If Saddam Wasn't Seeking Nuclear Weapons?

Question

Why did we find enough Yellow Cake Uranium to build a nuclear bomb?

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/22/politics/22NUKE.html?ei=5007&en=32e4a82798061939&ex=1400558400&partner=USERLAND&pagewanted=print&position=

http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/11/12/103450.shtml

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/02/AR2007040201286.html

Also, why did a Senate Intelligence Committee have this to say about Joe Wilson?

"The panel found that Wilson's report, rather than debunking intelligence about purported uranium sales to Iraq, as he has said, bolstered the case for most intelligence analysts. And contrary to Wilson's assertions and even the government's previous statements, the CIA did not tell the White House it had qualms about the reliability of the Africa intelligence that made its way into 16 fateful words in President Bush's January 2003 State of the Union address.

The report states that a CIA official told the Senate committee that Plame "offered up" Wilson's name for the Niger trip, then on Feb. 12, 2002, sent a memo to a deputy chief in the CIA's Directorate of Operations saying her husband "has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity." The next day, the operations official cabled an overseas officer seeking concurrence with the idea of sending Wilson, the report said.

Wilson stood by his assertion in an interview yesterday, saying Plame was not the person who made the decision to send him. Of her memo, he said: "I don't see it as a recommendation to send me."

The report also said Wilson provided misleading information to The Washington Post last June. He said then that he concluded the Niger intelligence was based on documents that had clearly been forged because "the dates were wrong and the names were wrong."

"Committee staff asked how the former ambassador could have come to the conclusion that the 'dates were wrong and the names were wrong' when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports," the Senate panel said. Wilson told the panel he may have been confused and may have "misspoken" to reporters. The documents -- purported sales agreements between Niger and Iraq -- were not in U.S. hands until eight months after Wilson made his trip to Niger.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A39834-2004Jul9?language=printer

Isberry, read past the first link next time.

I quote from the second link:

:Though President Bush didn't mention it in his speech yesterday rebutting critics of his administration's use of intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, experts say that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled enough partially enriched uranium to produce at least one full-fledged nuclear bomb.

Commenting on Saddam's enriched uranium stash after the U.S. Energy Department removed it to Oak Ridge, Tenn., in June 2004, top physicist Ivan Oelrich told the Associated Press:

"[Saddam's] 1.95 tons of low-enriched uranium could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb."

Oelrich, a leading member of the Federation of American Scientists, is not alone in that assessment. "

Cont'd

Bryan Wilkes, a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration, told the New York Times that Saddam's partially enriched uranium "could have been further enriched to make it useful in a weapon."

After the U.S. removed Saddam's nuke fuel stockpile, interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi confirmed that it posed a great danger to the region's security interests.

"These materials, which are potential weapons of mass murder, are not welcome in our country and their production is unacceptable," Allawi told Agence France Press.

Even Saddam's 500-ton un-enriched uranium stockpile, which he stored at the same nuclear weapons research facility where inspectors found his partially enriched stash, posed a potential threat.

"You have a warehouse containing 500 tons of natural uranium," Dombey wrote. "You need 25 kilograms of U235 to build one weapon. How many nuclear weapons can you build?

"The answer is 142 [nuclear bombs]," he said.

~Edit~

I know it's a lot to ask, but please read all the links as they are different articles and different information. Please do all the homework before answering the questions.

A1A,
I am one of those soldiers. I have served over HERE for 4 years now.

Answer 1

He was its just the shills wont admit it!~!

Answer 2

The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program until it was largely shut down after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, holds more than 500 tons of uranium, none of it enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon.

Answer 3

We didn't invade because Saddam had weapons 20 years ago - he was claimed to have them in the present time and to be a threat to America. A LIE.
Read your own articles next time:

""The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program until it was largely shut down after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, holds more than 500 tons of uranium, none of it enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon.""

The second one is just some guy that is a "member" of a scientific organization saying Saddam had enough material to make a bomb.

The third is about the first gulf war again.
""Frans van Anraat, 64, is petitioning to overturn a 15-year prison sentence handed down in December 2005 for selling tons of chemicals made into mustard and nerve gas that was unleashed on Kurdish villages in northern Iraq in 1987-88 and against Iran during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.""

Answer 4

I am so fed up with the rehashing of what Sadaam did and didn't have.

Hey, we're in Iraq fighting a war now so what difference does it make? Were we told the truth or told a lie? I really don't know or care anymore. Just stop trying to prove things that really don't matter anymore.

Pray for the troops. That's the most important thing. Do you do that? If you are a veteran, are you praying for your fellow troops? If not, then start.

If you haven't been praying for your fellow men and women who are serving over there, shame on you. Their blood is on your hands.

Answer 5

He was but:

By the time I get to Phoenix she'll be rising
She'll find the note I left hangin' on her door
She'll laugh when she reads the part that says I'm leavin'
'Cause I've left that girl so many times before

By the time I make Albuquerque she'll be working
She'll prob'ly stop at lunch and give me a call
But she'll just hear that phone keep on ringin'
Off the wall that's all

By the time I make Oklahoma she'll be sleepin'
She'll turn softly and call my name out loud
And she'll cry just to think I'd really leave her
Tho' time and time I try to tell her so
She just didn't know I would really go.

Best Regards.

Answer 6

Thank you, Ronald Reagan! Still not a justification for war! Otherwise, you get to pack your bags and get ready for an extended conflict with North Korea, which HAS NUCLEAR WEAPONS. Sometimes, a humble foreign policy can solve the most complex problems. Otherwise, the cold war might have consumed us all. Good thing god gave us Gorbachev, because if it would have been Bush's buddy Putin, as Bush would say, "Nuculer mushroom clowd"!

Answer 7

"none of it enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon"

Do you have any idea how unbelievably difficult it is to refine non weapons grade uranium to weapons grade? Saddam couldn't do it. Period.

Ivan Oelrich was totally misquoted by NewsMax - no surprise since it's a republican rag. He said "if" the uranium was above 3-4% purity........... which it wasn't.

The rest of your assertions are just blabber.

Answer 8

Assuming your facts are true, I would say he probably was planning to build a nuclear bomb but was much further away from accomplishing it than some of our other enemies. However, it still does not change the fact that Iran and North Korea were the bigger threats. Saddam was isolated and contained by the no-fly zone and U.N. sanctions. While we invaded Iraq, this gave Iran and North Korea the time and courage to actually build nuclear weapons that really do exist. Because we are committed to operations in Iraq, they know that it will be much more difficult for us to threaten them with any sort of military action.

Answer 9

"The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program until it was ***largely shut down after the first Persian Gulf war in 1991***, holds more than 500 tons of uranium, *****none of it enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon*****."

"none of it enriched enough to be used directly in a nuclear weapon."

Did you not notice that part?

Answer 10

People forget that WMD's are not always nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. Many times a WMD is simply a scientist with access to a lab facility. Saddam had plenty of those. For all the "faults" with the war and how it is handled I don't see anyone worried about Saddam and his WMD's any more. No one - shocking.

Answer 11

Saddam also tried to get nukes another time when Israel bombed Iraq.

**Contrary to your position, it's legal for Israel to protect itself. Wasn't it rational and intelligent that during the Gulf war, when Saddam would get angry with the US, he'd bomb Israel? Your heros are thugs and murderers.