"nearly 380 tons of powerful conventional explosives - used to demolish buildings, make missile warheads and detonate nuclear weapons..."

Nuclear weapons? What interest would Saddam have had in those?

And the reporter on NPR this morning breathlessly asserted that the whole reason these explosives are missing is because:
1. GWB did not aniticipate a "second war" after toppling the Iraqi govt.
2. We were warned by the UN inspectors that these explosives were there and simply ignored their lerned advice.
3. We're basically inept

Exactly.

The story is important, but the way the media spins it (as I said, uneccesarily) is inept and misleading.

Saddam could have buried it in the desert or shipped it to Syria, for all we know. And if that material was ripped off in the looting, I have little doubt that it would have hit the streets in force by now.

But who knows? They need to determine when it disappeared.

I think they are trying to spin it to appear that Bush personally posted a "Free Explosives, take all you want" sign outside the compound.

Figuring out where the went, and when is a good idea.

I think the "nuclear weapons" reference is just to "sex up" the story itself. According to these critics, SH didn't have nukes and didn't want them, and the hard part about nukes isn't conventional explosives, but the nuclear material, they appear to have left that important fact out of the story.

I read this story a couple of times and I'm still confused as to exactly WHEN the explosives went missing. Equally important seems to be the amount that is missing. And on the second read I see that the people making the assertion, IAEA, have no one in Iraq to actually make the assessment.

I think there is a UN spin to this to make Bush look bad.

Not to worry. When Kerry is elected, he will kiss up to the French and the missing munitions will reappear.

More seriously, I would closely examine the physical inventory count and not the “booked inventory.” Given Iraq’s corruption, Saddam’s cronies might have ordered 380 tons, but far less was delivered and they pocketed the excess cash. The UN inspectors say they did an inventory, but did they count empty and half-empty boxes?

So it can be used to initiate nuclear explosions. Big whoop. Never forget Saddam didn't have nukes or fissile material. Neither do the terrorists. So how can this be a threat?

See, even the NY Times has bought into the Bush "fear" tactics. (Of course, we all know the NY Times is the secerte cabal leader of VRWC, why else would thye be helping Bush by pointing out that Iraq had components for WMD...).

Buried in the desert? To what end? The explosives went missing and are currently, in all likelihood, being used in the near DAILY attacks against coalition and Iraqi forces. Regardless of when the explosives went missing (CLEARLY before Oct. 10th, 2004) the US Military is the main source of security in the country and it was OUR responsibility, given the fact that the IAEA informed us of the existance of this massive cache, to secure it. We failed.
The two impt aspects of this story that will be discussed in the coming days are:

1) The high yield explosives and NOT dismantled artillery shells are what is being used against the US forces

2) the DOD pressured the Iraqis to not inform the IAEA of the missing stash.

And Dan Senor was spinning this as if to suggest this was something the Fmr CPA just realized. Come on now! If they didn't realize the importance of the cache, then that suggests a whole new level of incompetance.

sean -

The high yield explosives and NOT dismantled artillery shells are what is being used against the US forces

Please excerpt the story where it reveals this bit of news, I missed it.

Sean you also missed the part where it says our troops did go through the facility and didn't find any weapons with the IAEA mark on them.

I think the "when" is a pretty important issue here.

Okay, 380 tons of the good stuff goes missing.

That's what fraction of one percent of the total amount of munitions literally lying around that country?

You'd think from the tone of the reporting that terrorists don't have access to explosives already.

Could it have been a blunder by the US? Sure. There are various times in military operations when you look at a horrible situation, shrug, and say, 'Oops'. Does this detract from the end goals of the war? Nope. Try to clean up the mess, and keep moving.

This is news? 380 tons? They've probably already detonated about ten times that since major combat hostilities ended.

That's what fraction of one percent of the total amount of munitions literally lying around that country?

The key being "good stuff." Unexploded ordinance used for IED's are one thing, but high quality military grade explosives are a whole 'nother ballgame. It's an order of magnitude above the stuff that blew up the UN mission in Iraq or the federal building in Oklahoma City.

Read the damn story!

On Page 3 of the internet version:

"The remaining stockpile was no secret. Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the arms agency, frequently talked about it publicly as he investigated - in late 2002 and early 2003 - the Bush administration's claims that Iraq was secretly renewing its pursuit of nuclear arms. He ordered his weapons inspectors to conduct an inventory, and publicly reported their findings to the Security Council on Jan. 9, 2003.

During the following weeks, the I.A.E.A. repeatedly drew public attention to the explosives. In New York on Feb. 14, nine days after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell presented his arms case to the Security Council, Dr. ElBaradei reported that the agency had found no sign of new atom endeavors but "has continued to investigate the relocation and consumption of the high explosive HMX."

A European diplomat reported that Jacques Baute, head of the arms agency's Iraq nuclear inspection team, warned officials at the United States mission in Vienna about the danger of the nuclear sites and materials once under I.A.E.A. supervision, including Al Qaqaa.

But apparently, little was done. A senior Bush administration official said that during the initial race to Baghdad, American forces "went through the bunkers, but saw no materials bearing the I.A.E.A. seal." It is unclear whether troops ever returned. "

So, no IAEA seals were found, and the IAEA had already reported that the stuff was uncontrolled BEFORE the US invasion.

Where is the story here? That Iraq again violated its UN required agreements? That they, yet again, deserved to be invaded, and the Baathist government removed?

Al Qaqaa was one of their Dual use facilities. They used the complex to test the high explosives and to learn how to use Shape charges, which is as you stated a key to starting a nuclear explosion.

They stole 380 tons. It would take 380 Ford pickup trucks and 380 man-days of labor to steal this. This story is stupid

Maybe more US troops would help. Bush said he'll send them if the military asks. Kerry, however, will not send more troops. (link)

Or maybe those vaunted French soldiers (if they come) will do a better job of securing weapons bunkers. Maybe better than they did in Afghanistan.

This is yet another manufactured MSM attempt to do a hit job on Bush.

Actually, it's an old story...

The MSM is trying to do to Bush what they tried to do to Arnold in Calif: bring up old stuff and try to make it look bad for Bush...

Sloth -

They used the complex to test the high explosives and to learn how to use Shape charges, which is as you stated a key to starting a nuclear explosion.

I realize this, and I realize that's why the Times harps on it.

My point is, that doesn't mean any rube or terrorist that gets the explosives will know how to build the bomb. It's not like they are sitting around in empty bombs that are just waiting to drop in some uranium.

It's just explosives.

The significance of this story is that it is yet another instance of MSM liberal bias...

After the election, regardless of who wins, we need to mount an intelligent, organized effort to replace the MSM...let's drive them into the ground...

Bill: you are exactly right...the NYT is trying to somehow connect these conventional explosives with nuclear weapons in people's minds...

The bottom line is this: all nuclear weapons need some initial high intensity explosion to set them off...the intense heat is required to start the nuclear reaction...in fact, in fusion bombs the heat required is so high that a fission explosion is used to start the chain reaction...

So any powerful enough conventional explosive device can in theory be used to set off a nuke...but just having the conventional explosives does in no way get one any closer to having a nuclear bomb...

In other news:

Terrorists capture 100 tons of Silicon Dioxide and Chromium-doped ferrous material. "Just exactly what you'd want for the electronics and shell of a nuke!" says nuclear expert Kitty Kelley.

Nuts.

As a side note, the high yield shaped explosive jackets in fission weapons are designed to create overpressure and momentarily compress the payload to fissionable density. The heat is secondary in a fission bomb. In a fusion bomb, the shaped charge sets off the fission trigger which supplies the heat to initiate fusion.

For perspective here, the explosives in question would be useful in Oklahoma city or Beirut type of car bomb where a load of packed explosives is set off by something as simple as a stick of dynamite or hand grenade. High yield explosives designed for use in shaped charge experimentation are actually less useful for IEDs than it would appear. IED's are best served by use of stripped munitions that have fusing. IEDs are essentially munitions with the fuses wired into remote activators. Usually the casing for the payload is not even removed, just the fuse exposed.

The IEDs we see everyday are "Artillery Shells", not a lump of RDX or HMX. The article even implies that the munitions in questions "Could" have been removed before the war.

This is nothing more than the MSM hype in the closing days because sKerry is getting waxed, and they have yet to deliver the 15%.

My two cents...

Soldier in Iraq, not far from Al Qaqaa

Bill writes:

"[B]ut saw no materials bearing the I.A.E.A. seal." Did they see any "materials" that were later unguarded? The article is unclear."

Well, one thing the article IS clear about is the fact that satellite photos show destruction of some of the bunkers, so the estimates of materials "unaccounted for" could easily be vastly exaggerated.

What we have here is the new Iraqi government trying to bring itself back into the family of nations by cooperating with the IAEA, and being criticized for the inability to account for materials which the previous regime intentionally lied about.

This story will backfire on the MSM. The nation favors Bush's handling on terrorism almost 2:1. This story will not change anyone's mind, but may reinforce the idea that we need a powerful leader in the face of a dangerous world.

Josh Marshall has been writing about this. He quotes from "the Nelson Report." It doesn't seem to be available online, but Josh Marshall has some excerpts from the conclusion here:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2004_10_24.php#003777

A couple excerpts from the excerpts:
-------------------------------------------
That last, rueful crack refers to efforts by DOD to create the impression that the road side bombs are made from captured artillery shells; our sources say, “this is very unlikely. Taking a shell apart is incredibly dangerous and difficult, it has to be done by real experts, and we’d have seen more ‘accidental explosions’ if they were doing this on any scale. No...it’s the RDX and HMX doing most of the damage, you can bet on it.”
------------------------------------------------
-- another obvious question is what’s been done with the 350 tons, if anything, outside of Iraq? Our sources were unanimous in thinking that for reasons noted below, “it’s still in Iraq, and this is the most likely primary source of the explosives which have been used to blow up Humvees and in all the deadly car bomb attacks since the Occupation began.” Sources also discount any possibility except that “this was a highly organized operation using heavy equipment, and it was done right under our noses.”
---------------------------------------------

--Rick Taylor

The Status of Nuclear Inspections in Iraq
Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei
IAEA Director General
2/14/03
"The IAEA has continued to investigate the relocation and consumption of the high explosive HMX. As I reported earlier, Iraq has declared that 32 tonnes of the HMX previously under IAEA seal had been transferred for use in the production of industrial explosives, primarily to cement plants as a booster for explosives used in quarrying."

IAEA UPDATE REPORT FOR THE SECURITY COUNCIL PURSUANT TO RESOLUTION 1441 (2002)
1/27/03
"54. IAEA inspectors have been able to verify and re-seal the remaining balance of approximately 196 tonnes of HMX, most of which has remained at the original storage location. The movement of the blended HMX and the other small quantity of HMX has also been documented by Iraq. However, it has not been possible to verify the use of those materials, as all of it is said to have been consumed through explosions and there are no immediately available technical means for verifying such uses. The IAEA will continue to investigate means of verifying the Iraqi statements about the use of the HMX and blended HMX."

So I'm sure that the 190 tons that the IAEA didn't have on the books will be found to have been destroyed in the two bunkers that were destroyed by air strikes after the IAEA did their accounting.

http://www.iraqwatch.org/un/iaea/iaea-elbaradei-021403.htm
http://www.iraqwatch.org/un/iaea/iaea-updatereport-012703.html

This is such a non-story.

Does it bother anyone else that the NYT can print just about anything and dictate the news agenda for the day?

The NYT could write in suspicious language the fact that Bush ate cereal for breakfast, and the whole media world would be oohing and aahing about it, as if Bush did something wrong.

I'm tired of having the NYT try to choose our leaders for us...

By the way, part of what is troubling about this is that we are only finding about it now, a year and a half after the event. Even if we put the best light on things possible, assuming that the explosives went missing before the invasion (and I'm not sure why we should), why was it reported to the IAEA only now? This is especially damning, given that the IAEA was not allowed to inspect the sites. That makes us responsible for it.

Further quotes from the Nelson report are especially damning if true:
---------------------------------------------
Since the explosives went missing last year, sources say DOD and other elements in the Administration sought to block the IAEA from officially reporting the problem, and also tried to stop the new Iraqi Interim Government from cooperating with the IAEA.
----------------------------------------------
3. The Iraqi authorities were caught in a similar bind, observers feel. Under heavy pressure from their sponsors in DOD and US occupation authorities not to cooperate with the IAEA, by confirming that all 350 tons of sealed explosives could not be accounted for, the Iraqi’s had to wait until the formal turnover of authority before notifying the IAEA, sources here suggest. So the Iraqis failed to act until Oct. 10, and the IAEA did not formally notified the US, by letter, until Oct. 15, according to the State Department’s official press guidance.
----------------------------------------------

--Rick Taylor

Rick, there's a serious problem with this quote:

That last, rueful crack refers to efforts by DOD to create the impression that the road side bombs are made from captured artillery shells; our sources say, “this is very unlikely. Taking a shell apart is incredibly dangerous and difficult, it has to be done by real experts, and we’d have seen more ‘accidental explosions’ if they were doing this on any scale. No...it’s the RDX and HMX doing most of the damage, you can bet on it.”

Um, eyewitness accounts and the reports of demolitions crews that disarm the ones that don't explode say they're finding artillery shells as IEDs. Also, there HAVE been accidental explosions, and there HAVE been people caught looting ammo dumps looking for shells to dismantle. If this guy thinks there haven't been enough accidents, he may want to consider that the "insurgents" have received terrorist training that includes precisely this kind of operation -- rigging conventional weapons for terror use.

I remember reading, sometime in the last year, a blog entry or an article by a US soldier who was there when a couple of dozen people were arrested while looting an ammo dump.

I've never heard of this "Nelson Report", and don't trust Marshall farther than I can throw him, so I'd take all that with a block of salt.

...a nuclear chain reaction is basically initiated from shape charges of conventional explosives.

In a plutonium bomb. A uranium bomb (e.g. the Hiroshima bomb) can be made from a much simpler design. Of course, as you say, the problem is getting hold of the fissile material, not the explosives.

With regard to the memo from Iraq to the UN regarding missing explosives, I am puzzled by the following aspects.

The memo number and date are handwritten. Other than the signature and a handwritten notation in Arabic above the Iraq seal, the rest of the memo is typed. Why are the number and date handwritten? Was the memo prepared at one point, then later dated and numbered?

The year is not completely legible. I presume it says 2004 because that’s what the NYT article suggests. It is not clear though whether the year is 2003 or 2004. How would the NY Times know that he year was 2004?

The word “Date” is typed with a substantially larger font than the rest of the memo. That seems particularly strange.

The memo is addressed to International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna Austria. That seems a bit vague. Perhaps a specific addressee and a more specific address were on the envelope. Perhaps the memo was hand delivered directly Dr. El Baradei or another appropriate official at IAEA.

The memo says the material was stolen sometime after 9-4-2003. Does this suggest that the material was inspected on that date and was not missing then? Does this suggest that another inspection was made prior to the date of the memo and was found missing then?

The memo seems to know why the material was missing. The material was lost “due to theft and looting … due to lack of security.” Coupled with the previous observation, does this suggest that the 342 tons of high explosives were discovered, then left unguarded, then later checked to see if they were still there?

The memo says they “would like to inform” the IAEA that the material is missing. It does not say they “regret” to inform the IAEA, or they are “sorry” to inform the IAEA. Maybe this is too fine a nit to pick. Maybe this is just a language barrier issue.

The memo is signed by Dr. Mohammed J. Abbas, General Director of the Planning & Following Up Directorate. I get zero hits in Google for:
Dr. Mohammed J. Abbas
Mohammed J. Abbas
Mohammed Abbas + General Director of the Planning
Mohammed Abbas + General Director of Planning
Following Up Directorate

I get no seemingly relevant hits for
Dr. Mohammed Abbas + Iraq
Doctor Mohammed Abbas + Iraq

I get lots of hits for
Mohammed Abbas + Iraq

Mohammed Abbas is a common name. One reason for all the hits on the last search was Mohammed Abbas was the given name of Abu Abbas, the renowned terrorist harbored by Saddam. He was responsible for, among other attacks, the taking of the Achille Lauro and the murder of the wheelchair-bound Leon Klinghoffer.

I’m not saying that the author is not as advertised, and I am certainly not saying the author is a terrorist. (Abu Abbas died in US custody.) At this point however, we know nothing about the person who sent the memo, and we don’t know to whom it was sent.

The memo is stamped CONFIDENTIAL at the top. Who applied the stamp? It is similar to the confidential marking I recall from my time in the Air Force, but US military documents are marked both on top and bottom. Was this a copy obtained by the US then marked as classified? Is the mark consistent with a secure communication between Iraq and the UN? Why was the document marked at all? If it is classified, from where did the NY Times get its copy?

Maybe someone can help with these questions.

"By the way, part of what is troubling about this is that we are only finding about it now, a year and a half after the event. Even if we put the best light on things possible, assuming that the explosives went missing before the invasion (and I'm not sure why we should), why was it reported to the IAEA only now? "

I don't think it was just reported now. I remember there being discussions of this a few months ago. I think the is a recycled news story.

I just got my personalized email from Joe Lockhart with the points the Democrats think are important.

After being warned about the danger of major stockpiles of explosives in Iraq, this administration failed to guard those stockpiles. This is one of the great blunders of the Bush policy in Iraq. The administration has several key questions to answer:
Why did the administration ignore warnings from the IAEA to secure the nearly 380 tons of explosives in Iraq?

Did President Bush's failure to listen to General Shinseki and others about the troop levels that would be needed to secure Iraq after the initial military operations contribute to the military's inability to secure the site?

How many terrorist bombings in Iraq, Egypt or elsewhere have been carried out using HMX, RDX or PETN explosives since 2002?

Who knew what, when? When was the civilian leadership at the Pentagon told about the missing explosives? When did Secretary Rumsfeld learn that the explosives had gone missing? When was the president's National Security Council informed? When was national security advisor Condoleezza Rice briefed on this? When was the president told?

What is the chronology of action taken by the Bush administration after being informed that the explosives had gone missing?

Has the site been inspected recently?

Why did the Bush administration deny the IAEA's request to go back into Iraq to verify the status of the stockpile?

What action did Paul Bremer take after reportedly being warned in May 2004 that the explosives had gone missing?

In addition to the missing explosives and reports of machine tools that can be used for nuclear and non nuclear purposes, what other sites in Iraq with dangerous material were not adequately protected and subsequently looted?

Is there an estimate for the total amount of munitions, weapons and explosives that have gone missing in Iraq?

A recycled story? According to CNN:

The discovery was not made public sooner because standard intelligence practice is not to let enemies know such information, said a senior administration official.

Senior administration official Condoleezza Rice was only told about this last month. The American people found out about it yesterday. This could have been made public over a year ago -- don't blame the media.

Having read the story thoroughly a few times, it appears the stuff MIGHT have been gone when the US got there (more on that below).

However, even if the stuff was gone, we must ask ourselves WHEN did the administration knew it was gone.

The White House is claiming that Condi found out about this in September 2004.

How is it possible that she took this long to find out? If those explosives were gone when the US got there--their absence should have been discovered right away by US troops. It would be unimaginable for this not to have been discovered.

For that reason, I suspect that if they were gone, this was a case of the administration knowingly deceiving the IAEA and/or covering this fact up to avoid political embarrassment.

However, check this out:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6326367

"At the Pentagon, an official who monitors developments in Iraq said U.S.-led coalition troops had searched Al Qaqaa in the immediate aftermath of the March 2003 invasion and confirmed that the explosives were intact. Thereafter the site was not secured by U.S. forces, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity."

There are various times in military operations when you look at a horrible situation, shrug, and say, 'Oops'.

LEFTIE COMMENTERS:

(and everyone else)

Please see the post's update.

So the only difference here seems to be that the IAEA happened to be watching this batch of weapons, and they've made this whole fuss about a tiny part of a big and ongoing problem that the military is dealing with the best that it can. I doubt the MSM will be likely to clear that up as nicely since the Dems will be shouting about it as much as they can. The closer we get to the election the more I hate the whole thing.

Saw the update, Bill.

It is not clear whether the explosives were gone when the US invaded. I agree.

However, what is causing the Bush administration the real trouble is the fact that this is only becoming known now.

One should probably assume that the Bush administration found out about the absence of these weapons shortly after they disappeared.

The question then becomes why so much was done to prevent this information from getting to the IAEA. Why the coverup?

Let's get some links on IEDs.

From the must-read Billings Gazette, this AP story:

At the Pentagon, one senior Army officer who monitors progress against the insurgency said the 155mm artillery shells and other explosives used to arm the improvised bombs are so easily available that the supply cannot be stopped, even though ammunition dumps are under surveillance. The officer discussed the problem only on condition that he not be identified.

They also note that about 40% of IEDs are found before they are detonated, so if there was a huge amount of HMX being used, it has been a well-kept secret.

Here is more from Global Security, but with the same conclusion:

Enemy forces in Iraq have used the following TTPs when employing IEDs:

Using command-detonated devices, both hardwired and radio controlled.
Using mortar rounds, artillery projectiles, and other explosive-filled ordnance as the explosive device....

- This is another case of "time frame slippage" by the MSM and the Kerry camp is taking full advantage of "talking out of school" knowing there are certain area's of intel the admin doesn't want to make public for various stretegic reasons. But in this case I think it will be shot down fast. There must be some Iraqi's that have first hand knowledge about the stockpiles and I would expect some statements by the Defense department letting the air out of this one...

- This one was timed to offset the security counsil lie...Kerry's people have backed off the "full security counsil" statements and have lowered that to "members of the security council" and refuse to make any other statements. Probably the best thing to come out of that story is it will shut down the dumbass statements that Kerry's so willing to make. Once again he's trying to have it both ways. But everyone knows why he switched 180 degree's on the 87 billion vote because Dean was threatening to run away with the primaries....

- Knowing there was something greater than 600,000 tons of explosives when we first went in and that more than 400,000 tons has been destroyed, 380 tons is not that much comparitively...Probably most of the material that was stolen is now hidden in Mosques and other insurgent safe sites or has already been used in clashes with the coalition....

- This is another "float and grab" headline for the Kerry people to make hay on by the MSM... They're drolling at the idea of 4 years of total daily mayhem and fun with Teresa's mis-guided missle mouth in the White House...Headlines everyday and full journalistic employment....

COOKING GAS SHORTAGE

Many explosives can be safely, more or less, burned for cooking. Early in the war there was a shortage of cooking gas. I suspect that 25 million Iraqi's could burn up 380 tons of explosives in less than a month.

Another thing. As I understand these things, you don't need fancy ass explosives to trigger a nuclear reaction. You can do it with plain old TNT.

The chemical explosion is used to create the kinetic energy necessary to get the atoms moving around at high speed, IIRC.

Just one of Hussein's ammo dumps, just north of Baghdad, was over 3 square miles across. After the Republican Guard bugged out ahead of the US troops all that guarded it was a chain link fence; and the first thing the Iraqis did was steal the fence.

And there are dozens more just like this.

I'm kind of curious how anyone expects us to destroy all this HX. Ever see the movie Tremors II? The final special effect was rigging a truckload of high explosives to blow and Burt Gummer screaming at everyone to run because "It's gonna be BIG!" Go back and look at that scene some time: it's comprable to what would happen if you blew up a truckload of dynamite. There's close to 10,000 truckloads of explosives left over from the Hussein regime.

The trick to making an A-bomb is you not only have to slap the masses together fast, before they melt, but create a secondary pressure wave that HOLDS them together, in a molten state, for the few milliseconds before the atoms chain react.

If you used enough TNT to "take out a block" the mass vaporizes before the chain reaction takes place. So it doesn't take all that much dynamite; most of the weight of an A-bomb is actually the casing.

"..you don't need fancy ass explosives to trigger a nuclear reaction. You can do it with plain old TNT..."

Not unless it were shaped and confined so that it smashed two masses of fissionable material together, each with a near perfect mirror surface. Unshaped TNT would simply blow the fissionable material apart. You'd have a radioactive "dirty bomb" explosion, but not a nuclear reaction.

"The chemical explosion is used to create the kinetic energy necessary to get the atoms moving around at high speed, IIRC."

Close. Heat though, is not the issue. Density is. In fissionable material, there are constant reactions occurring where unstable atoms drop into a more stable state and emit high speed particles as a by product - radiation. The change in atomic state - radioactive decay essentially - is exothermic. It generates heat. Drives nuclear reactors. Radioactive decay at a high rate but not self sustaining. I believe that I read somewhere that most of the internal heat in the earth is due to radioactive decay. Anyway, the decay does not initiate and sustain a chain reaction due to simple density issues - the decay creates particles, but the space between atoms is big enough that most particles pass right out of the mass without impacting other nuclei, initiating their decay, and creating more particles. The shaped charge causes a momentary compression of the fissionable material along the impact point to the point where decay particles collide with nuclei at a high enough rate to initiate a csacade effect. The number of particles resulting from colissions in the compressed areas now cause a significant number of collisons in the uncompressed areas and you get a chain reaction - decay of all the fissionable material at once (or close enough to at once to make no difference to the casual observer).

Set up some bowling pins scattered around a dance floor. Roll balls across the floor. You will hit some pins now and again, but each collision is unlikely to cause a pin to hit and knock over another. It'll sometimes happen, but for the most part, you'd have to knock them down one by one - no chain reaction.

Toss a bowling ball down the alley to a ten pin setup. It hits a pin. There is not enough space between pins for that pin to leave the mass without hitting two others and they in turn each hit two others and if you hit the first one right, you get a strike.

Just putting too much fissionable material together in close proximity does not buy you a chain reacion. It simply melts due to the heat, but it's density still isn't enough in molten form to allow for a chain reaction. Think reactor meltdown. There is I imagine a molten mass of reactor fuel still under Chernobyl. Kept molten by it's own decay heat, but no danger of a chain reaction.

Amazingly enough there have been NO documented uses of the "missing" RDX and HDX explosives in Iraq. Mainly IED's are comprised of mortars and other types of munitions. If RDX or HDX were being used the explosions would be a damn sight larger that what's been going off.

Until they find positive proof that these munitions are being used I think there is a good posibility that what was left of them were driven away to Syria or Iran.

Saw a report at another Blog that NBC is reporting that this cache disappeared over 18 MONTHS ago - before troops even arrived! G.D. NYTimes! They are not even smart enough to try to hide their bias - they are finished!

Seems to me to be pretty simple, no matter how the Times story tried to spin it:

Coalition forces invade Iraq from Kuwait. In doing so, they move through al-Qaqaa, a known weapons site reported by the IAEA. They find the IAEA seals broken or missing, and the 380 tons gone. Clearly Bush's fault.

What's that? Something caught my eye. Bashar, are you passing tons of HMX explosives in class? Would you like to share with the rest of us?

Looks like NBC ruined the Times' "October Surprise".

Bill... Time for another Update!
Senator Kerry eats crow less than 12 hours after opening his mouth. If Kerry wins, he will be the 1st President to govern from the editorial page of the local paper. What jokes Kerry and Edwards are. Did you hear them today? Talk about over-reactionary.

So, has no one noticed that Joe Lockhart cited these missing high grade explosives as being a component of a nuke with which we could be threatened? Are he and the Kerry Campaign admitting to a serious WMD threat such as the one Cheney has been talking about?

Hugh McBryde

P.S. Sorry if someon mentioned it before and I didn't notice.

Drudge, Kerry Spot and Captain's Quarters are now all reporting that NBC News (which was in a position to know, having had a reporter embedded with the 101st Abn unit that captured that ammo dump in 4/03) has blown up, if you will excuse the pun, the NY Times story.

um...me wonders?

Now that Drudge has broke the embedded reporters story that the explosives WENT MISSING PRIOR to the LIBERATION,

you know, the explosives the times didn't bother to verify the truthfulNESS of, the same LARGE STOCKPILE KERRY said George Bush FAILED to SECURE...

me wonders...

if the lying about a one-on-one at the UN might just be a little more significant than most gave Bill credit for?

huh? huh?

If the weapons weren't there when we invaded, and we checked and found that they were not, how come the DOD and the WH just found out the past couple of weeks?

Well, the point is: Bush should have anticipated that these explosives had legs and could walk ... on their own. So he should have invaded sooner!

Ha.

Joe Lockhart was throwing garbage up in the air when asked about that.

Funny, though is, none of the news websites, incl MSNBC.com, are reporting this new "revelation" that the explosives were missing before invasion.

They owe it to CBS News to jump all over NY Times on this one!

I think I enjoy watching Joe Lockhart make a fool out of himself.

But, I'm keeping myself in check..waiting for the next shoe to drop.

Drudge?

Funny how people will accept his word without even pausing to wonder if it's true. Funny how there's no actual link stating this--just Matt's purely objective posting--and plenty of other material stating that the material disappeared after the US took over. But, to some, Drudge is the Bible for their faith-based world view.

Not accusing Bill of this--he's smarter than that. Others, though . . .

HUGE NEWS: A Fox News report links to an AP Press Report dated April 4th, 2003 that has US troops visiting Al Qa Qaa and finding thousands of vials of what they think are "explosives" but what they, at the time, hoped were chemical agents. Here's the report in its entirety:Closer to Baghdad, troops at Iraq's largest military industrial complex found nerve agent antidotes, documents describing chemical warfare and a white powder that appeared to be used for explosives.

U.N. weapons inspectors went repeatedly to the vast al Qa Qaa complex -- most recently on March 8 -- but found nothing during spot visits to some of the 1,100 buildings at the site 25 miles south of Baghdad.

Col. John Peabody, engineer brigade commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, said troops found thousands of 2-by-5-inch boxes, each containing three vials of white powder, together with documents written in Arabic that dealt with how to engage in chemical warfare.

Initial reports suggest the powder is an explosive, but tests are still being done, a senior U.S. official said. If confirmed, it would be consistent with what the Iraqis say is the plant's purpose, producing explosives and propellants.

According to U.N. weapons inspectors, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the Iraqis filled warheads and artillery shells with explosives at the site and manufactured bomb casings there. The activities, for conventional weaponry, were allowed under U.N. resolutions. But the resolutions, passed after the 1991 Gulf War, ban Iraq from possessing chemical, biological and nuclear weapons and the long-range missiles to deliver them.

Peabody told an Associated Press reporter that troops at al Qa Qaa also discovered atropine, used to counter the effects of nerve agents, and 2-PAM chloride, which is used in combination with atropine in case of chemical attack.

The presence of atropine, and the discovery of gas masks and chemical suits earlier in the war, could indicate Iraq was preparing to use chemical weapons.

For years, the al Qa Qaa site has raised the suspicions of weapons inspectors who believed the facilities could be converted for the production of missiles and chemical and nuclear weapons. It was visited repeatedly during the 1990s and during the last cycle of inspections -- between Nov. 27 and March 17 -- when U.N. experts went to the complex more than 10 times.

According to a British dossier on Iraq published last September, parts of al Qa Qaa's chemical complex, destroyed in 1991, were repaired and are now operational, including a production plant for the chemical weapon phosgene.

Nuclear inspectors believe an area of the complex was involved in designing an atomic bomb before Iraq's nuclear program was destroyed by U.N. teams after the 1991 Gulf War. The facility also made lenses and other components that can be used to trigger nuclear explosions.

In March 1990, customs officers at Heathrow Airport in London seized a case of capacitors -- components for triggers in nuclear weapons -- bound for al Qa Qaa that were especially designed for detonating nuclear warheads.

Inspectors had installed cameras and sensors around the complex after the Gulf War but the Iraqis dismantled the equipment when inspectors left in 1998. The U.N. inspectors who returned in November had planned to install new monitoring equipment but ran out of time.

Much is riding on the disarmament process.

The United States believes Iraq has chemical and biological weapons and a reviving nuclear weapons program.

But the Bush administration was unable to convince much of the world in the run-up to the war.

Countries including France and Russia blocked the United States from winning U.N. support for the war partly because they saw no proof that Iraq possessed such weapons. The chief weapons inspectors reported several times that they had found nothing to support the administration's claims.

So far, invading U.S. forces have not found chemical or biological weapons. Officials and former weapons inspectors have said discoveries were likely to be made closer to Baghdad. Several large facilities, such as al Qa Qaa, are within 50 miles of the capital.

"We believe that this regime does possess weapons of mass destruction, we remain convinced of that," U.S. Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks said Friday. He said some weapons may have been pulled into the Baghdad area, "either delivery systems, or, potentially, storage systems."

But a discovery far from the Iraqi capital was made Friday when troops in the western desert came across what they believe is a training center for nuclear, chemical and biological warfare, Brooks said.

One bottle found at the site was labeled "tabun" -- a nerve agent that the U.S. government says may have been used during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. There was no way to immediately confirm whether the substance was indeed tabun and soldiers found only a small amount, indicating the site was meant for training, not storing or deploying chemical weapons, Brooks said.

"In that particular site, we believe that was the only sample," he said. "That's why we believe it was a training site. Our conclusion is that this was not a (weapons of mass destruction) site ... it proved to be far less than that."

Photos of the site showed shelves of brown bottles with yellow labels. Brooks said troops did not understand some of the labels and were collecting the bottles for examination.

Iraq declared to U.N. inspectors the overall production of 3,859 tons of chemical weapons agents. According to Iraq's declarations, mustard, tabun and sarin were produced in large quantities. Iraq also admitted production of 3.9 tons of the deadly nerve agent VX.

Subsequently, inspectors destroyed 116 tons of tabun and more than 1,000 tons of ingredients for brewing up the nerve gas.

Iraq has repeatedly claimed that it destroyed its unconventional weapons programs after 1991. The claim was voiced again on April 1 by Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan. Referring to the gas masks and other chemical gear found by advancing coalition troops, he suggested U.S. forces were planning to plant evidence to implicate Iraq.

"Let me say one more time that Iraq is free of weapons of mass destruction," he said. "The aggressors may themselves intend to bring those materials to plant them here and say those are weapons of mass destruction."

This report is from the AP Wire and can be accessed via Lexis-Nexis.

Gotta eat some crow here. I just found the NBC video. No RDX or HMX found when the unit with the NBC embed was there.

The administration's comments have been all over the board on this--some saying that they may have disappeared after US troops were there. Plus, they're saying Condi was unaware they were missing until last month--which makes no sense if you think about it.

The descriptions of TNT are as a yellow crystalline solid/powder. While RDX and HMX are described as white crystalline...completely consistent with the initial AP report that PRE-DATES the supposed arrival of the NBC embed.

One question remains. In between the arrival of the first US units in or around April 4th and the arrival of this NBC embed on the 10th...was the place looted? What were the thousands of VIALS of white powder?

So - is the Administration line that:

"we didn't know about the explosives, so we didn't secure the site" or

"the explosives were gone when we got there, so we didn't need to secure the site" or

"mistakes happen in war, and you can't expect us to cover everything" or

"The explosives dump was a lower priority than other targets, so we made a rational decision to forego securing it"

I've heard all of these from various Administration officials and mouthpieces in the past few days. Which is it?

Also - were the thousands of glass vials explosives? If so, why were they left unsecured?

-Fe Wm.

Irond -

what are you talking about? The explosives were gone when they got there, specifically the ones that were marked for WMD programs and monitored by the IAEA. NOT the rest. 380 TONS.

So what seems to be the case is that the Iraqis moved them after the inspectors left and before or during the war.

This begs a larger philosophical argument about the left's belief that inspections were the way to go, but it all but demolished the credibility or novelty of teh NY Times' angle of attack.

See last update and ne post.

Rush Limbaugh hypothesised today that Kery had advance knowledge of the NYT canard based on the fact that he was talking about "unguarded ammo dumps" in the October 8 debate. That is strong circumstantial evidence, but no proof.

Here's the actual proof that Kerry knew: During the first debate on September 30, Kerry repeatedly talked about Bush's failure to guard "nuclear facilities".
Some had wondered back then what he meant by that. Now we know. Kerry had advance knowledge of this story, at least as far back as September 30.

I am more interested in the "markings" on the explosives. French, German, Russian, most likely. We probable moved all the stuff back home so we could look at it in detail to see how our UN friends are making things.

Just one comment about using artillery shells as roadside bombs. The assurtion that it is much to dangerous, and or complicated is contrary to our experience in Vietnam. The VC were very adept at doing exactly this using only hand tools and a campfire. Talk to some Vietnam Vets and i am sure you can get plenty of stories of exactly this same thing taking place.

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Just heard tonight that they will be releasing photos showing the weapons from the al-qaqaa site being destroyed. They claimed that at least 270 tons were destroyed from the facility and they have photos to prove it. Maybe Kerry should wait for evidence before quoting the NYT.

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