"WMD" Trailer Back in the News
Iraq
| October 6, 2004
| Tim
And I wouldn't be suprised if this is being done for political reasons.
Nonetheless, it looks like an article at World Net Daily (via Powerline and Laurie Mylroie) bears out some of my original arguments that the trailers found in Iraq weren't for producing hydrogen for balloons, as a number of people argued.
At the time, the British and our own State Department argued it was for producing hydrogen for weather balloons. Bioweapons experts in the Pentagon argued it was more likely for biological agents.
I tended to side with the Pentagon, for a number of reasons:
For one, I thought the Pentagon would have more clue than the State Department about weapons. Don't ask where I'd get such an idea.
For another, although I could impute a political motivation to both camps, the Pentagon struck me as being less politically motivated that State, which is famously, shall we say, antagonistic to American interests.
Finally, the whole idea didn't make sense given the evidence. The trailer was a custom German-built one-off, which was surely constructed at huge expense. And someone took the time to give it a complete, extensive wipe-down.
Why do all that to generate hydrogen on the road? And why use hydrogen at all, when helium is cheap and readily available? And don't tell me Iraq couldn't get it because of embargoes -- the truck itself contained German components circa 2001, and Saddam was rebuilding whole palaces. He could get helium.
All that would have made for some wickedly expensive weather balloons.
So the whole "weather balloon" theory made little sense to me, and I'm suprised other people have bought into it too. Nobody builds a million-dollar plus set of custom trailers to launch a few lousy weather balloons, when helium is cheap and plentiful enough for kids' toys. The only reason you'd embrace such a hare-brained theory, as far as I could see, is if you had a political motivation to deny the obvious: That Saddam was a bad guy who tended to pose a threat to his neighbors.
Given the data we see in the World Net Daily article -- late-stage injectors, etc. -- the conclusion of "weather balloons" looks even more unlikely, if not disproven outright.
After reading the ISG report available here: http://news.findlaw.com/nytimes/docs/iraq/cia93004wmdrpt.html
specifically: Volume 3, biological warfare p. 79-98 (Annex D)
The evidence is overwhelming that the trailers in question, the same trailers cited by WorldNetDaily in your post, were used for hydrogen production.
Upon reading the report, if you have the time, I am sure you will agree that the WorldNetDaily article you linked is utterly devoid of merit. I wanted to believe that article, but after reading the report I am forced to conclude, despite my bias to the contrary, that the WorldNetDaily article is misinformation.
Conservatives will not be well served by being led to believe misinformation that can be so easily and overwhelmingly discredited by opponents. I know you were just passing on information that seemed to be credible at the time, so I hope that now in the light of new facts, your committment to the truth will lead you to update the post in question.
One fact worth noting is that the Bush administration did not act improperly in its portrayal of these trailers. Two pre-ISG examinations found the trailers to be compatible with biological agent production. (p.79, top right column, "Initial Assessments and Sample Analysis") This fact blown Senator Levin's spin that the Administration lied about these trailers completely out of the water: the best intelligence available at the time backed the Administration's portrayal.
Kaltes,
First, I want to thank you for the heads-up. I've read much (though not all) of the material you recommended. At the current point my thinking is as follows:
After much pondering and consideration, I believe, IF the ISG documentation is absolutely accurate, then those like you, who say these trailers are not sufficient for bioweapons production are basicly...
Right.
The three crucial tip-offs, as I see it are: (a) lack of a stirrer, (b) Lack of clean air and water (wild yeasts dominate otherwise in any such fermentation), (c) the inability to clean the thing out: it would be difficult to purge a bad batch. And fermentation, as a I learned from a girlfriend who is actually an expert in it, (yes, I'm telling truth here) often goes wrong.
And yes, it could be modified to fix some of those problems (though not all: the lack of a stirrer would require extensive rework). But it wasn't, and that's a key point.
The bit about the volumnious supporting documentation was also persuasive.
Now I could be wrong about this: Saddam and his bright guys could have cooked up some kind of tough anerobic yeast hitherto unseen which produced; something tough enough to generally "win" any fermentation contest with non-yeast organisms. But I admit that's just speculation.
Nor does this answer my questions: Why on earth go to such extremes to generate hydrogen for weather balloons? I still wonder if that part of the explanation is wrong, and there's something we're not seeing here. And I'm still puzzled, if such reports are true, about the extensive sterilization these trailers were given.
BUT, I'm certainly willing to concede, based on what I see here (and thank you again) that it doesn't appear these babies were meant to grow BW agents.
(Although I'm still a bit hesitant to say that, given that they appeared to be a badly-designed version of pretty much anything you'd care to suggest.)
Finally, I also agree with your comments about Bush and co not necessarily being dishonest in their characterization, given the initial assessment. Many of these differences -- the quality of the filters used, how easy it is to clean out the chamber -- aren't immediately "macroscopically" visible, nor was the accompanying documentation available then.
So, touche!
PS: But the report, from what I read, seems also to confirm my concerns about the intended use of pesticides. Still reading though.
"Why on earth go to such extremes to generate hydrogen for weather balloons?"
If the trailer's for battlefield use for, I dunno, something to do with artillery maybe, it might be better to be self-sufficient than to require shipments of tanks of compressed gas. One less thing to worry about, no chance of an artillery battery becoming useless due to running out of helium or hydrogen.
Another consideration is the sides of the vehicle: it's open. Presumably it had fabric sides.
That's not a good idea for biological agents, should there be an accident. Even Saddam would probably want to avoid an accidental anthrax release - it could take out his own troops or scientists.
But open sides would be desirable if it were generating hydrogen. In a closed trailer, there'd be a chance of leaked hydrogen collecting and exploding. Open sides remove that possibility, by letting leaked gas disperse.
Another thing to consider is that Laurie Mylroie is batshit crazy, and/or on the Iranian payroll.
Hi Tim,
I think your blog is having some technical problems. You and I were debating the merits of the Iraq War. I raised some questions about the links and evidence you were using to support your claims and suddenly without any notice our whole discussion of over a dozen posts disappeared.
It was over at: http://tim.2wgroup.com/blog/archives/000961.html
The whole page is there, intact, but our debate has disappeared.
Could you check into it and let me know when you get it fixed and when you are ready to resume our discussion?
It was just getting interested and I was just getting warmed up.
Regards,
Dave
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After reading the ISG report available here: http://news.findlaw.com/nytimes/docs/iraq/cia93004wmdrpt.html
specifically: Volume 3, biological warfare p. 79-98 (Annex D)
The evidence is overwhelming that the trailers in question, the same trailers cited by WorldNetDaily in your post, were used for hydrogen production.
Upon reading the report, if you have the time, I am sure you will agree that the WorldNetDaily article you linked is utterly devoid of merit. I wanted to believe that article, but after reading the report I am forced to conclude, despite my bias to the contrary, that the WorldNetDaily article is misinformation.
Conservatives will not be well served by being led to believe misinformation that can be so easily and overwhelmingly discredited by opponents. I know you were just passing on information that seemed to be credible at the time, so I hope that now in the light of new facts, your committment to the truth will lead you to update the post in question.
One fact worth noting is that the Bush administration did not act improperly in its portrayal of these trailers. Two pre-ISG examinations found the trailers to be compatible with biological agent production. (p.79, top right column, "Initial Assessments and Sample Analysis") This fact blown Senator Levin's spin that the Administration lied about these trailers completely out of the water: the best intelligence available at the time backed the Administration's portrayal.
Posted by: Kaltes on October 7, 2004 08:40 AM