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U.S. Loses Track of Saddam's Weapons in Iraq Stewart Stogel UNITED NATIONS -- NewsMax first reported in a July 30 article, more than two dozen medium-range, surface-to-surface missiles, once an integral part of the army of Saddam Hussein, had been lost by the U.S. military. Pentagon spokesman Cmndr. Robert Mehal reacted to the story: "I contacted several commands on the issue (missing missiles) without any significant results."
Mehal's comments echo earlier ones made by the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and the military headquarters of the Multi-National Force (MFN).
The missiles, 25 at last count, are medium-range Iraqi al Samoud 2s that can reach targets as far away as Israel and were in the process of being destroyed by U.N. inspectors shortly before the U.S.-led coalition force invasion in March 2003.
A more advanced missile, the al Fatah, also under development by Saddam, remains unaccounted for by the Pentagon.
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Some reports claim that the missiles and other weapons (particularly chemical), may have fallen into the hands of unnamed "third parties."
That warning was voiced by the former executive director of the U.N. Monitoring, Observation, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), the Iraqi arms inspectors.
On June 29, 2007, Dimitri Perricos told a closed meeting of the Security Council: "In the present security environment of Iraq, the possibility should not be discounted that non-state actors may seek to acquire toxic agents or their chemical precursors . . . the possibility is real."
Perricos expressed concern about an attack in Iraq on March 28, 2007 that used chlorine gas. That attack, in Fallujah, sent 15 Iraqi and U.S. soldiers to the hospital.
The truck bombing, which was called "complex" by the U.S. military, included the release of several canisters of the toxic gas.
Though none of the soldiers died in the incident, it was feared that insurgent forces were now adding chemical weapons to their arsenal.
Several additional "incidents" also involving chlorine and U.S. forces have been reported with weapons that formerly may had been "secured" by U.N. inspectors.
David Kay and Charles Duelfer who led the CIA's Iraq Survey Group's hunt for Saddam's weapons in 2003-2004, refused comment on the issue.
The missing missiles and chemical agents come in addition to a recent Pentagon audit revealing that more than 13,000 small arms purchased for the new Iraqi military "cannot be accounted for." As much as $19 billion in guns, rifles and ammunition purchased by the U.S. for Iraq may now be "missing in action."
Last month, the White House pressured the U.N. Security Council to terminate the mandate of the U.N. inspectors, ending a 16-year run.
In a letter to the Council, Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, stated that a continuation of the U.N. inspections "was no longer in the interest of Iraq."
U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Zalmay Khalilzad told NewsMax that he voted to terminate the UN inspectors "because, there was nothing left for them to do."
© NewsMax 2007. All rights reserved.
Editor's note:
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