflamed and should have restrained themselves to not making any conclusions based on the words posted.
I guess my request is -- given that we weren't supposed to respond to the insult and that we weren't supposed to come to any conclusions based on what was said, would you be so kind as to let us know next time when commentary on your diaries isn't wanted?
--It's impossible to debate if people simply hold beliefs that have no grounding in reality.
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| parent )to your and others' commentary isn't wanted. Same thing, isn't it?
And what "insult"? Saying that some people would attempt to trivialize this? That was a guess, not an insult, and it turned out to be pretty accurate.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )The key sentence here seems to be...
So we already knew about this. Does the fact that it's now in Canada, I dunno, justify the war? Or prove anything?
--To think is not enough; you must think of something -- Jules Renard
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)Projecting again. It's a form of stereotyping.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )and others.
A simple thesis: Saddam had no nuclear weapons program in 2002.
tomsyl, are you willing to be candid enough to provide us with cogent and articulate [Agree] or [Disagree]
Or shall you continue to lay smoke (using yellow cake dust) and evade the question?
--Fence post turtles -- They don't get up there by themselves, some moron had to put 'em there.
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| parent )But people keep telling me how little I know, so it's anyone's guess whether I'm right on this. For example, I don't even know what a "cogent and articulate agree" is. Did you mean "degree", as in HS and so forth? And where did I evade that question? I'm disappointed in myself for not noticing I was doing it.
OK, now what'd I win? A chance to return to what's in my diary? Or are you arguing that because Saddam didn't have the ability to make bombs in '02, we should have left the yellowcake mouldering in the desert for another six years?
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )And a million dead people.
--It's impossible to debate if people simply hold beliefs that have no grounding in reality.
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)By your metric, nothing in Iraq is worth crap unless it has a value of a trillion dollars. (Your "million dead" has been so widely debunked that it's not worth addressing.)
Please look down the debit side of your ledger and read off the value of one nuclear weapon in the hands of terrorists. Also, could you multiply that by 142 and give me the result? Thanks.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Therefore your comment is nonsense. Sorry, dude.
But maybe you should go to Safeway and buy a nice Betty Crocker cake mix. Yellow, of course.
--Fence post turtles -- They don't get up there by themselves, some moron had to put 'em there.
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| parent )Silly sarcasticisms are always worth trying, but you're repeating yourself. Unless you think the stuff was just fine sitting out there in the desert. Do you?
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Who typed those words?
--Fence post turtles -- They don't get up there by themselves, some moron had to put 'em there.
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| parent )Ever heard of Iran? Pakistan? Syria?
Bill, it sounds like you have all of these arguments that are just waiting for a place to happen. If the simple diary I wrote said all of the things you and others keep insisting it said, it would be ten thousand words long instead of a hundred and forty-two.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Was I supposed to trivialize something? Like a million dead people?
--It's impossible to debate if people simply hold beliefs that have no grounding in reality.
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| parent )-
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )I'm not the one who pretends they don't exist, for whatever reason.
--It's impossible to debate if people simply hold beliefs that have no grounding in reality.
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| parent )If this is going to be version 153 of what I truly meant, but did not say, in my diary, you'll have to show your work.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )What are you talking about?
Others have already posted that this was several steps from weapons grade, so why do you bring up the strawman of 142 nukes?
And it's not spoken like an accountant, it's spoken like a homo economicus. A rational being. If I spend $1 trillion then I hope to get something worth $1 trillion. And no, nukes are not part of the equation here, this stuff wasn't even useful as a dirty bomb.
Finally, and not to revisit that story once again, but the idea that the number of dead has been widely discredited is completely wrong. It's only in conservative blogs that it's been discredited. Among the practitioners there's no such discrediting. Let's leave that particular storyline for Redstate.
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| parent )I already gave you the link above, but here it is again.
How is the nuclear weapon potential of the Iraq yellowcake a straw man? Have you read any of the links I provided about the status of Iraq's refinement program? And just as an aside, what do you think Iran might have paid for that 550 tons?
The battle over the Lancet study and the projections of various anti-war groups has been fought at length here, and I have no interest in rehashing it. I have never seen a credible study, link or story supporting your or PM's figures. But that is your argument, not mine. I'm sticking with the apparently outre conclusion that removal of 550 tons of yellowcake from Iraq is of positive significance, and trying my best to ignore "look over there - giant bumblebees!!" arguments.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )I don't get what you are trying to say here.
If your only point is that it's great that we got the yellowcake out of Iraq I agree. As I think does everyone else here. We can argue about the ineptitude in handling all of this but that's another story.
Now if your point is that this somehow validates the war in iraq then I don't follow your argument at all. This was not hidden by Saddam or 'discovered' by us, it was not weapons grade and gives us no new information on Saddam's nuclear plans. I realize the idiots at Redstate somehow think this is something new but it actually isn't.
Finally, on the Lancet study, that was a credible figure. The people that criticized that study here simply did not understand what they were talking about. Something I saw in a lot of conservative websites on this topic.
--This place is my vacation.
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| parent )Your second para says what I meant to say, and thought I said. I haven't remotely attempted to validate the war; I think that's just projection by a lot of liberals here who want to argue the point. I don't, and I'm not going to argue it; that's one reason why I pointed out in the diary that this yellowcake has nothing to do with the Niger issue, just so there was no confusion about it supposedly supporting that fiasco.
That's really all. I am way simpler than even the liberals here apparently think.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )The response might have had something to do with this:
Especially the part in bold. But also the other parts about bombs and centrifuges and the eagle eyes of the MSM.
Brooks and B Rational was asking about what goes into a 300 comment diary. He should bookmark this one.
In any case, I think we all agree with what you say you said. Better that the stuff is in Canada than in Iraq. But agreeing is not as much fun.
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| parent )running through your post. IOW, of course I put in the line about trivialization to rile up the one or two people I thought would respond to the diary.
But whatcha got against the footnote? I just figured out how to do that line thingy and was kind of proud of the effect. Envious?
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Thirteen or fourteen of 'em.
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| parent )But where would we be if we did not have these long discussions based on simple misunderstandings?
:)
--This place is my vacation.
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| parent )Someone in particular is about to serve me with a defamation complaint, so it's again time to don my Inspector Clouseau disguise and outfox the sheriff.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )at the time they were discovered by advancing 3ID troops, who didn't know what they were looking for at the time. When the Americans came through Tuwaitha, they left the nearest thing to WMDs unguarded. The results were ghastly: the Iraqis simply dumped the yellowcake on the ground and used the drums as water tanks. Then the nearby people started dying of uranium poisoning.
Has it taken this long to remove this yellowcake? The only news here is the legacy of the colossal screwup called the Iraq War. Here, if you are a fan of the WMD argument against Saddam, was the evidence. But alas, once the Americans arrived, the once-secure nuclear materials were looted, not by terrorists intent on building bombs to destroy us, but by poor ignorant Iraqis who took the storage barrels home to die hideous deaths.
Thanks George. I sure do feel safer now. Leaving all that yellowcake out there in the sun for six years and more, gosh, that's wisdom and prudence for our times.
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)Or are you using a grove of date palms to prove there's a forest out there somewhere?
Your WaPo link doesn't support your conclusion. The barrels referred to were "low-lever nuclear waste" according to an IAEA source. Yellowcake is not nuclear waste. Elsewhere the article refers to laboratory equipment, spent rods, radioactive cesium and thorium, and other radioisotopes. Yellowcake is not a radioisotope, and doesn't contain cesium or thorium. The WaPo article contains this summary:
Nowhere in the article is there any reference to Iraqis reusing drums that had been filled with yellowcake, so you'll have to provide a credible link for that claim before it's worth discussion.
Who said anything about George (either the man or the magazine)? Not me.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )the once-secure nuclear materials were looted
Anyone who believes an IAEA seal is some sort of magic shield that makes anything "secure" really ought not be lecturing anyone expect perhaps on the Easter Bunny, 'ol Saint Nick and the Tooth Fairy.
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )Was whether or not Hussein was complying with the terms by which Part I of this mess ended. And the fact that their location was known and they had IAEA seals on them indicate that they were not part of a stockpile that was being hidden from UN weapons inspectors.
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| parent )it sure acted secure until after the US invasion, so I'm not sure what your point is. While the seal doesn't guarantee anything, it did serve it's purpose until we invaded and left it unguarded.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )Let's all pretend that under Saddam's thumb and "sealed" -- by an arm of the only organization in the world that makes government look competent in comparison -- is "secure".
Ahhh good times. Good times.
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )If you're keeping score.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )Funny, I missed that. I had the distinct impression tha tit was the US and the Iraqi government that sent the stuff to the Canadians.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )Thank God that AQ, the insurgents or criminal gangs had no use for it. Not that they could have done much with it even if they knew what it was, except perhaps make mud pies out of it.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )It's the cavalier attitude everyone takes about the problem of nuclear proliferation. The Americans should have made a beeline for those IAEA sites and gotten that material immediately.
The WMD fiasco would have been attenuated greatly if all of Iraq's nuclear materiel had been retrieved immediately. Let's not even go into the massive stupidity of the al-Qaqaa facility where the nuclear implosion explosives were stored, nobody will ever know what happened to all that stuff.
Y'know, if you're gonna have a war over WMDs, and let's put aside the whole issue of Was Saddam Dangerous for the nonce: he was dangerous -- then why not get the dangerous stuff first? Why didn't we set up huge burn pits and berms to detonate all the explosives Saddam had? Why has it taken all this time to get that stuff into responsible hands? Iraq was stuffed to the gills with the machinery of war, why couldn't we keep this stuff out of the hands of the insurgency? That's just insanity. Bremer and his crew of nogoodniks should all be beaten to death: every last bit of that stolen explosive and mines and artillery shells and suchlike was used on our troops. And we're sposta praise and thank the powers that be, four thousand dead soldiers and Marines later.
You can say what you want to about the Liberals Trivializing this Debate. It's a crock. There's no good news here.
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| parent )The entire diary is about the significance of 550 tons of yellowcake being shipped out of Iraq and to Canada, where it'll be used in powerplants. Doesn't that qualify as anti-proliferation? and how can you possibly argue that the removal of that enormous volume of uranium from the MidEast is not good news, regardless of your political tilt?
I didn't even mention He Who Cannot Be Named's name, let alone saying we're suppsed to thank him or his admin for anything. You're projecting, Blaise; arguing with yourself.
Liberals are in fact trivializing what are statements of fact about the diary subject, not debating points. Actually, they're saying things like "what a crock".
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )They're not just saying 'what a crock'. They are suggesting that the diary is riddled with a series of factual inaccuracies regarding yellowcake, enriched Uranium, etc. That's not trivial. And you've yet to address a single one of the complaints.
--To think is not enough; you must think of something -- Jules Renard
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| parent )or alternatively, 4. Make a point, rather than claiming others have. your comment shows you haven't been following the discussion.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )1. Do your homework. I do mine. When I say barrels of uranium dust were looted, you can count on it to be a fact. Don't demand a link to say so. It's your obligation to prove barrels weren't looted when I say they were.
2. Stop putting words in people's mouths. We Liberals have always been screaming about nuclear waste. Uranium poisoning is a serious problem.
3. Answer the questions you were asked. Stop cherry picking. You've been asked several times to answer why this process took so long and you've been avoiding the question. Now unless you've answered it while I'm writing this reply, answer this goddamn question. If we had that stuff in hand in 2003, dropped the ball on it, let it get looted, had to buy some of it back for three dollars a barrel, messed around and FINALLY got it out of Iraq, this isn't grounds for rejoicing. It's proof positive these bastards in the Administration pay more attention to handing out no-bid contracts and getting moremoremore money for this war without dealing with the very reason they went to war in the first place. It's an everlasting disgrace, that's what this is, Tomsyl.
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| parent )On your point no. 1, if you've done your homework as you say, a cite to a reliable source should fall readily to hand. I try to provide links when I can, and certainly when someone asks. Things you say aren't automatically facts, and you have your burden-shifting argument backward.
Your point 2 makes no sense to me. The diary is not about nuclear waste. Heavy metal poisoning is well known; no one's said it's not serious.
I answered your point 3 elsewhere, but maybe that was while you were writing the above. Do you honestly think I know why this process took so long? Of course I don't. And no one's asking you to rejoice, praise Bush, or stand on your head and spit wooden nickels. Admitting that this is better late than never wouldn't kill you, though.
I've done my own share of sounding off about the contractor situation in Iraq, and would go farther than you because I think criminal conduct has occurred. But my thoughts on that subject don't relate to this diary.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )You were handed your hat. I presumed you'd take me seriously. Well, now you have your linkie-winkie and have had your little charade about Your WaPo link doesn't support your conclusion. The barrels referred to were "low-lever nuclear waste" according to an IAEA source. pulled down and stomped on like a bug. Where was your source? I had to point out Tuwaitha had many different sorts of nuclear materiel, including the yellowcake barrels we had to buy back. That disgraceful part of the story wasn't brought out in your encomium to this long-overdue transfer of nuclear materials, and when your argument is demolished, you get all huffy and personal. I had thought better of you. Now I know better.
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| parent )Don't mean to be singling you out.
Just wanted to put folk generally on notice that the standards are going to be a little more rigorous in the short term.
Your comments are more aggrssive than they should be, IMO, but also w/in the standards around here the past week or so.
That's why i didn't issue a warning and I probably could've found some other comments to make an example of, but yours were handy.
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| parent )I had thought better of you. Now I know better.
Blaise your comment is a personal attack. We're running a tighter ship around here right now. Pls adjust accordingly.
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| parent )Just answer that question, and I can get beyond these Cavalier Attitude statements I made. It's proven, beyond any shadow of a doubt, the US military did not round up that stuff and keep an eye on it. I thought leaving the yellowcake in Iraq was a dumb idea way back before this war, and I kept telling people who were against this war, "but hey, guys, there's all that crap left over from the Osirak reactor, he's got tons of yellowcake, if only for that reason, we ought to go in there and finally settle up with Saddam's intransigent lyin' sacks of merde." Of course, everyone on that side of the aisle was mad at me for pointing out Saddam really was a problem and maybe there might be some justification for going in there for a while.
But what happened, Tomsyl? Here you are, in the month of July, in the year of our Lord 2008, trying to make the case for the significance of finally acting on this. Excuse me, I've been mad about this since 2003, and I'm in a foul mood when you say we Liberals are trivializing it. It's like some teenage boy coming home drunk with a dent in the fender of the family car. Give me a break. This is just nonsense. Four thousand lives later, hell, more now, and we finally get around to the root of the problem. A whole town is coated in uranium dust, it's going to be causing cancers for centuries to come, and you accuse us of trivializing this?
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| parent )I don't run the place, or this country. I just know what I read, and I've read the fact that there is now 550 tons less yellowcake in Iraq than there was a year or so ago in enough places that I consider it proven to be true. And buy any objective measure that stuff is a lot safer now that it's in Canada. I'm not asking you to thank anyone, to bless George Bush, to hosanna to the heavens or anything else; nor was I particularly asking for your diatribe about how you've been waring people about this for years (unless you're saying that given the passage of time, we should just have left that stuff out there in the Iraq desert). You're pissed at the wrong person on the wrong subject.
Simple questions: Is 550 tons of yellowcake a lot? and is it safer in Canada or Iraq? That's really all the diary is about.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )You read, and think you understand. Let someone come along who says "there's another side to all this" and you scream like a singed chimpanzee. I have my own Objective Measures here, ones you don't have in mind.
Uranium dust is hugely toxic. Forget the nuclear bombs and all that. We're talking just plain old toxicity. You wave "550 tons" around as if I'm sposta be impressed. I'm not. I would have been impressed if that stuff had been sent to Canada in 2003. But it's 2008. So I'm not impressed. I'm deeply angered. I thought this stuff had long since been dealt with, turns out it's just now that we're getting around to it.
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| parent )Actually, two things: I don't run Iraq, and uranium is toxic in certain forms. (I'm not getting into a DU debate here, so don't expect replies if you start one.) And you disagree that it is a good thing that the yellowcake has been shipped to Canada, apparently.
I'm impressed by 550 tons of yellowcake; you're not. Again, we disagree. That wasn't that hard, was it? No need for pistols at dawn, drawn rapiers, fencing school scars or any of that stuff. IMO.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )- Login or register to post comments
| parent )"Uh, Daddy, what's a patooter?"
"I don't know, honeykins - why do you ask?"
"Well, Daddy, this strange man on the Internet said he wanted to see if he could stick mine together."
"Why, who the-! Effin' %#%&glefirb! What's his email?? Pity the poor fool etc."
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )in addition to letting him cast your vote?
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| parent )Sorry, thought that was obvious.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )for anyone who believes invading & disbanding the government is a good way to keep stuff from falling into the wrong hands.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )of Iraqis living near Tuwaitha, or ???
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/05/16/sprj.nilaw.iraq.radiation/
--http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/2006/tuwaitha.html
Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )There were these early reports of looting, yet the IAEA claims to have known exactly how much material was at the facility. So, they should know exactly how much was looted. However, they never seem to publish this exact information.
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )issue:
Of course, that was before those madcap Canadians got hold of the stuff, so now its fate is anyone's guess.
--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
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| parent )that took place in April 2003, where anybody with a pickup and a brother could have loaded it up & taken it just about anywhere. It's not like there were geiger stations at the border.
And we knew the Tawaitha cache was there. What about the WMDs we supposedly *didn't* know about?
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Take place that is? Because if it did, the IAEA would know exactly how much was looted.
So, what is the exact figure?
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )from their containment barrels by villagers from nearby Ishtar, according to news reports.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )I know that was reported early on. However, I've never seen any confirmation from the IAEA with an exact figure of what was taken, and only vague reports of "some" and "several tons".
--“I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”
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| parent )