Bomb technology enters Iraq from Iran: general

Oct. 29, 2004

When I read last Sunday's New York Times story of the missing explosives from the Iraqi weapons storage facility south of Baghdad at Al Qaqaa, it brought back memories from my time with the Army National Guard's 223rd Military Intelligence Battalion in Iraq last year. Bad memories. In the Times story, Iraqi scientists who worked at Al Qaqaa described how the facility was looted of almost 400 tons of high explosives right after the American troops swept through the area in April 2003 and failed to secure the site.

But Al Qaqaa is not the whole story. The same month it was being looted, I learned of another major weapons and ammunition storage facility, near my battalion's base at Camp Anaconda, that was unguarded and targeted by looters. But despite my repeated warnings -- and those of other U.S. intelligence agents -- nothing was done to secure this facility, as it was systematically stripped of enough weapons and explosives to equip anti-U.S. insurgents with enough roadside improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, for years to come.

Link:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/10/29/anaconda/index_np.html


Al Qaqaa Weapons Cache

Al Qaqaa Weapons Cache

From dKosopedia, the free political encyclopedia.

On October 25, 2004 the New York Times reported here the disappearance of 380 tons (about 345 metric tons) of powerful conventional explosives from an Iraqi military facility south of Baghdad. According to the report, the national security adviser Condoleezza Rice had been informed within the preceding month about the disappearance. White House and Pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished sometime after the American-led invasion last year. (The New York Times, October 25, 2004, Huge Cache of Explosives Vanished From Site in Iraq)

The explosives are referred to as HMX High melting explosives and RDX cyclonite or hexogen. HMX and RDX are white powders in their pure form. (See section below on the explosives for more technical information and remarks on the meanings of he acronyms.)

Prior to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, the HMX had been sealed and tagged with the IAEA emblem while being stored at Al Qaqaa.

Iraq was permitted to keep some of its explosives for mining purposes after the IAEA completed its dismantling of Saddam's covert nuclear weapons program after the 1991 Gulf war.

According to Reuters <1>, diplomats at the IAEA in Vienna said the IAEA had warned the United States about the danger of the explosives before the war, and after the invasion it specifically told U.S. officials about the need to keep the them secured.

Link:

http://www.dkosopedia.com/index.php/Al_Qaqaa_Weapons_Cache