-Caveat Lector- http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2001/02/25/stifgnmid03001.html February 25 2001 MIDDLE EAST Defectors say Iraq tested nuclear bomb By Uzi Mahnaimi and Tom Walker DISTURBING new evidence has emerged about Saddam Hussein's nuclear arsenal as tension rises in the Middle East over an increasingly aggressive Iraq. According to two former senior scientists in the Iraqi nuclear programme - corroborated by a former aide to Saddam's son Uday - Iraq carried out a successful nuclear test before the Gulf war and now has a nuclear stockpile. The scientists describe in detail Iraq's nuclear programme. They say Saddam carried out a nuclear test in September 1989 deep beneath Lake Rezzaza, southwest of Baghdad. The blast was undetected because it was relatively small - about equal to the Hiroshima bomb - and muffled. Over the past decade, despite UN inspections, Saddam has carried out further tests and now has several bombs stored in a bunker under the Hamrin mountains north of Baghdad, they say. Their claims, which are reported in today's News Review section of The Sunday Times, challenge the consensus among the American, British and Israeli intelligence services that Saddam does not have sufficient enriched uranium or plutonium to fulfil his ambition of developing a nuclear bomb. Israel's prime minister-elect, Ariel Sharon, is expected to warn Colin Powell, the visiting American secretary of state, during talks today that the region may slide into war. Powell, who was in Egypt yesterday, urged Arab countries to join America in countering the threat posed by Saddam. Israeli military sources say that Sharon has ordered Shaul Mofaz, the chief of staff, to prepare the army for a pre-emptive attack on Iraq's missile launch zone, which is close to its border with Syria. Resurrecting and developing plans from the Gulf war, Sharon threatens to deploy tactical neutron bombs to "wipe out" the launch zone in the event that intelligence reports say a non-conventional weapons attack by Iraq is imminent, according to the sources. Sources close to Sharon say he will tell Powell that Israel would not sit still and wait for Iraqi missiles to rain down on its towns, as it did in the 1991 Gulf war in reponse to American requests for restraint. On Thursday Israel placed its forces on high missile alert after American intelligence warned about movements of Iraqi armoured divisions close to the border with Syria. American satellites also picked up preparations in the Iraqi long-range surface missiles brigade. Israeli air force planes took off opposite the Syrian coast. Almost at the same time, two American Awacs, four Hawkeye spy planes and 36 assorted American and British fighter aircraft took off from the Turkish base of Incirlik and from American carriers in the region. They ran into fierce anti- aircraft missile fire from batteries north of the Iraqi oil city of Mosul. The allied fighters blasted the Iraqi batteries in return but caused little damage. The next day, an Arabic- language Israeli newspaper published a warning from Baghdad that "Iraq is about to hit Israel" and "will liberate the occupied territories". An Israeli general, formerly assistant to an Israeli prime minister, told The Sunday Times: "It's hard to believe that Saddam will use non-conventional weapons against Israel, but we failed to predict his moves in the past and we may fail to do so in future." The principal source of the new evidence about Saddam's nuclear programme is a former military engineer, known as "Leone", who says he worked for a special scientific department of the Republican Palace in Baghdad, which supervised the development of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. His claim is corroborated by a scientist from another branch of the weapons programme and by Abbas al-Janabi, a former personal assistant to Uday Hussein. "A nuclear test was carried out in 1988 or 1989 in an underground site beside Lake Rezzaza," said Janabi, who claimed to have been in the test cavern before the explosion. Satellite images from 1989 show a huge tunnel at the site. Last month, another former engineer from the weapons programme, now in hiding, said Saddam had two "fully operational" nuclear bombs. Western intelligence officers who have heard Leone's claims say he is well informed, but they insist there is no evidence that Iraq could obtain sufficient enriched nuclear fuel. Leone and his corroborators say that the fuel was smuggled in from South Africa via Brazil. Gwynne Roberts, a film-maker who has investigated Leone's story, said: "Something very unusual happened on the shores of Lake Rezzaza prior to the Gulf war, which was completely missed by western intelligence agencies." ================================================================= Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT FROM THE DESK OF: *Michael Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends ================================================================= <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! 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